The first book of its kind; a thorough and entertaining examination of
hedge funds today
Mallaby's book may well be the most hilarious depiction of a big
organization and its controversial boss since Michael Lewis's
Liars' Poker- Financial Times
Wealthy, powerful, and potentially dangerous, hedge-find managers have emerged as the stars of
twenty-first century capitalism. Based on unprecedented access to the industry, More Money Than
God provides the first authoritative history of hedge funds. This is the inside story of their origins
in the 1960s and 1970s, their explosive battles with central banks in the 1980s and 1990s, and
finally their role in the financial crisis of 2007–9.Hedge funds reward risk takers, so they tend to
attract larger-than-life personalities. Jim Simons began life as a code-breaker and mathematician,
co-authoring a paper on theoretical geometry that led to breakthroughs in string theory. Ken
Griffin started out trading convertible bonds from his Harvard dorm room. Paul Tudor Jones
happily declared that a 1929-style crash would be ‘total rock-and-roll’ for him. Michael Steinhardt
was capable of reducing underlings to sobs. ‘All I want to do is kill myself,’ one said. ‘Can I watch?’
Steinhardt responded.A saga of riches and rich egos, this is also a history of discovery. Drawing on
insights from mathematics, economics and psychology to crack the mysteries of the market, hedge
funds have transformed the world, spawning new markets in exotic financial instruments and
rewriting the rules of capitalism. And while major banks, brokers, home lenders, insurers and
money market funds failed or were bailed out during the crisis of 2007–9, the hedge-fund industry
survived the test, proving that money can be successfully managed without taxpayer safety nets.
Anybody pondering fixes to the financial system could usefully start here: the future of finance lies
in the history of hedge funds.