- Hardcover: 480 pages
- Publisher: Allen Lane (5 Mar 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1846141958
- ISBN-13: 978-1846141959
- Product Dimensions: 23.8 x 15.8 x 4.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 41,037 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
House of Cards: How Wall Street's Gamblers Broke Capitalism
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Review
You should personally dog-ear a copy of William Cohan's House of Cards ... the book is annoyingly hard to put down, especially thanks to its dishy, often profane, quotes from insiders. The book's galling takeaway: Bear Stearns earned billions setting the stage for the world to lose trillions. Read it, learn--and weep. --Business Week
Review
A riveting, blow-by-blow account ... Mr Cohan handles his material deftly, portraying Bear as symptomatic of an industry that had come to believe its own hype and had lost sight of how inherently unstable it really was. Bear's crash marked the moment when a delirious Wall Street was knocked to its senses.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
William D. Cohan, a journalist for the Financial Times and Fortune magazine and formerly an "investment" banker on Wall Street, has written an account of the financial company Bear Sterns from its inception to its demise during the initial stages of the recent financial crisis.
Cohans starts of his tale at the end with an account of the goings on as Bear Sterns attempted to stave of liquidation before going on to tell the story of it's inception and life, finally ending on where it began with the companies demise, as well as an ostensibly broader picture of the credit crunch kicking in.
Unfortunately Cohan is unable to transcend his background as an insider and financial journalist and makes little effort, not even a glossary, to describe the terms that he throws around the text with gay abandon, for those without a background in finance, or a working knowledge of the large lexicon of financial terminology. The impression is of someone who, in a manner of speaking, is in love (with perhaps a dash of hate) with the world of high finance (quite literally for the apparently dope smoking Bear Sterns CEO James Cayne) and has written a book primarily for insiders. The compensation package for the financially illiterate is a stirring narrative, of rich, hard working, foul mouthed and folksy bankers, studded with quotation after quotation from many of the main characters in the tragedy, or more likely farce, that makes up Bear Sterns life and death.
With regard to broader issues beyond the internal world of Bear Sterns and Wall Street Cohan is silent, or fairly asinine. The perspective is one that seems unable to step outside the collection of received wisdoms that make up the free-market mantras of Wall Street. Personally if I heard another CEO of a belly up banking company mouth platitudes about the fate of his employees, given the fate of the average American employee under Wall Streets regime, I was going to puke up.
A compelling enough read, but like many of the main personalities of the story, one that is essentially hollow and un-enlightening with the exception of what one can garner by reading between the lines. Personally I'll be looking elsewhere for the story of the credit crunch.
Cohans starts of his tale at the end with an account of the goings on as Bear Sterns attempted to stave of liquidation before going on to tell the story of it's inception and life, finally ending on where it began with the companies demise, as well as an ostensibly broader picture of the credit crunch kicking in.
Unfortunately Cohan is unable to transcend his background as an insider and financial journalist and makes little effort, not even a glossary, to describe the terms that he throws around the text with gay abandon, for those without a background in finance, or a working knowledge of the large lexicon of financial terminology. The impression is of someone who, in a manner of speaking, is in love (with perhaps a dash of hate) with the world of high finance (quite literally for the apparently dope smoking Bear Sterns CEO James Cayne) and has written a book primarily for insiders. The compensation package for the financially illiterate is a stirring narrative, of rich, hard working, foul mouthed and folksy bankers, studded with quotation after quotation from many of the main characters in the tragedy, or more likely farce, that makes up Bear Sterns life and death.
With regard to broader issues beyond the internal world of Bear Sterns and Wall Street Cohan is silent, or fairly asinine. The perspective is one that seems unable to step outside the collection of received wisdoms that make up the free-market mantras of Wall Street. Personally if I heard another CEO of a belly up banking company mouth platitudes about the fate of his employees, given the fate of the average American employee under Wall Streets regime, I was going to puke up.
A compelling enough read, but like many of the main personalities of the story, one that is essentially hollow and un-enlightening with the exception of what one can garner by reading between the lines. Personally I'll be looking elsewhere for the story of the credit crunch.
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In March 2008, when Bear Stearns was hurriedly pushed by the U.S. government into accepting a rescue act by J.P. Morgan Chase, many correctly thought it was the beginning of the end of investment banking as we know it. Lehman Brothers' collapse followed in September that year with Wall Street reeling, having believed in its own hype and covered wretched excesses for years. Bear Stearns' fall from grace typified the hubris writes William Cohan.
