Too Big to Fail [0]
TOO BIG TO FAIL
The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System from Crisis—and Themselves
Andrew Ross Sorkin
VIKING
VIKING
Published by the Penguin Group
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First published in 2009 by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Copyright © Andrew Ross Sorkin, 2009
All rights reserved
ISBN: 1-101-13480-1
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To my parents, Joan and Larry, and my loving wife, Pilar
Size, we are told, is not a crime. But size may, at least, become noxious by reason of the means through which it was attained or the uses to which it is put.
—Louis Brandeis, Other People’s Money: And How the Bankers Use It, 1913
CONTENTS
AUTHOR’S NOTE
THE CAST OF CHARACTERS AND THE COMPANIES THEY KEPT
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTES AND SOURCES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
AUTHOR’S NOTE
This book is the product of more than five hundred hours of interviews with more than two hundred individuals who participated directly in the events surrounding the financial crisis. These individuals include Wall Street chief executives, board members, management teams, current and former U.S. government officials, foreign government officials, bankers, lawyers, accountants, consultants, and other advisers. Many of these individuals shared documentary evidence, including contemporaneous notes, e-mails, tape recordings, internal presentations, draft filings, scripts, calendars, call logs, billing time sheets, and expense reports that provided the basis for much of the detail in this book. They also spent hours painstakingly recalling the conversations and details of various meetings, many of which were considered privileged and confidential.