A review by mimig312
The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis

4.0

The Big Short explains the who, why, when and where of the subprime mortgage collaspe from three different perspectives. The author often provides more detail and background on other key players and backs up actual events with more back story to drive home the point of how crazy the whole thing was. The selling methods, bond packaging, and bond ratings are so convoluted its confusing to understand. Sadly, as the author notes, that was the point. The investors, insurance companies, CEOs, even the traders didn't truly get what the real risk was when they created and sold these risky assets. A few people did and shorted the market just in time.

I was in awe reading the book at times. The greed that drove some of the key players to create the bets that they did with billions of dollars astounds me. Left unchecked, greed made millions of loans that it shouldn't have which collapsed the housing market and subsequently Wall Street.