In a fast paced narrative, Cohan - a former banker himself - explains how the investment bank earned massive profits only to be trumped by even larger losses courtesy irresponsible investments. He articulates that Bear Stearns, though publicly listed since 1985, was a closeted and arrogant partnership of individuals fixated on profits. The architect of the "good years" and the spectacular fall which followed was Jimmy Cayne, its long serving CEO.
Cayne named by my former employers CNBC as one of the "Worst American CEOs of All Time" is classically described as by the author as a "Sophoclean tragic hero, ruined by his own terrible choices." He was the architect of Bear's over-exposure to mortgage backed securities (MBS) that became near impossible to sell as the US housing market first slowed and then started crashing.
Sums of capital invested and lost were staggering. Within a matter of days Bear Stearns went from a perceptively healthy corporate brand name to a dead corporation with severe doubts about its solvency. The story is there in this book with all the gory details.
It makes references to Jimmy Cayne's fixation on playing Championship Bridge and for lack of a better metaphor brands Bear's structure under his watch as a "House of Cards" that could and actually did come down with the slightest of headwinds. As its share price was tumbling from its perch of $170 towards $10 many of its management including Cayne grumbled that people could not separate fact from fiction. Many prudent observers, including the author, thought it was Bear's management holding that misleading notion.
For all this moaning and groaning, it is thought Cayne and co. were busy playing Bridge when two Bear Stearns hedge funds collapsed in July 2007, and again in March 2008 when their investment bank was driven in a state of near desperation to the arms of J.P. Morgan. These were the same management guys under whom Bear had been the only big Wall Street name that refused help to Long Term Capital Management (LTCM) - a hedge fund which ran into trouble in 1998. (See for example: When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management, By Roger Lowenstein)
Cayne's cardinal sin was the failure to diversify and an innate inability to take criticism from colleagues as well as external observers. Instead he pushed on with a strategy that sent Bear's balance-sheet swelling by as much as 45 times its equity. It banked on a relentless and aggressive push into complicated credit markets. Suspicions still exist on Wall Street that Cayne never really understood such complicated instruments but was blinded by the money.
The result, there for all to see, carries a much broader message writes the author. He opines that Bear's near ruin brought about a reality check on Wall Street. It was a moment that many professionals, including some at Bear, saw round the corner. I really enjoyed reading this book and would be happy to recommend it to anyone interested in the wheeling and dealing of toxic assets on Wall Street.
In a fast paced narrative, Cohan - a former banker himself - explains how the investment bank earned massive profits only to be trumped by even larger losses courtesy irresponsible investments. He articulates that Bear Stearns, though publicly listed since 1985, was a closeted and arrogant partnership of individuals fixated on profits. The architect of the "good years" and the spectacular fall which followed was Jimmy Cayne, its long serving CEO.
Cayne named by my former employers CNBC as one of the "Worst American CEOs of All Time" is classically described as by the author as a "Sophoclean tragic hero, ruined by his own terrible choices." He was the architect of Bear's over-exposure to mortgage backed securities (MBS) that became near impossible to sell as the US housing market first slowed and then started crashing.
Sums of capital invested and lost were staggering. Within a matter of days Bear Stearns went from a perceptively healthy corporate brand name to a dead corporation with severe doubts about its solvency. The story is there in this book with all the gory details.
It makes references to Jimmy Cayne's fixation on playing Championship Bridge and for lack of a better metaphor brands Bear's structure under his watch as a "House of Cards" that could and actually did come down with the slightest of headwinds. As its share price was tumbling from its perch of $170 towards $10 many of its management including Cayne grumbled that people could not separate fact from fiction. Many prudent observers, including the author, thought it was Bear's management holding that misleading notion.
For all this moaning and groaning, it is thought Cayne and co. were busy playing Bridge when two Bear Stearns hedge funds collapsed in July 2007, and again in March 2008 when their investment bank was driven in a state of near desperation to the arms of J.P. Morgan. These were the same management guys under whom Bear had been the only big Wall Street name that refused help to Long Term Capital Management (LTCM) - a hedge fund which ran into trouble in 1998. (See for example: When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management, By Roger Lowenstein)
Cayne's cardinal sin was the failure to diversify and an innate inability to take criticism from colleagues as well as external observers. Instead he pushed on with a strategy that sent Bear's balance-sheet swelling by as much as 45 times its equity. It banked on a relentless and aggressive push into complicated credit markets. Suspicions still exist on Wall Street that Cayne never really understood such complicated instruments but was blinded by the money.
