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The Sellout
- How Three Decades of Wall Street Greed and Government Mismanagement Destroyed the Global Financial System
- Narrated by: Thomas M. Perkins
- Length: 21 hrs and 50 mins
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Publisher's summary
The ongoing tumult in financial markets and the global economy began when some of our most esteemed financial institutions, our government, and even average citizens abdicated their collective responsibilities, eventually selling out investors and selling off the American Dream itself.
From critically acclaimed investigative journalist and CNBC personality Charles Gasparino comes a sweeping examination of the most volatile, anxiety-ridden era in our nation's socioeconomic history. The winner of the 2009 Investigative Reporters and Editors Award for Books, The Sellout traces the recent implosion of the financial-services business back to its roots in the late 1970s, when Wall Street embraced a new business model predicated on enormous risk. Gasparino reveals a startling trail of culpability - from the government bureaucrats who crafted housing policies to the Wall Street firms that underwrote and invested in risky debt, to the mortgage sellers who indiscriminately handed out loans, and finally to the homeowners who thought they could afford mansions on blue-collar wages.
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Story
Jamie Dimon is Wall Street's biggest player. Following the 11h-hour rescue of Bear Stearns by JPMorgan, his profile has reached stratospheric levels. And while the deals and decisions he's made have usually turned out to be the right ones, his journey to the top of the financial world has been anything but easy. Now, in The House of Dimon, business writer Patricia Crisafulli goes behind the scenes to recount the amazing events that have shaped Dimon's career.
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Intriguing
- By Jean on 08-28-16
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Tap Dancing to Work
- Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966–2012: A Fortune Magazine Book
- By: Carol J. Loomis
- Narrated by: Susan Boyce, Barry Press
- Length: 17 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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When Carol Loomis first mentioned a little-known Omaha hedge-fund manager in a 1966 Fortune article, she didn’t dream that Warren Buffett would one day be considered the world’s greatest investor - nor that she and Buffett would become close personal friends. Now Loomis has collected and updated the best Buffett articles Fortune published between 1966 and 2012, including thirteen cover stories and a dozen pieces authored by Buffett himself. Loomis has provided commentary about each major article that supplies context and her own informed point of view.
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A collection of finance articles - not a biography
- By Gerardo A Dada on 08-23-13
By: Carol J. Loomis
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Borrowed Time
- Two Centuries of Booms, Busts, and Bailouts at Citi
- By: James Freeman, Vern McKinley
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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To save the economy and keep Citi afloat in 2008, the government provided huge infusions of cash through multiple bailouts that frustrated and angered the American public. But, as Wall Street Journal writer James Freeman and financial expert Vern McKinley reveal, the 2008 crisis was just one of many disasters Citi has experienced since its founding more than 200 years ago. In Borrowed Time they reveal Citi’s disturbing history of instability and government support. It’s a story that neither Citi nor Washington wants told.
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Biased
- By CF on 08-09-19
By: James Freeman, and others
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Why Wall Street Matters
- By: William D. Cohan
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 4 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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William D. Cohan is no knee-jerk advocate for Wall Street and the big banks. He's one of America's most respected financial journalists and the progressive best-selling author of House of Cards. He has long been critical of the bad behavior that plagued much of Wall Street in the years leading up to the 2008 financial crisis, and because he spent 17 years as an investment banker on Wall Street, he is an expert on its inner workings as well.
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An Inch Deep and A Mile Wide
- By Doug Sheridan on 04-26-17
By: William D. Cohan
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The Greatest Trade Ever
- The Behind-the-Scenes Story of How John Paulson Defied Wall Street and Made Financial History
- By: Gregory Zuckerman
- Narrated by: Marc Cashman
- Length: 11 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2006, hedge fund manager John Paulson realized something few others suspected - that the housing market and the value of subprime mortgages were grossly inflated and headed for a major fall. Paulson's background was in mergers and acquisitions, however, and he knew little about real estate or how to wager against housing. He had spent a career as an also-ran on Wall Street. But Paulson was convinced this was his chance to make his mark. He just wasn't sure how to do it. Colleagues at investment banks scoffed at him and investors dismissed him.
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Better Books Now Available
- By David on 05-02-11
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The Lost Bank
- The Story of Washington Mutual - The Biggest Bank Failure in American History
- By: Kirsten Grind
- Narrated by: Traber Burns
- Length: 14 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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During the most dizzying days of the financial crisis, Washington Mutual, a bank with hundreds of billions of dollars in its coffers, suffered a crippling bank run. The story of its final, brutal collapse in the autumn of 2008, and its controversial sale to JPMorgan Chase, is an astonishing account of how one bank lost itself to greed and mismanagement, and how the entire financial industry - and even the entire country - lost its way as well. Kirsten Grind’s The Lost Bank is a magisterial and gripping account of these events.
