During the period from 1492 to roughly 1800, the views of trade were different than today. Today economics classes focus on the mutual benefits of trade, in that each nation can buy goods for a lower cost than they can make them, and we can sell goods at a comparative advantage to make even more money.

At the time, trade was seen as mutually exclusive. This means that resources I import have now been lost as their potential to be imported by you. There was "trade", as in the transfer of goods and wealth from the colony to the homeland. However, each colonizing power essentially worked in autarky.

Enter the Dutch. The Netherlands were essentially a piece of the Spanish empire that broke away. It's a small, below sea level area that had little going for it. But access to the north sea allowed connections to be built overseas, and they realized they could profit from trade in both Europe and the world. They were one of the richest nations because they bought British wool and sold it to Europeans. Then their trade outposts (such as New Amsterdam, today NYC) continued to contribute.

The Spanish largely kept the transfer of goods internal to their empire. It's the modern equivalent of the cold war, little transfer of goods between the imperial powers. The Spanish didn't rely on other European nations for goods, and they believed that trading with them would only hurt their own ambitions within Europe.