The destruction of the system of revolutionary government eventually brought about the end of the 'Economic Terror'. "Maximum" was relaxed even before 9 Thermidor. Now virtually nobody believed in price controls any longer. Because the black market was plentifully supplied, the idea took hold that price controls equaled scarcity and that free trade, therefore, would bring back abundance. It was generally supposed by the free trade minded Physiocrat economists within France that prices would at first rise but that then they would fall as a result of competition. This illusion, however, was to be shattered in the winter of 1794–1795. Formally, the National Convention had put the end to the "maximum" as the season had started on the Christmas Eve of 4 Nivose Year III (24 December 1794).