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Sad and Angry by Turn
- By Johnnie Walker on 07-24-12
By: Kirsten Grind
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Reckless Endangerment
- How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Led to Economic Armageddon
- By: Gretchen Morgenson, Joshua Rosner
- Narrated by: L. J. Ganser
- Length: 11 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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In Reckless Endangerment, Gretchen Morgenson, the star business columnist of The New York Times, exposes how the watchdogs who were supposed to protect the country from financial harm were actually complicit in the actions that finally blew up the American economy.
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Required reading
- By David on 10-24-11
By: Gretchen Morgenson, and others
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The Bank That Lived a Little
- Barclays in the Age of the Very Free Market
- By: Philip Augar
- Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
- Length: 15 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Based on unparalleled access to those involved, and told with compelling pace and drama, The Bank That Lived a Little is the story of one of the most familiar names on the British high street since Big Bang in 1986. Philip Augar describes in detail three decades of boardroom intrigue driven by ruthless ambition, grandiose dreams and a desire for wealth. It is a tale of a struggle for long-term supremacy between rival strategies and their adherents.
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Global superstar bankers under light-touch gov
- By Philo on 12-21-18
By: Philip Augar
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Hedgehogging
- By: Barton Biggs
- Narrated by: William Dufris
- Length: 3 hrs and 31 mins
- Abridged
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Rare is the opportunity to chat with a legendary figure and hear the unvarnished truth about what really goes on behind the scenes. Step inside the world of Wall Street with Barton Biggs as he discusses investing in general, hedge funds in particular, and how he has learned to find and profit from the best moneymaking opportunities in an eat-what-you-kill, cutthroat investment world.
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HedgeHotDogging
- By Bob on 10-01-06
By: Barton Biggs
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After the Music Stopped
- The Financial Crisis, the Response, and the Work Ahead
- By: Alan S. Blinder
- Narrated by: Graham Vick
- Length: 15 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Alan S. Blinder - esteemed Princeton professor, Wall Street Journal columnist, and former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board under Alan Greenspan - is one of our wisest and most clear-eyed economic thinkers. In After the Music Stopped, he delivers a masterful narrative of how the worst economic crisis in postwar American history happened, what the government did to fight it, and what we must do to recover from it.
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Irresponsible, corrupt, and confused book
- By Thomas on 12-22-14
By: Alan S. Blinder
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Too Good to Be True
- The Rise and Fall of Bernie Madoff
- By: Erin Arvedlund
- Narrated by: Karen White
- Length: 12 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Erin Arvedlund, the financial reporter who questioned the amazing returns of Bernie Madoff's hedge funds way back in 2001, traces the life of the infamous swindler and addresses the tough questions surrounding the collapse of his Ponzi scheme.
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Doesn't add much more that a lot of details.
- By Robert on 11-07-10
By: Erin Arvedlund
What listeners say about The Sellout
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Spencer Carter
- 07-03-16
Nails on a chalkboard
Literally, every third sentence had a mispronounced word. It was absolutely infuriating. It's pronounced Saul-oh-man Brothers, not Salmon Brothers!
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- Greg E Helfrich
- 01-09-12
Spellbinding!
Would you listen to The Sellout again? Why?
Excellent detail and structure laid out as a story, very well written.
What about Thomas M. Perkins’s performance did you like?
Great voice and enunciation.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Christopher
- 04-12-12
It takes effort to distill the "big picture"
In my opinion the book spends too much time profiling the personalities of those running the banks. No doubt their risk-taking and competitive personalities contributed to the near global meltdown. But that's just part of it. I wish there was more explanation of the system as a whole, more explanation of processes and terminology. The same concepts were repeatedly referred to in different terms. I found that confusing. The book would have been better with wider story arcs and wider perspective, and less focus on the day to day actions of individual players.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Scott
- 04-09-12
Comprehensive History of the Securities Collapse
What made the experience of listening to The Sellout the most enjoyable?
The author was thorough in his research tracing mortgage backed securities, which many of us might assume to be recent inventions, back to their beginnings several decades ago up and the invention of 'junk bonds' created to buy out, break up and sell off highly successful companies purely for profit. The author also describes the personalities of traders as compulsive gamblers and the myriad factors that led up to the great fiscal collapse requiring the major banks and investment banks need to be bailed out or sold out.
What did you like best about this story?
It's a real history with amazing personalities and a culture of greed so pervasive that it's amazing it lasted as long as it did.
If you could give The Sellout a new subtitle, what would it be?
or.. Greed Really Can be a Very Destructive Thing.
Any additional comments?
While lengthy the writer was able to hold my interest how well he describes the various individuals. It is an amazing bit of history and journalism.
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