Dunbar charts the untold story of how investment banks invented new financial products, how investors across the world were wooed into buying them, and how speculators made a killing from the near-meltdown of the financial system.

Hailed as "the best business book of 2010" (Huffington Post), this New York Times bestseller about the 2008 financial crisis brings the devastation of the Great Recession to life. As soon as the financial crisis erupted, the finger-pointing began. Should the blame fall on Wall Street, Main Street, or Pennsylvania Avenue? On greedy traders, misguided regulators, sleazy subprime companies, cowardly legislators, or clueless home buyers? According to Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera, two of America's most acclaimed business journalists, many devils helped bring hell to the economy. All the Devils Are Here goes back several decades to weave the hidden history of the financial crisis in a way no previous book has done. It explores the motivations of everyone from famous CEOs, cabinet secretaries, and politicians to anonymous lenders, borrowers, analysts, and Wall Street traders. It delves into the powerful American mythology of homeownership. And it proves that the crisis ultimately wasn't about finance at all; it was about human nature. Just as McLean's The Smartest Guys in the Room was hailed as the best Enron book on a crowded shelf, so will All the Devils Are Here be remembered for finally making sense of the financial meltdown and its consequences.

As a corporate manager or executive, you probably have little contact with the actual day-to-day trading of derivatives contracts. Regardless, your oversight responsibilities place your career directly in the hands of aggressive derivatives traders. Do you really know what they're up to? DERIVATIVES is the first and only book written for the manager who is not a derivatives expert but is responsible for the experts. Concise, uncomplicated, and often entertaining, it gives you a basic understanding and appreciation for these complex yet powerful financial tools. DERIVATIVES isn't another "how to trade" book. Instead, it eschews technical jargon and mathematical formulae to show you "how to survive" when derivatives inevitably cross your professional path. Real life examples of derivatives disasters (Proctor & Gamble's 1994 loss of $102 million, Barings Bank's 1995 loss of $1.3 billion, and the Belgian government's 1997 loss of $1.2 billion) are accompanied by analyses of where they went wrong. Far from the daredevil, all-or-nothing reputation they are often given, derivatives are basically conservative hedging instruments designed to REDUCE risk. They allow organizations to pass the assumption of natural risks to speculators (who intend to profit from those risks). From simple agricultural futures to the latest versions of credit derivatives and swaps, DERIVATIVES will give you a basic appreciation of how derivatives operate and where the dangers lie. Look to this comprehensive yet easy-to-read overview for valuable information on: How to instinctively recognize different types of risk, and choose the instruments which best counteract each; Examination of the legal environment for derivatives, and how to protect your firm from potential liabilities; Strategies to structure your firm's checks and balances to keep pace with the changing structure of the derivatives business. While it may be the quants and traders who make the costly errors, it is the managers and executives who ultimately answer to the authoritiesÑnot to mention their stockholders. DERIVATIVES will help you safeguard your company from undue risk, provide you with a new level of comfort and understanding regarding these vibrant and valuable risk protection tools, and help ensure that your companyÑand careerÑwon't be the next cautionary tale splashed across financial pages worldwide. Derivatives can be both beneficial and devastating. DonÕt let yourself get burned! Derivatives will give you a step-by-step tour through the amazing benefits of derivativesÑas well as an overview of their hazardsÑand put you firmly in control of your corporation's risk control program.

This is the first book to deliver a total strategy for controlling derivatives risk. The strategy is integrated with the organization's wider systems, strategies and culture. Focusing on managing the future and not merely auditing the past, the book is designed to move risk management from a dead weight cost to a driver of value. The authors successfully integrate the key disciplines of finance, management and international law in a model for truly optimal risk control across the whole business

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 The creation of the mortgage-backed security allowed Wall Street to scoop up loans made to people who were buying homes, and then resell the bundle to investors. #2 The American Dream is synonymous with homeownership. Government policy has long encouraged homeownership, and it has been a statement about values as well as upward mobility. #3 Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were two important agents of government homeownership policy. They were both insulated from criticism. Fannie was born during the Great Depression, and its original role was to buy up mortgages that the Veterans Administration and the Federal Housing Administration were guaranteeing. #4 Wall Street developed securities that were much more appealing to investors than Ginnie Mae or Freddie Mac bonds. Tranching, or splitting the bond into different categories based on risk, was one method. The rating agencies became an important part of the process.

Why our addiction to debt caused the global financial crisis and is the root of our financial woes Adair Turner became chairman of Britain's Financial Services Authority just as the global financial crisis struck in 2008, and he played a leading role in redesigning global financial regulation. In this eye-opening book, he sets the record straight about what really caused the crisis. It didn’t happen because banks are too big to fail—our addiction to private debt is to blame. Between Debt and the Devil challenges the belief that we need credit growth to fuel economic growth, and that rising debt is okay as long as inflation remains low. In fact, most credit is not needed for economic growth—but it drives real estate booms and busts and leads to financial crisis and depression. Turner explains why public policy needs to manage the growth and allocation of credit creation, and why debt needs to be taxed as a form of economic pollution. Banks need far more capital, real estate lending must be restricted, and we need to tackle inequality and mitigate the relentless rise of real estate prices. Turner also debunks the big myth about fiat money—the erroneous notion that printing money will lead to harmful inflation. To escape the mess created by past policy errors, we sometimes need to monetize government debt and finance fiscal deficits with central-bank money. Between Debt and the Devil shows why we need to reject the assumptions that private credit is essential to growth and fiat money is inevitably dangerous. Each has its advantages, and each creates risks that public policy must consciously balance.

In The Social Life of Financial Derivatives Edward LiPuma theorizes the profound social dimensions of derivatives markets and the processes, rituals, and belief systems that drive them. In response to the 2008 financial crisis and drawing on his experience trading derivatives, LiPuma outlines how they function as complex devices that organize speculative capital as well as the ways derivative-driven capitalism not only produces the conditions for its own existence, but also penetrates the fabric of everyday life. Framing finance as a form of social life and highlighting the intrinsically social character of financial derivatives, LiPuma deepens our understanding of derivatives so that we may someday use them to serve the public well-being.