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The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine |  | Author: Michael Lewis
Publisher: Allen Lane
List Price: £25.00
Buy New: £11.49
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Rating:  34 reviews
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 288
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.1
ISBN: 1846142571
EAN: 9781846142574
Publication Date: March 15, 2010
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Tells a story of spectacular, epic folly. This book takes us around the globe and back decades to trace the origins of the crisis. It introduces the people who saw it coming, the people who were asleep at the wheel and the people who were actively driving us all of cliff.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 34
 strong on finance - weak on politics July 20, 2010
D. Kjerulf
as always, Lewis is faultless on the "how" of things: how did all this happen, who did what when etc.
but the "why" is weak. Lewis seems to have a party political agenda and therefore skirts the issue.
Entertaining reading, but keep your political antennae activated throughout!
 Lively inside report from the front lines of the fiscal breakdown July 19, 2010
Rolf Dobelli (Switzerland)
The global financial panic of 2008 stemmed from the collapse of the market for mortgage-backed bonds and collateralized debt obligations (CDOs). Executives at many major financial institutions were slow to recognize the true risk of interest-bearing securities backed by home mortgages. Yet some money managers not only predicted the collapse of the mortgage securities market but also profited from it. Best-selling author Michael Lewis writes a narrative that moves along like a novel. He profiles a handful of money managers who correctly forecast that an explosion of mortgage loan defaults would flatten the housing industry and slam U.S. economic growth. Though he focuses his engrossing narrative on these contrarian investors, Lewis also traces the roots of the 2008 crisis to original U.S. policy decisions in the 1980s that allowed major Wall Street firms to become publicly held - thus making the investment banks themselves objects of speculation and letting bankers gamble with their stockholders' investments. getAbstract recommends this compelling book to readers who want deeper insights into the U.S. financial system from the perspective of obscure money wranglers who bet against the subprime industry when few others would - and made a fortune.
 Good book - no Liar's Poker but what could be? July 12, 2010
Dr. B. C. Burrows (Bristol UK)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
See my review on too big too fail - if you are only going to read one book about the credit crunch and structure credit derivatives - make it this one. Good prose, interesting, unique angle.... good storytelling, may be too simple for the big maths boys but it does provide an interesting background to the events that unfolded, albeit not really from a big banks point of view
`What kind of people, in which parts of the country, exhibited the highest degree of financial irresponsibility?' July 12, 2010
J. Cameron-Smith (ACT, Australia)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
We are still living with the consequences of the global financial crisis of 2008. A sad story of losses and losers resulting from the construction and application of flawed mathematical models, untested assumptions and greed. Much has been written about the process of turning subprime mortgages into financial products which were then sold, after being accorded triple A (or equivalent) ratings by ratings agencies. Much is being spent by governments around the world to try to repair the damage. And, hopefully, changes are being made to try to ensure that such disasters are avoided in future.
In this book, Michael Lewis tells the stories of some of those people who analysed the market and saw the possibility that instruments created on the foundation of subprime mortgages could fall. In such circumstances, going short could reap a fortune.
So, how did these people know this? Were they prescient, or just lucky? Maybe both: together with the fact that they undertook some analysis of the subprime mortgages and realised that the facade was rotten. Who were these people? Mr Lewis writes about Steve Eisman and his team, who understood the US housing market and Wall Street. He writes of Michael Burry, who immersed himself in the bond market, and of the `garage band hedge fund' created by Jamie Mai and Charlie Ledley.
I found this book interesting because it sheds light on a different aspect of the crisis. Its discomforting to think that while some individuals undertook the analysis required to determine an opportunity for profit, the multiple entities involved in the subprime mortgage financial path (from lending money initially to manufacturing the financial products sold as a consequence) did not undertake appropriate risk analysis. And now, sadly, individuals and taxpayers are bearing the cost.
`Success was individual achievement; failure was a social problem.'
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
Brilliant book! Derivatives - Innovation or fodder for greed? July 11, 2010
Sandeep Potnis (UK)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is an amazing narration of the background of different actors and their differing actions during the ~5 years that lead up to the crisis. That the Stock market is a zero-sum game is made abundantly clear by Michael through many accounts of the two sides of deals involving sub-prime mortgages or some derivative thereof. Not surprisingly, in hindsight and leaving morality issues aside, those who won were the ones who shorted sub-prime mortgages and their acronym-veiled derivatives. Those long on these products lost and lost big and that included AIG! What surprised me most was the role played by rating agencies.
In a recent conference on Data analytics in London, a presenter mentioned that the use of data analytics would possibly have prevented the crisis. However, it is clear from this book that every type of actor used some or other form of analytics. Unfortunately, analytics can only help inform decisions but the decisions have to be taken by people. It wasn't the data or information or the technology that caused the crisis rather it was the misuse of that knowledge by those involved that caused the crisis. Even right, accurate and timely knowledge cannot prevent such actions taken by fools, crooks or opportunists
Showing reviews 1-5 of 34
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