Going Rogue. Big Banks, Murky Finance, and Reckless Trading

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Description

It wasn't a hostile takeover or a run on the bank that destroyed Barings, one of Britain's most solid financial institutions. All it took was Nick Leeson, a 20-something trader operating in Singapore, to burn through more than a billion dollars and bring the company down. Of course, that was in 1995. Today, with increased regulations and super-sophisticated monitoring systems, Leeson's transgressions would never be allowed to happen. Right? Wrong-as recently as the fall of 2011, a rogue trader was nabbed for gambling away 2.3 billion dollars at the giant European bank UBS. This program shows how such egregious offenses continue to plague the global financial system thanks to a pervasive culture of greed, risk addiction, and criminality. Interviews with Leeson and other industry insiders clearly illustrate the institutional problems while a trader-turned-neuroscientist discusses the psychology behind out-of-control investing.