This work will examines the decline of the British merchant bank during the 1980's and 90's. The story of Barings is commonly told, but Barings was just one of a significant number of British merchant banks which collapsed, were sold, or simply gave up. Only four now remain, and all of these survivors are independent of outside institutional shareholders. Phillip Augar takes us through the boom of the Thatcher years, the crash of 1987, the "Big Bang" and the impact of technology, and the aggressive invasion of the American banks. He looks at why the British banks failed to keep pace with these changes like their American counterparts, and what this says about the way they were run, and the way that companies in general are run. He also examines the issue of ownership and shareholding, which appear pertinent given that the four surviving British merchant banks are independent.
The Death of Gentlemanly Capitalism
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Philip Augar arrived in the City of London a callow graduate in the late 1970s, stunned by a world where jobs were casually offered over long and boozy lunches, where your school tie was more important than anything you knew about investment. A City whose "institutions and values reflected the pillars of conservative England: the public school, the gentleman's club and the country house". Twenty years later, having held key positions in London banks, and enjoying a salary of more than £1m a year, Augar was still troubled. He reveals an unreal world, where investment banks lost money for decades while amateurish bosses, raised in the cloistered and deferential realms of public school and National Service ran multi-million pound operations on a nod, wink and plenty of alcohol.
Centuries of tradition were coming to an end. With Big Bang in 1986 the banks pursued a lunatic course that led to meltdown just years later. Freed from regulatory limits and allowed to mix brokerage and merchant banking, as well as enter the global market, the Londoners' lack of control was their undoing. Salaries went crazy and, by the millennium, the English merchant banks that dominated the Stock Exchange were gone--bought, faded or, in the case of Barings, spectacularly imploded.
The Death of Gentlemanly Capitalism is a sad tale of British arrogance and complacency to rank with anything our motor industry can throw up. It's also a page-turning, stranger-than-fiction read, packed with larger than life characters, scandal, corruption and incompetence. Go to City boardrooms today--no longer in the Square Mile, but perched on the upper floors of Canary Wharf, and the trappings are still there. Augar relates with amusement a recent trip to Docklands, where an inventory of the boardroom reveals "two framed prints of English hunting scenes, one gilt-framed mirror, one antique side table, Regency striped curtains with drape ties". All fake of course. Behind the Regency curtains lie the walls of a 1990s office block, and behind the old school tie sits a foreign owner. --John Rennie --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
"The book is well founded on direct experience, consultancy and research, and it's also a good read." -- Gerald Haigh, Times Education Supplment, 12 July 2002
"This pleasing book, itself earthed in a recognisable reality, is an important wake-up call." -- Charles Handy, Management Today, August 2002
"a treasury of first-hand witness statements and personal reminiscence." -- Marcus Scriven, Evening Standard, 12 August 2002
"welcome and exciting." -- Simon Caulkin, The Observer, June 2002
"This pleasing book, itself earthed in a recognisable reality, is an important wake-up call." -- Charles Handy, Management Today, August 2002
"a treasury of first-hand witness statements and personal reminiscence." -- Marcus Scriven, Evening Standard, 12 August 2002
"welcome and exciting." -- Simon Caulkin, The Observer, June 2002
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
An insider's view of the City's takeover by American and European firms. Augar is very interesting on the different cultures of commmercial and investment banking, the failure of UK firms to adopt sophisticated management and the failure of the UK government to keep control of at least some of the major firms in British hands.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
As one who worked in the City during the period that Philip Augar describes (my own book, The City: Inside The Great Expectation Machine, comments on the decline of the British investment banks though in less detail) I can honestly say it struck many chords. The picture he paints is a vivid account of failure, the failure of the senior partners of broking firms and the senior management of banks to grasp fully what was happening and what needed to be done. The analysis in this book has implications beyond the narrow confines of the City of London. As well as being vital to the British economy, the City is a reflection of what is good - and what is bad - about the wider society. A good read, spiced with plenty of quotes and anecdotes.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
Despite tackling a subject that is potentially fascinating - how indeed did the British manage to pass control of almost all their investment banking institutions to foreign corporations in the space of a few years - this book fails to hit the mark.
Despite having worked for many years in the City, and thus having a greater affinity for the subject matter than some may do, and thus a higher boredom threshold, this is one of the few books I could not finish.
I think the reason is simple; while Philip Augar is indeed a very experienced and respected professional, his background is as a research analyst and this shines through the whole book. Pages and pages of tables and graphs, every comment backed up by a quotation from some source or other, cross referenced and dated in minute detail. It makes for an accurate work, but also a desparately uninteresting one, unless you want a reference manual.
What makes a full-length book "scan" is anecdotes and characters around facts (which don't need endless referencing), and I certainly don't find reams of tables in the least bit compelling reading. Indeed, it has all the attractions of reading a super-elongated piece of analyst research.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
2.0 out of 5 stars
What is this man trying to say ?
The author does not appear to have made up his mind about what the loss of "gentlemanly capitalism" means. Read more
Published on 28 Aug 2001 by "jamesrobertneilson"
3.0 out of 5 stars
A great piece of research, not so great read
Philip Augur was trained as an analyst, and it shows in this book. Having been intimately involved, he obviously has a detailed understanding of his subject. Read more
Published on 13 Jun 2001
5.0 out of 5 stars
A great read for those wishing to understand the city!
Philip Augar, a long respected figure in the city of London, describes the events that have shaped the city from the 1970's onwards......to the present day. Read more
Published on 28 Feb 2001 by vikas.krishan@accenture.com
5.0 out of 5 stars
What An Expose!
"The Death of Gentlemanly Capitalism" is a wonderfully penned, fascinating expose of the "secret" world of British bank management revealing the negative... Read more
Published on 1 Dec 2000
5.0 out of 5 stars
A fasinating insight into the truth.
This book should be the wake up call for the Government and the City of London, and an absoulte must for anyone who worked in the city during that period. Read more
Published on 21 Nov 2000
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