The Big Short

If anyone here is interested in how the sub prime mortgage mess actually occurred, they should read Michael Lewis' new book, "The Big Short".

He has written a readable, concise and very interesting account of how that financial mess came about, and which of the half dozen folks in America saw it coming. This is a book hard to put down. I read it in three days and could have read it in one if I hadn't been busy.

When the crash of the U. S. stock market became public knowledge in the fall of 2008, it was already old news. The real crash, the silent crash, had taken place over the previous year, in bizarre feeder markets where the sun doesn’t shine, and the SEC doesn’t dare, or bother, to tread: the bond and real estate derivative markets where geeks invent impenetrable securities to profit from the misery of lower- and middle-class Americans who can’t pay their debts. The smart people who understood what was or might be happening were paralyzed by hope and fear; in any case, they weren’t talking.

I highly recommend this book.