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Selling America Short
- The SEC and Market Contrarians in the Age of Absurdity
- Narrated by: Ken Kliban
- Length: 12 hrs and 48 mins
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Publisher's summary
system and the agencies who attempt to control it.
During his dozen years as an SEC attorney, author Richard Sauer opened and supervised some of its most notable financial cases-investigations that took him to a dozen countries and returned hundreds of millions of dollars to American investors. While a partner at a major law firm and, later, a hedge fund manager, he saw firsthand the follies and failures of our system. Now, in Selling America Short, he shares his extraordinary experiences with you.
Selling America Short is a gripping chronicle of crooked companies, financial philanderers and hapless enforcers told through the eyes of personal experience. Page by page, it shows the damage wrought by the deep biases and lack of worldly experience common among those who hold the reins of our capital markets.
- Sheds light on the inner workings of our financial system
- Takes you on a fascinating journey of a rogue's gallery of crooked executives, professional fraud enablers, and squirrelly technocrats
- Offers a firsthand account of the many ways contrarian views of public companies are suppressed and punished, depriving the market of critical information
With the capital markets in turmoil, people are fascinated with what is happening on Wall Street. This book provides a unique look at the forces and events that led directly to financial tragedy and continue to wreak havoc.
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Story
Instead of going where other journalists have gone in search of this story - the board rooms and trading floors of the big Wall Street firms - Scheer goes back to Washington, D.C., a veritable crime scene, beginning in the 1980s, where the captains of the finance industry, their lobbyists and allies among leading politicians destroyed an American regulatory system that had been functioning effectively since the era of the New Deal.
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A great telling of an unfortunate part of history
- By Trace on 10-27-20
By: Robert Scheer
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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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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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Detroit Resurrected
- To Bankruptcy and Back
- By: Nathan Bomey
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 9 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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From thriving Motor City to the largest municipal bankruptcy in American history, Detroit has become the nation's cautionary tale. But what led to the fateful day of the filing, and how did the city survive this crisis? Journalist Nathan Bomey delivers the inside story of Detroit's decline and the people who fought to save it against impossible odds: Governor Rick Snyder, a self-proclaimed nerd; emergency manager Kevyn Orr, a lawyer with singular dedication; Judge Steven Rhodes, the city's conscience; and retirees who fought to ensure that Detroit kept its promises.
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Outsiders Perspective
- By Carl on 02-07-17
By: Nathan Bomey
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When Genius Failed
- The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management
- By: Roger Lowenstein
- Narrated by: Roger Lowenstein
- Length: 9 hrs and 12 mins
- Abridged
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Roger Lowenstein, the bestselling author of Buffett, captures Long-Term's roller-coaster ride in gripping detail. Drawing on confidential internal memos and interviews with dozens of key players, Lowenstein crafts a story that reads like a first-rate thriller from beginning to end. He explains not just how the fund made and lost its money, but what it was about the personalities of Long-Term's partners, the arrogance of their mathematical certainties, and the late-nineties culture of Wall Street that made it all possible.
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When Genius Failed
- By Sean on 12-17-08
By: Roger Lowenstein
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Tangled Webs
- How False Statements are Undermining America: From Martha Stewart to Bernie Madoff
- By: James B. Stewart
- Narrated by: Michael Kramer
- Length: 19 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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In Tangled Webs, James B. Stewart reveals in vivid detail the consequences of the perjury epidemic that has swept our country, undermining the very foundation of our courts.With many prosecutors, investigators, and participants speaking for the first time, Tangled Webs goes behind the scene of the trials of media and homemaking entrepreneur Martha Stewart; top White House political adviser Lewis "Scooter" Libby; home-run king Barry Bonds; and Wall Street money manager Bernard Madoff. Tangled Webs reaffirms the importance of truth.
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in great detail
- By Andy on 06-22-11
By: James B. Stewart
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Overhaul
- An Insider's Account of the Obama Administration's Emergency Rescue of the Auto Industry
- By: Steven Rattner
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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This first real look inside Team Obama mixes political warfare and big-business shakeups in equal proportions, and comes from a uniquely informed source. Steve Rattner is not just the man brought in by the president to save the auto industry, he is a former New York Times financial reporter who also earned a place among the top tier of Wall Street's most informed investment bankers and corporate experts.
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Overhaul - A Memoir
- By Roy on 12-05-10
By: Steven Rattner
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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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Shaky Ground
- The Strange Saga of the US Mortgage Giants
- By: Bethany McLean
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 3 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2008 the US Treasury put Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into a life-support state known as "conservatorship" to prevent their failure - and worldwide economic chaos. The two companies, which were always controversial, have become a battleground. Today, Fannie and Freddie are profitable again but still in conservatorship. Their profits are being redirected toward reducing the federal deficit, which leaves them with no buffer should they suffer losses again.
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Details on the Culture and History of the GSEs
- By Jose on 10-15-15
By: Bethany McLean
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Good for the Money
- My Fight to Pay Back America
- By: Bob Benmosche
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 9 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2009, at the peak of the financial crisis, AIG - the American insurance behemoth - was sinking fast. It was the peg upon which the nation hung its ire and resentment during the financial crisis: the pinnacle of Wall Street arrogance and greed. When Bob Benmosche climbed aboard as CEO, it was widely assumed that he would go down with his ship. In mere months, he turned things around, pulling AIG from the brink of financial collapse and restoring its profitability.
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Worthwhile, informative, and just short of inspiring
- By Preston on 11-17-21
By: Bob Benmosche
What listeners say about Selling America Short
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Gilbert J. Bradshaw
- 01-20-11
Very detailed analysis of the financial system
This book was great if you are an investment banker or securities attorney. I guess if you are a sophisticated investor it would also be of interest. Sauer gives a good explanation of short-selling hedge funds and gives the best defense of short sellers that I have ever heard: that short sellers create a self-regulating environment for the markets.
I was always curious about what exactly happened with Overstock and the CEO's crusade against short sellers. This book went into extraordinary detail on the whole affair. It also gave me insight as to the realities of an investigation by the SEC and the internal processes and politics that occur in the SEC.
I thought this book was exciting and intellectually engaging. Usually I listen to books at 1.5-2.0 speed. This book was way too complicated to do that. That's not to say that it wasn't well-written. Sauer explains complicated ideas in a relatively simple and readable format, but it's not a light read.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Philo
- 10-21-11
A standout -- informative AND entertaining
For those who fancy tales of corporate fraud, dodgy accounting, international permutations of same, PR manipulators, foibles of regulators, weird judges, and such, this one goes to the top of the stack. The author, though an attorney, has a light nimble step of intelligence, great nimbleness and ease with words, ready humor, and is a great explainer of fairly complex things in plain English with relentless puckishness. I found myself smiling incessantly, and repeatedly laughing out loud. The reader was well-cast, matching his effervescently amused tone with the content. Being in legal and teaching fields, I admire this presentation and content.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Kyle
- 12-31-13
Inconclusive and Misnamed
There isn't really anything wrong with this book, but you can probably find a better use for your credit. Contrary to the title, short selling and market contrarians play a minor role in the book. Most of it is about the author's time as an SEC enforcement attorney, and the main problem with that is that the investigations this guy participated in are still going on, with no end in sight and no relevance to most of us. It was more appalled at the ineffectiveness of the SEC than excited at a whodunit story. Short selling and market contrarians only come in when short sellers pestered him to launch investigations into the issuers they had shorted, and when he left the SEC to work for a short selling hedge fund that eventually went under. If you're looking for something captivating like The Big Short (which I was) look further.
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1 person found this helpful