Infectious Greed: How Deceit and Risk Corrupted the Financial Markets - Softcover

Partnoy, Frank

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0805075100 ISBN 13: 9780805075106

Publisher: Holt Paperbacks, 2004

Synopsis

“Readers are unlikely to find a more readable explanation of how the financial system has changed since the 1980s and who came unstuck.” —Financial Times

The still-unfolding financial story is terrifying. One by one, major corporations such as Enron, Global Crossing, and WorldCom are imploding all around us, prey to a greed-driven culture and dubious or illegal corporate finance and accounting. We have reached a perilous crossroads.

In a compelling and disturbing narrative, Frank Partnoy brings to bear all of his skills and experience as a securities attorney, financial analyst, and law professor to tell the story of the rise of the trading instruments and corporate financial structures that now imperil the economic health of the country. Starting in the mid-1980s, he documents how each new level of financial risk and complexity obscured the sickness of corporate America. Finally, Partnoy offers clear policies that can save our financial system.

About this title

About the Author

Frank Partnoy is a professor at the University of San Diego Law School. He has worked as an investment banker, derivatives broker, and corporate securities attorney. He also consults on regulation of the markets and white-collar crime. His expert testimony before the Senate committee investigating the Enron collapse has been widely cited in the media. Partnoy is the author of F.I.A.S.C.O.: Blood in the Water on Wall Street. He lives in San Diego, California.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

From Infectious Greed:

By 2002, the closing bell of the New York Stock Exchange was barely relevant, as securities traded 24 hours a day, around the world. The largest markets were private, and didn't involve regulated exchanges at all. Financial derivatives were as prevalent as stocks and bonds, and nearly as many assets and liabilities were off balance sheets as on. Companies' reported earnings were a fiction, and financial reports were chock full of disclosures that would shock the average investor if she ever even glanced at them, not that anyone—including financial journalists and analysts—ever did. Trading volatilities were sky high, with historically unrelated markets moving in lock step, increasing the risk of systemic collapse.

In just a few years, regulators had lost what limited control they had over market intermediaries, market intermediaries had lost what limited control they had over corporate managers, and corporate managers had lost what limited control they had over employees. This loss-of-control daisy chain had led to exponential risk-taking at many companies, largely hidden from public view. Simply put, the appearance of control in financial markets was a fiction.

Edition details

• Publisher: Holt Paperbacks
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0805075100
• ISBN 13: 9780805075106
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 496