The result, there for all to see, carries a much broader message writes the author. He opines that Bear's near ruin brought about a reality check on Wall Street. It was a moment that many professionals, including some at Bear, saw round the corner. I really enjoyed reading this book and would be happy to recommend it to anyone interested in the wheeling and dealing of toxic assets on Wall Street.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
As I read this excellent book, a quote from 'Gulliver's Travels' kept recurring - the response of the King of Brobdingnag to Gulliver's explanation of life back home: "the most pernicious race of odious little vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth".
If Dickens had written 'House of Cards', each and everyone of the ghastly parade of characters would have been described, warts and all. Cohan is no Dickens, of course, so the book would have been better with photos of its hideous protagonists so we, the innocent, could eye-ball the perpetrators.
What we have here is a fast-paced expose of all that went wrong at finance house Bear Stearns, and the aftermath of its dramatic collapse. Here is venality and avarice in biblical proportions, sums of money made and lost that are eye-watering, both for their size and the blase nature of their destruction.
If you're like me, a hard-working, cautious investor who pays his taxes and saves for retirement, then you'll read this with growing consternation and anger. It's good to do, if only to know where it went wrong and have someone to blame for an increasingly uncertain future.
It's written well, and clearly grounded on solid research, both attributed and anonymous. It beggars belief what has come to pass and we should all understand it, just to prevent it happening again.
The characters at the dark heart of 'House of Cards' are the enemies of capitalism, ruthlessly exploiting it for their own accumulation of wealth and self-aggrandisement by sucking value out the market, rather than adding value to it.
William Coham has done us all a great service by charting what went wrong. Just one plea for the paperback: tell us where they're all working now so we don't give them any more money.
If Dickens had written 'House of Cards', each and everyone of the ghastly parade of characters would have been described, warts and all. Cohan is no Dickens, of course, so the book would have been better with photos of its hideous protagonists so we, the innocent, could eye-ball the perpetrators.
What we have here is a fast-paced expose of all that went wrong at finance house Bear Stearns, and the aftermath of its dramatic collapse. Here is venality and avarice in biblical proportions, sums of money made and lost that are eye-watering, both for their size and the blase nature of their destruction.
If you're like me, a hard-working, cautious investor who pays his taxes and saves for retirement, then you'll read this with growing consternation and anger. It's good to do, if only to know where it went wrong and have someone to blame for an increasingly uncertain future.
It's written well, and clearly grounded on solid research, both attributed and anonymous. It beggars belief what has come to pass and we should all understand it, just to prevent it happening again.
The characters at the dark heart of 'House of Cards' are the enemies of capitalism, ruthlessly exploiting it for their own accumulation of wealth and self-aggrandisement by sucking value out the market, rather than adding value to it.
William Coham has done us all a great service by charting what went wrong. Just one plea for the paperback: tell us where they're all working now so we don't give them any more money.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
just about bear sterns
very disappointed as i was expecting a full story about the financial crisis, but this is only about bear sterns' fall. Read more
Published 2 months ago by max b
A House Of Cards indeed
This is the third book by William D. Cohan I have read. The other two were Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World and The Secret History of Lazard Freres & Co. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Thomas Koetzsch
House of Cards
An enjoyable read. Learning from men at the top of their game fall to the bottom within the space of a few months. I was gripped from the offing.
Published 15 months ago by Clive D Webb
Jaw-dropping!!
One of the most engrossing books I have read for a long time, this is Wall Street laid bare (if you pardon the pun). Read more
Published 17 months ago by F. G. Lelliott
How it all came tumbling down...
Wall Street has long been a source of fascination for me and many people. It's kind of frightening to think that the money you earn and spend, the money you invest in pensions and... Read more
Published on 5 April 2010 by J. Cronin
The end of Bear
As a former employee, it was a very interesting read about "what really happened"....especially when you thought you already knew....
Published on 22 Jan 2010 by AJ's mum
Both entertaing and informative
This book is a thorough, well researched chronicle of the events surrounding the collapse of the investment bank, Bear Stearns & Co. Read more
Published on 14 Jan 2010 by R. McCarthy
Fabulous story
Bear Stearns & Co. collapsed within a matter of 10 days. This book is the story of how it all happened. Read more
Published on 15 Nov 2009 by Mariusz Skonieczny
Inside saga of Bear Stearns' dazzling rise and dramatic, abrupt...
The 2008 collapse of leading Wall Street investment house Bear Stearns showed the world just how rickety the global financial system had become. William D. Read more
Published on 3 Aug 2009 by Rolf Dobelli
Very good book, but a little long.
I enjoyed this book and thought it provided a good insight into Bear Stearns' culture and history - as well as what caused their downfall. Read more
Published on 26 May 2009 by DF
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