Chasing Goldman Sachs: How the Masters of the Universe Melted Wall Street Down... and Why They'll Take Us to the Brink Again (精装) 0307460118

You know what happened during the financial crisis now it is time to understand why the financial system came so close to falling over the edge of the abyss and why it could happen again.Wall Street has been saved, but it hasnt been reformed. What is the problem? Suzanne McGee provides a penetrating look at the forces that transformed Wall Street from its traditional role as a capital-generating and economy-boosting engine into a behemoth operating with only its own short-term interests in mind and with reckless disregard for the broader financial system and those who relied on that system for their well being and prosperity. Primary among these influences was Goldman Sachs envy: the self-delusion on the part of Richard Fuld of Lehman Brothers, Stanley ONeil of Merrill Lynch, and other power brokers (egged on by their shareholders) that taking more risk would enable their companies to make even more money than Goldman Sachs. That hubrisand that narrow-minded focus on maximizing their short-term profitsled them to take extraordinary risks that they couldnt manage and that later severely damaged, and in some cases destroyed, their businesses, wreaking havoc on the nations economy and millions of 401(k)s in the process. In a world that boasted more hedge funds than Taco Bell outlets, McGee demonstrates how it became ever harder for Wall Street to fulfill its function as the financial systems version of a power grid, with capital, rather than electricity, flowing through it. But just as a power grid can be strained beyond its capacity, so too can a financial grid collapse if its functions are distorted, as happened with Wall Street as it became increasingly self-serving and motivated solely by short-term profits. Through probing analysis, meticulous research, and dozens of interviews with the bankers, traders, research analysts, and investment managers who have been on the front lines of financial booms and busts, McGee provides a practical understanding of our financial utility, and how it touches everyone directly as an investor and indirectly through the powercapitalthat makes the economy work. Wall Street is as important to the economy and the overall functioning of our society as our electric and water utilities. But it doesnt act that way. The financial system has been saved from destruction but as long as the mind-set of chasing Goldman Sachs lingers, it will not have been reformed. As banking undergoes its biggest transformation since the 1929 crash and the Great Depression, McGee shows where it stands today and points to where it needs to go next, examining the future of those financial institutions supposedly too big to fail. Business journalist McGee paints Wall Street as a utility with capital flowing through the system like an electric power grid, noting why it almost failed. She describes the pressure on the U.S. House of Representatives in 2008 to bail out Wall Street firms, why Wall Street was called an “abstraction,” and how Wall Street morphed from an intermediary (raising capital) into a casino. Goldman Sachs was the master of its universe, generating average return on equity of 25.4 percent in the decade before the financial crisis, compared with 15 percent annually for four other firms during the same period. Other firms' CEOs chased Goldman Sachs, considering it their model for boosting their own personal wealth and keeping shareholders happy. The author reports, “When left to their own devices, financial services firms . . . will focus almost monomaniacally on what is in their own best interest, seeking out ways to take earn sichigher returns and recruit top talent by paying the most lavish bonuses and offering the most enticing perks. . . . They cannot help themselves.” Excellent book. --Mary Whaley "...masterful...exceptionally lucid, well-written"--Washington Post must-read on the venerable Wall Street firm [Goldman Sachs]. Dow Jones FINS   A disturbing account of how Goldman Sachs Group Inc. became a seductively successful Pied Piper, luring rival banks down a path to destruction. Bloomberg   McGees book is full of entertaining and enlightening material. Financial Times     McGee has taken it upon herself to make the case less through assertion or argument than through anecdote and appeal to authority. New York Times Book Review   a great look at a current event for the general reader. Library Journal Excellent book. Booklist SUZANNE McGEE, is a contributing editor at Barrons. She has written about the financial markets for the New York Post, Institutional Investor, Portfolio.com,and the Financial Times and is a Loeb Award winner for a multimedia series on consumer culture in China. Earlier in her career she was a staff reporter for the Wall Street Journal.

出版社	CROWN PUB INC
作者	Suzanne McGee