The Zeroes: My Misadventures in the Decade Wall Street Went Insane

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The Zeroes: My Misadventures in the Decade Wall Street Went Insane Pub. Date: 8/30/2011 Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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The Zeroes: My Misadventures in the Decade Wall Street Went Insane Pub. Date: 6/29/2010 Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated

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Overview

"As eight sets of boxers slugged through the night, traders and bankers streamed toward Hammerstein, unfurling rolls of hundreds in hopes of charming the check-in girls and buying their way into the capacity event. Via text messages and cell phone calls, The Word had gone out: Wall Street was celebrating tonight.

"The past month had seen the Dow Jones Industrial Average surge past 14,000 points for the first time. These guys were making fortunes by creating securities more complicated than the Rosetta stone and also far more valuable. For these guys-my guys, for better or worse-all was right and just with the world.

"No one had yet developed a name for this era, this decade with the once-a-millennium calendar quirk of two zeroes perched in the middle. As I gazed across the room in front of me, 'the Zeroes' seemed fairly spot-on. Wall Street's breathless pursuit of zeroes, that easy-money mentality, had permeated every aspect of our culture. In my role as Wall Street's scorekeeper, I too had fallen prey to the mind warp.

"But I had no inkling that, when the figures were tallied at the end of 2009, there would be zero increase in household net worth for the decade. Zero net job creation. Zero median income growth. Zero stock market appreciation. Or that the global economy, imperiled by a group of collective zeroes, faced an imminent meltdown that would wipe out millions of people financially-myself included. Given my unique perch, perhaps I should have. But wealth and excess have a blinding effect, especially amid the kind of greedfest that comes along only once every thousand years."

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781591843290
Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
Publication date: 6/29/2010
Pages: 368
Sales rank: 1,159,270
Product dimensions: 5.60 (w) x 9.10 (h) x 1.40 (d)

Meet the Author

Randall Lane is a journalist and entrepreneur. As CEO and editor in chief of Doubledown Media, he founded or relaunched six magazines, including Trader Monthly, Dealmaker, and Private Air. A National Magazine Award finalist, he has written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Slate. He is currently editor at large at The Daily Beast. He lives in New York City.

Prologue 1

Part I Fever : 2001-2006

1 See It,Make It,Spend It (2001-2004) 9

2 Starmakers (2005) 37

3 The Jealousy Machine (2005) 59

4 Doubling Down (2005) 83

5 Dealmaker (2006) 106

Part 2 Mania: 2006-2008

6 We Want Your Money (Lace 2006-Mid-2007) 137

7 The Blank Check (2007) 161

8 Fight Night (Mid-2007-Late 2007) 186

9 Nails (Late 2007-Early 2008) 211

10 Maxed Out (Early 2008) 239

Part 3 Reckoning: 2008-2009

11 Leverage (Mid-2008) 265

12 The Party's Over (Late 2008-Early 2009) 296

13 See It, Spend It, End It (2009) 329

Afterword 343

Acknowledgments 347

Index 350

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Rob_Bob_H

Posted July 5, 2010

A Book for Everyone

This is a great book for everyone. You don't need to be an "insider" to enjoy "The Zeroes", and more importantly, you don't need to be an "insider" to absorb the lessons/warnings contained within "The Zeroes". While the book is cataloged under industries it is so much more than a "business book". This is a multi-layered book that has:

. Many shocking stories that read almost like one of Aesop Fables; a little incredible, a little funny and always entertaining. Lane's writing is upbeat, fun to read, a page turner. Some of the stories include people off Who's Who lists from all different areas of life; Al Gore, John McCain, John Travolta, Martha Stewart, Lenny Dykstra, T. Boone Pickens, etc..

. Some background information on how Wall Street works; investment banking, hedge funds, private equity.. This was informative and at the right level of detail for the Wall Street "outsider" to understand. Gives a better understanding of what is wrong (and what is right) with Wall Street. Highlights how the way people are incented/compensated can lead to incredible risky decisions that can cripple a company and possible an economy. And the scary thing, this isn't the illegal Bernie Madoff stuff, this is the everyday operating norm for Wall Street compensation. Scarier still, is that it very probably hasn't been fixed.

. A first person account of the "zeroes" from what I have to believe is one of the most unique perspectives ever to memorialize a specific period in Wall Street's history. Sure, there have been journalists to chronicle Wall Street stories, but I can't think of an author that was so specifically attuned to the excesses of Wall Street at a time when Wall Street was so flush with excess cash.

. A story of personal growth; the hurdles, the "successes", the "failures" and ultimately the remembrance that success and failure is defined from within and not by the outside even by Wall Street millionaires. Ultimately, this is a human story.

I hope this book catches lightning. It is a great read, but more importantly it explains what went wrong with Wall Street in layman's terms so everyone can understand. To me, this of great importance since as the saying goes (using some editorial license) "those that don't understand the past, are doomed to repeat it". I don't think we have a good understanding of went wrong with Wall Street and I have the feeling we haven't fixed it, so I hope this book will keep that debate going.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.
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Hawthorne2455

Posted July 7, 2010

Should Be A Movie

I'm shocked at the tales in this tell-all memoir -- colorful and frightful at the same time. Real insider stuff. I can see it unfolding in its awfulness, the way Randall Lane writes it. The best page turner I've had in a long, long time. The scenes are written as if you were there and the ones about Peter Max, John McCain and Lenny Dyskstra are especially vivid and colorful. In fact, so many people besides those on the Street are in here, in really personal ways. Even John Travolta and Martha Stewart!

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Anonymous

Posted June 30, 2010

regardless of the content

randall lane is a liar and a crook. that he should be speaking as an insider is a joke. he pretended to be a publisher - and stole other peoples magazines along the way. He bankrupted owing over 250 people money - many of which were magazine owners that he "bought" their magazines from and never had any intention of every paying. dont buy the book because it just lines the pockets of a crook.

0 out of 2 people found this review helpful.
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Anonymous

Posted July 16, 2010

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Posted June 29, 2010

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