Dot-com company

[6] With the creation of the World Wide Web in 1991, many companies began creating websites to sell their products.

[11] The same phenomenon occurred with many other internet companies—venture capitalists were eager to invest, even when the companies in question were not profitable.

In late 1999, the Nasdaq index reached a price-to-earnings ratio of over 200, more than double that of the Japanese asset price bubble at the beginning of the 1990s.

[15] Many such startups were formed to take advantage of the surplus of venture capital funding and were launched with thin business plans, sometimes with just an idea and a catchy name.

This selling frenzy further depressed the values of these stocks, and by 2002, estimated investor losses had reached an astounding $5 trillion.