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The shocking fall of Bear Stearns in March 2008 set off a wave of global financial turmoil that continues to ripple. How could one of the oldest, most resilient firms on Wall Street go so far astray that it had to be sold at a fire sale price? How could the guys who ran Bear so aggressively miscalculate so completely?
In this vivid and dramatic narrative, Kate Kelly takes us inside Bear's walls during its final, frenzied 72 hours as an independent firm. Expanding with fresh detail from her acclaimed front-page series in The Wall Street Journal, she captures every sight, sound, and smell of those three unbelievable days.
For decades, Bear had proudly recruited "PSDs" -- employees who were poor, smart, and had a deep desire to become rich. An elite family or Ivy League diploma didn't matter. Were you willing to do almost anything to make money for the firm? Were you tough enough to be a street fighter?
Bear's leaders were arrogant and didn't play nice. But their style had made them a fortune, and had helped Bear survive every crisis from the Great Depression to the dot-com bubble.
Yet as the subprime mortgage crisis began to brew, the firm's key executives descended into civil war. Kelly reveals fresh, never-before-told details about the moves that led to that brutal final weekend.
With a style as riveting as it is enlightening, Street Fighters is the definitive account of a once-great firm's demise, and the human folly that led to the worst financial crisis since the 1930s.
About the Author
KATE KELLY is a staff reporter for The Wall Street Journal and a former reporter for Time Magazine and the New York Observer. She attracted international attention for her three-part series of articles on Bear Stearns, which ran on the front pages of The Wall Street Journal in May 2008. This is her first book.
Given that we know what happens, Kelly's depiction of the end of Bear Stearns can have the feel of a high-class snuff film. As she spins out the behind-closed-doors machinations, it's hard to turn away from the images of egomaniacal, often bullying Wall Streeters getting their comeuppance…it's the narrative itself that's the star here, and the twists and turns of those frantic few days make for lively reading. Kelly…lived through the whole tale as a beat reporter; in the process, she clearly developed a real affection for many of the people she profiles.
| Price | Condition | Delivery | Seller | Action |
| $99.99 | Digital |
| WonderClub |
Richard Jones
reviewed Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street on May 28, 2009
Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street
Kind of a Cliff Notes version of William Cohan's book, House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street. But what I liked about it was that it was paced so fast that you are really able to get a sense of the urgency facing the main players at the doomed investment bank.
I think it was Joss Whedon that said about the The Civil War that the reason why we're so interested in The South is because they lost. No one cares about the victors in a struggle, it is the losers with whom we are most able to identify and as we see ourselves in them, we see that there is something fundamental in human nature that sometimes drives us to struggle in losing causes. Such is the case laid out in this book.
By chronicling the missteps that the major players in this story made, it becomes clear that despite their exorbitant lifestyles, outrageous salaries, and fundamental business culture of rough-and-tumble capitalism, the leaders at Bear Stears were all liable to making the same kind of mistakes that plague the tragic heroes of epic tales. And like the leaders of the South, they eventually have to stand aside while those who burned their cities come riding in to take over, impose their will and rebuild it all in a startlingly different manner.
I liked Cohan's book better because it got closer to the hearts and minds of the major players at the firm. By the time you finished reading it, you felt like you knew something about men like Jimmy Cayne, Warren Spector, Alan Schwartz, Ace Greenberg, etc. Whereas in this book, some of the characters pass by in a blur before you get to know them. But understanding that this book serves a different purpose. This is the book about the battle, not the back story of how they got to the battle. And Kate Kelly really gets the pace, the desperation and the ultimate capitulation of the losing side of the battle down in the pages.
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Add Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street, The acclaimed New York Times bestseller-updated for the second anniversary of the collapse of Bear Stearns The fall of Bear Stearns in March 2008 set off a wave of global financial turmoil that continues to ripple. How could one of the oldest, Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street to the inventory that you are selling on WonderClubX
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Add Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street, The acclaimed New York Times bestseller-updated for the second anniversary of the collapse of Bear Stearns The fall of Bear Stearns in March 2008 set off a wave of global financial turmoil that continues to ripple. How could one of the oldest, Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street to your collection on WonderClub |