When
Tuesday, January 7th, 6pm-7:30pm UK timeWhere
Online via Zoom.Format
There'll be a great line-up of speakers plus ample scope for discussion and debate.Join us for a captivating evening with acclaimed author and journalist Diana B. Henriques, as she explores the fascinating intersection of financial history and reform through her bestselling works, including The Wizard of Lies, A First-Class Catastrophe, and her latest book, Taming the Street. From Bernie Madoff’s infamous Ponzi scheme to the 1987 market crash and Franklin Roosevelt’s battle to regulate Wall Street, Henriques offers unparalleled insights into the forces shaping modern finance and the enduring lessons for today.
About the books...
Who was Bernie Madoff, and how did he pull off the biggest Ponzi scheme in history?
This question has long fascinated people, about the New York financier who swindled his friends, relatives, and other investors out of $65 billion. And in The Wizard of Lies, Diana B. Henriques of the New York Times has written the definitive and bestselling account of the man and his scheme, drawing on unprecedented access and more than one hundred interviews, including Madoff’s first interviews for publication following his arrest. Henriques provides vivid details from the lawsuits and government investigations that explode the myths that have come to surround the story, and in a revised and expanded epilogue, she unravels the latest legal developments.
A true-life financial thriller—and now a major HBO film starring Robert De Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer—The Wizard of Lies contrasts Madoff’s remarkable rise on Wall Street with dramatic scenes from his accelerating slide toward self-destruction. It is also the most complete account of the heartbreaking personal disasters and landmark legal battles triggered by Madoff’s downfall—the suicides, business failures, fractured families, shuttered charities—and the clear lessons this timeless scandal offers to Washington, Wall Street, and Main Street.
Monday, October 19, 1987, was by far the worst day in Wall Street history. The market fell 22.6 percent – almost twice as bad as the worst day of 1929 – equal to a one-day loss of nearly 5,000 points today.
Black Monday was more than seven years in the making and threatened nearly every U.S. financial institution. Drawing on superlative archival research and dozens of original interviews Diana B. Henriques weaves a tale of missed opportunities, market delusions, and destructive actions that stretched from the “silver crisis” of 1980 to turf battles in Washington, a poisonous rivalry between the New York Stock Exchange and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and the almost-fatal success of two California professors whose idea for reducing market risk spun terribly out of control. As the story hurtles forward, the players struggle to forestall a looming market meltdown and unexpected heroes step in to avert total disaster.
For thirty years, investors, regulators, and bankers have failed to heed the lessons of 1987, even as the same patterns have resurfaced, most spectacularly in the financial crisis of 2008. A First-Class Catastrophe offers a new way of looking not only at the past, but at our financial future as well.
Taming the Street describes how President Franklin D. Roosevelt battled to regulate Wall Street in the wake of the 1929 stock market crash and the ensuing Great Depression.
With deep reporting and vivid storytelling, Diana B. Henriques takes readers back to a time when America’s financial landscape was a jungle ruled by the titans of vast wealth, largely unrestrained by government. Roosevelt ran for office in 1932 vowing to curb that ruthless capitalism and make the world of finance safer for ordinary savers and investors. His deeply personal campaign to tame the Street is one of the great untold dramas in American history.
Success in this political struggle was far from certain for FDR and his New Deal allies, who included the political dynasty builder Joseph P. Kennedy and the future Supreme Court justice William O. Douglas. Wall Street’s old guard, led by New York Stock Exchange president Richard Whitney, fought every new rule to the “last legal ditch.” That clash—between two sharply different visions of financial power and federal responsibility—has shaped how “other people’s money” is managed in the United States to this day.
As inequality once again reaches Jazz Age levels, Henriques brings to life a time when the system worked—an idealistic moment when ordinary Americans knew what had to be done and supported leaders who could do it. A vital history and a riveting true-life thriller, Taming the Street raises an urgent and troubling question: What does capitalism owe to the common good?
About the author...
DIANA B. HENRIQUES
Diana B. Henriques is a renowned financial journalist and bestselling author specialising in financial history and reform. A former senior writer at The New York Times, she has been a Pulitzer finalist and the recipient of numerous awards, including the Gerald Loeb Award and the George Polk Award. Henriques is the author of several acclaimed books, including The Wizard of Lies, adapted into an HBO film starring Robert De Niro, A First-Class Catastrophe, and her latest, Taming the Street. She serves on the boards of George Washington University and investigative journalism organisations.
