Flash Crash: A Trading Savant, a Global Manhunt and the Most Mysterious Market Crash in History - Softcover

Vaughan, Liam

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0008270430 ISBN 13: 9780008270438

Publisher: William Collins, 2021

Synopsis

’Not just a readable, pacey account of an extraordinary individual and his quixotic quest … but also a troubling exposé of the fragility of our entire financial system … I loved it’
Oliver Bullough, author of Moneyland

For fans of Bad Blood and The Big Short, the story of how one reclusive trading prodigy manipulated Wall Street and amassed millions from his childhood bedroom – then short-circuited the global market.

A real-life financial thriller, Flash Crash gives panoramic insight into our economic landscape – its weaknesses, its crooks and its exploitable loopholes – and uncovers the remarkable, behind-the-scenes narrative of a mystifying market crash, a globe-spanning investigation into international fraud, and the man – Navinder Singh Sarao – at the centre of it all.

Depending on whom you ask, Sarao was a scourge, a symbol of a financial system run horribly amok, or a folk hero: an outsider who took on the tyranny of Wall Street and the high-frequency traders.

About this title

About the Author

Liam Vaughan is an award-winning investigative journalist and author with Bloomberg and Businessweek magazine.

From the Back Cover

For fans of Bad Blood and Flash Boys, the story of a trading prodigy who amassed $70 million from his childhood bedroom-until the US government accused him of helping trigger an unprecedented market collapse.

On May 6, 2010, financial markets around the world tumbled simultaneously and without warning. In the span of five minutes, a trillion dollars of valuation was lost. The Flash Crash, as it became known, represented the fastest drop in market history. When share values rebounded less than half an hour later, experts around the globe were left perplexed. What had they just witnessed?

Navinder Singh Sarao hardly seemed like a man who would shake the world's financial markets to their core. Raised in a working-class neighbourhood in West London, Nav was a preternaturally gifted trader who played the markets like a computer game. By the age of thirty, he had left behind London's trading arcades, working instead out of his childhood home. For years the money poured in. But when lightning-fast electronic traders infiltrated markets and started eating into his profits, Nav built a system of his own to fight back. It worked-until 2015, when the FBI arrived at his door. Depending on whom you ask, Sarao was a scourge, a symbol of a financial system run horribly amok, or a folk hero-an outsider who took on the tyranny of Wall Street and the high-frequency traders.

A real-life financial thriller, Flash Crash uncovers the remarkable, behind-the-scenes narrative of a mystifying market crash, a globe-spanning investigation into international fraud, and the man at the centre of them both.

Edition details

• Publisher: William Collins
• Publication date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0008270430
• ISBN 13: 9780008270438
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272