By: La Papillion
A few weeks ago, I was browsing books in the library as usual when two books caught my eyes – Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis and Confessions of a Wall street analyst by Dan Reingold. I thought it was good fortune that had me borrow both books at the same time, because reading these books one after another brought me to a level of insight that reading them individually would not bring.
Liar’s Poker is the more famous of the two. It talks about the story of a trader and bondsman who went through hell and came back ahead, dealing and wheeling in the pits of Salomon Brothers. I learnt more about the history of Salomon Brothers in this autobiography than I would have had I read it straight from a point by point, chronologically arranged sequence of events. It’s the story that stays after the facts faded from memory and the author weaves the story so tight and so engaging that it’s literally a page turner for me. Imagine this – a page turner for this genre of books!
It struck me that back in 1980s, these traders and bond salesman are paid to take enormous amount of risk, all backed by their clients’ money. The firm actually encouraged them to take such risk. A few hundred millions is small change for these people. It’s incredible to think that this insane amount of money just floats around waiting for Big Swinging Dicks to play around.
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