Traders, Guns and Money: Knowns and Unknowns in the Dazzling World of Derivatives Revised Edition (Financial Times)

‘…a distinctly timely book ... Traders, Guns & Money tries to reach out to the mathematically challenged to explain how the world of derivatives “really” works.’

Gillian Tett, Financial Times

 

‘...a scalpel of a book that pulls back the skin on the derivatives and risk management industry to expose the blood, guts and circulatory system underneath…’

Nina Mehta, Financial Engineering News

 

 ‘... a beginner's guide to the often unsavoury and murky world of trading ... a surprisingly gripping account ...’

Money Week   

 

‘ ... more rivetting than The Da Vinci Code...in the mould of Liar's Poker...an insider's account of how derivatives markets work...’

Goola Warden, The Edge, Singapore

 

‘The sexier side of finance ... at last ... a convincing picture of what life is like in today's modern financial industry.’

Corporate Financier

 

‘…a page-turning quality more reminiscent of a John Grisham novel.’

JASSA, Finsia

 

 

Traders Guns & Money is a wickedly comic exposé of the culture, games and pure deceptions played out every day in trading rooms around the world. And played out with other people’s money.

 

A sensational insider’s view of the business of trading and marketing derivatives, this revised edition explains the frighteningly central role that derivatives and financial products played in the global financial crisis.

 

 

 

Traders Guns and Money is a wickedly comic exposé of the culture, games and pure deceptions played out every day in trading rooms around the world. And played out with other people’s money.

A sensational insider’s view of the business of trading and marketing derivatives, this revised edition explains the frighteningly central role that derivatives and financial products played in the global financial crisis.

This worldwide bestseller reveals the truth about derivatives: those financial tools memorably described by Warren Buffett as ‘financial weapons of mass destruction’. Traders, Guns and Money will introduce you to the players and the practices and reveals how the real money is made and lost.

The global financial crisis took almost everyone by surprise and even now new problems keep appearing and solutions continue to be elusive. In the original version of Traders, Guns and Money, Satyajit Das provided a highly prescient insight into the structure and risk of the world financial system exposing the problems that are becoming readily apparent. In a 2006 speech – The Coming Credit Crash – Das argued that: "an informed analysis … shows that risk is not better spread but more leveraged and (arguably) more concentrated…. This does not improve the overall stability and security of the financial system but exposes it to increased risk of a "crash".

Satyajit Das is a leading international authority in the area of financial derivatives and treasury management. He was the treasurer for the TNT Group on Australia for six years. Prior to this he worked in the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Citicorp Investment Bank and Merrill Lynch Capital Markets. He is the author of Swap Financing and has published widely on financial derivatives, corporate finance, treasury and risk management. He has presented seminars on financial derivatives and treasury management/corporate finance all over the world.

Prologue

 

Introduction to the paperback edition

 

1. Financial WMDs - derivatives demagoguery

 

2. Beautiful Lies - the 'sell' side      

 

3. True Lies - the 'buy' side

 

4. Show Me The Money - greed lost and regained

 

5. The Perfect Storm - risk mismanagement by the numbers

 

6. Super Models - derivatives algorithms

 

7. Games Without Frontiers - the inverse world of structured products

 

8. Share and Share Alike - derivative inequity

 

9. Credit Where Credit Is Due - fun with CDS and CDO

 

Afterword – Credit Crunch – The New Known Known of Financial Markets