Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World - Hardcover

Cohan, William D.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 184614454X ISBN 13: 9781846144547

Publisher: Allen Lane, 2011

Synopsis

When, in late 2008, the dust finally started to settle on one of the worst financial crises in history, only one Wall Street institution still stood virtually unassailed - Goldman Sachs. Why did Goldman survive, and even flourish, when so many of its peers were collapsing around them? Were the Goldman professionals simply the 'smartest guys in the room', the elite of the elite? Or was there more at work than simply the magic of 'The Goldman Way'?

In Money and Power William D Cohan peers behind the curtain to give us the inside story of why Goldman is so profitable, and so powerful. His behind-the-scenes account shows how, buttressed by the most aggressive and sophisticated PR machine in the financial industry, Goldman Sachs has continually projected an image of being superior to its competitors - smarter, more collegial, more ethical, more client-focused. But Cohan also reveals another way of viewing Goldman - as a secretive money-making machine that has walked an uneasy line between conflict-of-interest and legitimate deal-making for decades; a firm that has assiduously cultivated power and exerted its influence over government (to the extent that Sidney Weinberg, who ran the firm for nearly forty years, advised presidents from Roosevelt to Kennedy and was nicknamed 'The Politician'); a company kept in line by former CIA operatives and private investigators; a workplace rife with brutal power struggles.

William Cohan is the first author to chronicle and to interview the leaders of Goldman Sachs since the 2008 crash, and has gained unprecedented access to the firm's inner circle. Every living former chief executive of Goldman Sachs has spoken to him, as well as its current chairman and CEO, Lloyd Blankfein. Money and Power is the most penetrating study yet of these larger-than-life characters and their secretive world: the definitive account of an institution whose public claims of virtue look very much like ruthlessness when exposed to the light of day.

About this title

Review:

Exhaustive, revelatory...engrossing...Cohan...is...a sympathetic listener, at his best once he has found a few people on the inside to pump for gossip....Such insights make Money and Power the most penetrating of the three major attempts to tell the Goldman story....Cohan revels in a good bust-up. (John Gapper Financial Times)

Cohan offers the most human portrayal of the firm yet...Seems destined to be a runaway bestseller. Such is the wonder of Goldman Sachs. (Ian McGugan Bloomberg Businessweek)

[An] imposing history...Cohan evinces an eye for telling images and an ear for deadpan quotations...brings the bank's sometimes "schizophrenic" behavior to vivid life. (James Pressley Bloomberg News)

[Cohan's] technique combines mastery of financial detail with extensive use of quotes to catch the authentic Wall Street voice... Cohan has done a comprehensive and highly professional job (Martin Vander Weyer Literary Review)

A rollercoaster account of how Goldman Sachs does business, and the best analysis yet of its increasingly tangled web of conflicts, by a master-storyteller (The Economist Books of the Year 2011)

From the Back Cover:

Praise for House of Cards

"Like Michael Lewis's 'Liar's Poker' and Bryan Burrough and John Helyar's 'Barbarians at the Gate,' this volume turns complex Wall Street maneuverings into high drama that is gripping .... [His] account of its death spiral not only makes for riveting, edge-of-the-seat reading, but it also stands as a chilling cautionary tale about how greed and hubris and high-risk gambling wrecked one company."--Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

“Fascinating.”--The Wall Street Journal

"A riveting blow-by-blow account." --The Economist

"Masterfully reported....[Cohan] has turned into one of our most able financial journalists....he deploys not only his hands-on experience of this exotic corner of the financial industry but also a remarkable gift for plain-spoken explanation... It's impossible to do justice to his reportorial detail in a brief review..." --Los Angeles Times
Praise for THE LAST TYCOONS

“Cohan's portrayal of the firm's dominant partners—whose gargantuan appetites and mercurial habits provide the unifying force behind the book's operatic melodramas— makes this an epic . . . In fact, The Last Tycoons bears a striking resemblance to F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Last Tycoon.”—New York Times Book Review

“Breezy and highly readable . . . For those of us who enjoy high-level gossip (most people) and an inside look at the machinations, triumphs, failures, and foibles of some of Wall Street's and America's most exalted personages, Cohan's book is entertaining and seductively engrossing.”—Chicago Tribune

“Cohan not only knows where the bodies are buried but got a guided tour of the graveyard.”—Financial Times

“Rips the roof off of one of Wall Street's most storied investment banks.”—Vanity Fair

About this edition

• Publisher: Allen Lane
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 184614454X
• ISBN 13: 9781846144547
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 672