Economics Archives

Barbarians at the Gate: Book Overview and Takeaways

What is the book Barbarians at the Gate about? What was the biggest leveraged buyout in history? In their book Barbarians at the Gate, Bryan Burrough and John Helyar detail the 1988 leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco, which is the biggest business transaction of the 20th century. The high value of the transaction, as well as the unusually competitive bidding in the LBO process, caught the attention of the press. Read below for a brief Barbarians at the Gate book overview.

What Is an LBO? The Takeover of a Company, Explained

What is an LBO? Are LBOs considered hostile in the business industry? A leveraged buyout (LBO) is when a group of executives makes a company private by buying all of the company’s stock. There’s still much debate on whether a leveraged buy-out is considered a hostile takeover of a company. Read more about LBOs, according to Barbarians at the Gate by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar.

Jim Simons and Mathematics: A Passion-Turned-Career

Where did Jim Simons’s love for mathematics come from? How did he turn his childhood passion into a groundbreaking career? For Jim Simons, mathematics is everything. According to The Man Who Solved the Market by Gregory Zuckerman, Simons thought equations and theorems would be the answer to the universe’s biggest mysteries. Keep reading to learn more about Simons’s passion for mathematics.

Black Monday: The Stock Market Crash That Shook the World

What was the Black Monday stock market crash? How did the market suffer from this day? In Liar’s Poker, Michael Lewis writes about the day the financial world felt a shock unmatched since the Great Depression. On Monday, October 19, 1987, the global stock market crashed, wiping out trillions of dollars in investments. Learn more about Black Monday and how the investment bank Salomon Brothers and Lewis attempted to recover from the crash.

The Rescue of Salomon Brothers: Warren Buffett’s Plan

How did Warren Buffett help Salomon Brothers out of a hostile takeover? Why was the investment bank in danger to begin with? In 1987, Ron Perelman and Michael Milken conspired together to take over Salomon Brothers at its most vulnerable time. But with a large loan provided by Warren Buffett, Salomon Brothers managed to avoid the nasty bid. Keep reading to learn more about the heroic rescue by Warren Buffett and Salomon Brothers’ swift recovery.

Jim Simons’s Career: From Soviet Codes to Stock Trend Patterns

How did Jim Simons first identify stock trend patterns that changed the market forever? What did Simons do as a codebreaker? Jim Simons is known for his work as a mathematician who identified recognizable and consistent patterns in the financial market. But what some people might not know is that he started out decoding Soviet messages and signals during the Cold War. Discover more about how a codebreaker used his work to identify stock trend patterns.

Liar’s Poker: Quotes About Wall Street’s Tricky Game

What are the best Liar’s Poker quotes that detail the wealth-chasing culture of the 1980s? What does the book say about ethics in investing? In Liar’s Poker, Michael Lewis discusses the events that led to a boom in the bond market around 1980. Additionally, he details how the Salomon Brothers investment firm was ideally poised to make the most of that market, and what the internal culture of Salomon was like. Below are quotes from Liar’s Poker that share all you need to know about the book.

The History of Jim Simons’s Renaissance Hedge Fund

When was the Renaissance hedge fund launched? How did Jim Simons attract mathematicians and investors to the fund? After careers in codebreaking and academia, Jim Simons turned to a life of finance in 1978. He launched Monometrics in the same year, which was later renamed Renaissance. Learn more about Simons’s journey to the successful Renaissance hedge fund.

What It Was Like Being a Bond Trader for Salomon Brothers

How hard was it being a bond trader in the 1980s? How did Salomon Brothers take over Wall Street? Salomon Brothers investment bank was founded in 1910 by Arthur, Herbert, and Percy Salomon. It wasn’t until the 1980s that the firm found its niche within the growing bond market. Keep reading to learn how the Salomon Brothers controlled the bond market, according to Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis.

How Jim Simons’s Trading Strategy Changed the Market

What is Jim Simons’s trading strategy? Why did his strategy take off in the 1990s and 2000s? Jim Simons’s trading strategy was so unique that it made him one of the best money managers in modern financial history. It focused on buying or selling currencies at the right time based on the model’s predictions of when they were most likely to rise or fall in value. Let’s look at how the Renaissance strategy dominated the Quant Era of Wall Street.