The Big Short

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine

Hardcover edition
Author Michael Lewis
Country United States
Language English
Genre Finance
Publisher W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date
 March 15, 2010
Media type Print (Hardback)
Pages 266 pp.
ISBN 0-393-07223-1
OCLC 567188407
LC Class HC106.83 L5 2010
Preceded by Home Game
Followed by Boomerang

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine is a non-fiction book by Michael Lewis about the build-up of the housing and credit bubble during the 2000s. The book was released on March 15, 2010 by W. W. Norton & Company. It spent 28 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list.

Summary

The Big Short describes several of the key players in the creation of the credit default swap market that sought to bet against the collateralized debt obligation (CDO) bubble and thus ended up profiting from the financial crisis of 2007–2010. The book also highlights the eccentric nature of the type of person who bets against the market or goes against the grain.

The work follows people who believed the bubble was going to burst, like Meredith Whitney, who predicted the demise of Citigroup and Bear Stearns; Steve Eisman, an outspoken hedge fund manager; Greg Lippmann, a Deutsche Bank trader; Eugene Xu, a quantitative analyst who created the first CDO market by matching buyers and sellers; the founders of Cornwall Capital, who started a hedge fund in their garage with $110,000 and built it into $120 million when the market crashed; and Dr. Michael Burry, an ex-neurologist who created Scion Capital despite suffering from blindness in one eye and Asperger's syndrome.[1]

The book also highlights some people involved in the biggest losses created by the market crash: like Merrill's $300 million mezzanine CDO manager Wing Chau; Howie Hubler, infamously known as the person who lost $9 billion in one trade, the largest single loss in history;[2] and Joseph Cassano's AIG Financial Products, which suffered over $99 billion in losses.[3]

Reception

The book was shortlisted for the 2010 Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award. It spent 28 weeks on the New York Times non-fiction bestseller list.[4]

It also received the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights 2011 Book award given annually to an author who "most faithfully and forcefully reflects Robert Kennedy's purposes – his concern for the poor and the powerless, his struggle for honest and even-handed justice, his conviction that a decent society must assure all young people a fair chance, and his faith that a free democracy can act to remedy disparities of power and opportunity."[5]

Film

Main article: The Big Short (film)

Paramount acquired the rights to The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine in 2013. On March, 2014, it was announced that Adam McKay would direct the adaptation.[6] On January 13, 2015, Variety reported that Brad Pitt, Christian Bale and Ryan Gosling were set to star in the film with Pitt producing the film along with McKay and Dede Gardner. Steve Carell will reportedly portray Steve Eisman in the film.[7] On March 23 following an interview Lewis had with CBS This Morning revealed Beyoncé had been added to the cast.[8] Plan B Entertainment will finance the film with Paramount handling the distribution rights. Production is set to start on March 23, 2015 [9] in New Orleans, LA.[10]

References

  1. ↑ Lewis, Michael, "Betting on the Blind Side", Vanity Fair (magazine), April 2010
  2. ↑ "Stories on Howie Hubler", The New York Observer
  3. ↑ "U.S. offers more funds to help fraught AIG: $30 billion more in loans; $61.7 billion lost in the fourth quarter", MSNBC, March 2, 2009.
  4. ↑ http://www.hawes.com/2010/2010-10-10.pdf
  5. ↑ "RFK Center Book Awards".
  6. ↑ Dave McNary (March 24, 2014). "‘Anchorman’s’ Adam McKay Boards Financial Drama". Variety. Retrieved January 14, 2015.
  7. ↑ Borys Kit (January 14, 2015). "Steve Carell in Talks to Join Christian Bale, Ryan Gosling in 'The Big Short'". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved January 14, 2015.
  8. ↑ http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/03/beyonce-the-big-short-brad-pitt-ryan-gosling-christian-bale. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  9. ↑ Justin Kroll (January 13, 2015). "Brad Pitt, Christian Bale and Ryan Gosling to Star in Financial Drama ‘The Big Short’ (EXCLUSIVE)". Variety. Retrieved January 14, 2015.
  10. ↑ "Brad Pitt Film "The Big Short" Casting Call in LA". Auditions Free. March 5, 2015. Retrieved March 6, 2015.

External links

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