Václav Havel: The 1st and Last Democratically Elected President of Czechoslovakia

Václav Havel was the first democratically elected president after the fall of communism on November 17, 1989.

Just 8 days after the fall of the Berlin Wall, a student protest flooded the streets of Prague to protest the Soviet government. Police tried to suppress the riot violently, but that only served to further antagonize the mob which grew from 200,000 at the outset to more than half a million people on November 20, 1989.

The protests continued throughout the month, and ultimately the Communists were forced out of power, ending 41 years of one-party rule in Czechoslovakia. Nearly a decade later, the newly christened Czech Republic would join NATO along with other former Soviet states Hungary and Poland.

Obviously, that hasn’t stopped Russia from trying to reassert dominance over its former client states. We’ve seen that with the ongoing war in Ukraine.

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Profit From the Past is a weekly series that examines historical events and the opportunity they provide to us today, usually in the stock market. Every Wednesday host Jason Simpkins will discuss a different historical event on (or around) its anniversary, and how it has created an investment opportunity for us today.