Books
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In this extract from his new book, Countdown to Catastrophe, Spear’s economics editor Stephen Hill offers his vision of the course the financial crisis has left to run
Madness Under the Royal Palms
Life in Palm Beach, writes Laurence Leamer, ‘is like an elaborate costume party in which one can wear whatever outfit one wants as long as the mask never falls. For over a century, people have come to the exclusive community to reinvent themselves by cloaking themselves in the illusions of wealth. They often build second acts so unrelated to the first that their biographies are like two different lives mysteriously attached to each other.’
Lords of Finance
Too many financial history books lack pace, often mired by an overly scholastic approach. Liaquat Ahamed’s magisterial study is not only a compelling exception, but also perfectly-timed as we find ourselves living again in the shadows of a major financial crisis.
Nowhere Man
David Yarrow has taken his camera around the world and published the results in his book Nowhere. Here is a portfolio of his best shots
The King of Madison Avenue
Ogilvy gave his market what they wanted, and made himself an effective brand, a clear stand-out from the Organisation Men in their grey flannel suits and Brooks Brothers Boston Boxes. An advertising contemporary, getting it muddled, said Ogilvy was ‘practically a character out of Dickens’. Wrong century, wrong class, but you get the drift.
The Big Rich
In the 1950s Texas oil millionaires became the archetypal wealthy Americans, just as Greek shipping tycoons became the archetypal wealthy Europeans. In 1970s London it would be Arab oil sheikhs who came to dominate popular perceptions of the super-rich; in the 1990s it was Russian oligarchs. Presumably one day they shall go the way of the Texas oil millionaires.
Lord of Finance
Christopher Silvester meets Liaquat Ahamed, author of Lords of Finance, the winner of Spear’s Financial History of the Year award
Barbie and Ruth
Have you had it with Barbie? There’s been a lot of high-end Barbiana from the cultural studies/women’s studies crowd over the past twenty years or so. It’s mostly been about ‘representations’ of women and whether Barbie was a credit to the regiment — or seriously reactionary.
Fool's Gold
According to Gillian Tett in this fizzing account of the derivatives market over the past decade and a half, the root of our current problems can be dated back to a summer weekend in 1994 when the derivatives team of J.P. Morgan enjoyed a corporate retreat in Boca Raton, Florida.
The Match King
The Match King tells the remarkable story of a man who rose from obscurity to become one of the wealthiest men in existence with an empire spanning the globe, encompassing everything from mining, including the world’s third largest gold mine, banking, communications and real estate to the film business — all built on the back of safety matches.
Books
Boomerang: The Meltdown Tour
Michael Lewis
Kyle Bass, a Texas-based hedge-fund manager who did well out of shorting the sub-prime property market before the 2008 financial crisis, used to play the international strategy board game Risk as a kid, which led him to find out everything about a tiny country called Iceland, which was a key strategic location in the game
The Gentry: Stories of the English
Adam Nicolson
How delicious the notion of the gentry is. How beautifully it shades into every kind of 19th-century fraudulence, into Eric Hobsbawm’s Invention of Tradition. How easily it locks on to the much later and altogether more middle-class idea of the gentleman
Zahawi and Hancock on 'Masters of Nothing'
Anne McElvoy
The Wide Blue Yonder
A new breed of Tory MPs emerged from the 2010 general election, and already some are making their mark. Anne McElvoy looks at two of Cameron’s cabal
HNW Events
Spear's/Speechly Bircham Seminar: How to be a philanthropist in the 21st century
21 February 2012
Spear's Young Turk Awards 2012
01 April 2012
Spear's Design for Living Awards 2012
01 May 2012
Spear's Wealth Insight Forum 2012
19 September 2012
The Diary
Mark Hix
04 Jan 2012
Amanda Palmer
22 Nov 2011
Patrick Perrin
11 Oct 2011
Nicky Haslam
05 Aug 2011
Stephen Webster
06 Jul 2011