Abstract (EN)

I analyze the discourses, investment behaviors and presentations of themselves of financial practitioners (mutual funds, investment companies) during the 1960s and focus on their negative reception of the concepts introduced by financial economics. These practitioners described diversification as “un-american”, arguing that it would undermine the individual responsibility of the investment decision maker, place the market above all and deny the free will. I explore the context, conditions and actors of this battle which opposed conflicting conceptions of investing, competing actors and antagonistic representations of the figure of the modern investor.