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Michael Lewis

Liar's Poker (Norton Paperback) Paperback – Box set, March 15, 2010

by Michael Lewis (Author)

4.4 8,587 ratings

Book 1 of 2: Liar's Poker Series

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The time was the 1980s. The place was Wall Street. The game was called Liar’s Poker.

Michael Lewis was fresh out of Princeton and the London School of Economics when he landed a job at Salomon Brothers, one of Wall Street’s premier investment firms. During the next three years, Lewis rose from callow trainee to bond salesman, raking in millions for the firm and cashing in on a modern-day gold rush.

Liar’s Poker is the culmination of those heady, frenzied years—a behind-the-scenes look at a unique and turbulent time in American business. From the frat-boy camaraderie of the forty-first-floor trading room to the killer instinct that made ambitious young men gamble everything on a high-stakes game of bluffing and deception, here is Michael Lewis’s knowing and hilarious insider’s account of an unprecedented era of greed, gluttony, and outrageous fortune.

Book 1 of 2

Liar's Poker Series
Print length

320 pages
Language

English
Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date

March 15, 2010
Dimensions

5.5 x 0.8 x 8.3 inches
ISBN-10

039333869X
ISBN-13

978-0393338690
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Popular Highlights in this book

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Knowing about markets is knowing about other people’s weaknesses.
Highlighted by 1,855 Kindle readers
“Those who say don’t know, and those who know don’t say.”
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Knowing about markets is knowing about other people’s weaknesses.
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The only thing history teaches us, a wise man once said, is that history doesn’t teach us anything.
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"The funniest book on Wall Street I’ve ever read."
― Tom Wolfe

"Often profane, always hilarious, right on the mark."
― People

"So memorable and alive . . . one of those rare works that encapsulate and define an era."
― Fortune

About the Author

Michael Lewis is the best-selling author of Liar’s Poker, Moneyball, The Blind Side, The Big Short, The Undoing Project, and The Fifth Risk. He lives in Berkeley, California, with his family.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (March 15, 2010)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 320 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 039333869X
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393338690
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.53 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.8 x 8.3 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #6,951 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #12 in Workplace Culture (Books)
- #13 in Stock Market Investing (Books)
- #17 in Business Professional's Biographies

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Michael Lewis

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Michael Lewis, the best-selling author of The Undoing Project, Liar's Poker, Flash Boys, Moneyball, The Blind Side, Home Game and The Big Short, among other works, lives in Berkeley, California, with his wife, Tabitha Soren, and their three children.

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Bama Fan

Interesting read

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 12, 2023

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This book was very different from other Lewis books because he focuses a lot more on autobiographical details and it's interesting to look back and read this to see how he viewed the world at that time. There is a lot of imagery of what it was like within one of the more successful investment banks in the 80s and Lewis brings the people and the culture of the organization to light in the way that only Lewis can do. I know very little about this and I was able to follow along the whole time to get a sense of what things were like and to read about the ups and downs within the organization. Enjoyable and worth your time!

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Neville Samuels

A Classic and Timeless Tale of Life as an Investment Banker

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 26, 2012

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Although originally published in October 1989, Michael Lewis' 'Liar's Poker' is as timely a read today as it was back then. It seems the zero sum game in investment banking hasn't changed. For every money maker, there is a money loser, and usually it's the banks customers who lose.

Described as 'wickedly funny,' Michael Lewis has a knack for articulating the absurd, and this is his first, and one of his best books. A true story of how he started his career as a trainee in the investment banking firm, Salomon Brothers, later becoming a bond trader based in the Salomons London office, until he left in 1988.

He worked the phones, and on his customers, hard enough to become a 'Big Swinging Dick', or traders code for those who trumped the system, making millions for their company.

Michael Lewis, unlike many other traders, did have a conscience, but he also wanted to keep his job. He makes up names for those who helped and inspired him at the firm, like 'Dash Riprock', his constant trader companion, and his 'Rabbis'; a mentor, or manager who took him under their wing.

The author is less forgiving and used real names for those who deserve some kind of scorn, like John Gutfruend, who was chairman of Salomon Brothers during Michael Lewis' tenure there. Described as the 'last person a nerve-racked trader wanted to see.' He was the type of chairman who liked to sneak up from behind and surprise his traders.

The author learns, soon after leaving his training for the trading desks that 'some of the men... were truly awful human beings... They didn't have customers. They had victims.'

Other characters are colorfully portrayed in the book, although not many women are in the bunch, since, at the time, it was a male dominated play pen with not too many Big Swinging Dickettes. There was the 'Human Piranha,' a legendary trader who sprouted out profanities, stunning some trainees into silence and awe. And those 'mean gluttons' who worked as mortgage traders. Lewis wrote, 'nothing angered them more than being without food, unless it was being interrupted while they ate.'

Michael Lewis also describes in the book the creation and use of mortgage bonds, but not too technically, so it won't overwhelm a layperson. And this is just one reason why 'Liar's Poker' is a timeless piece. After all, it was the invention of mortgage bonds that ultimately led to the financial crisis in 2008.

And of course, the book would be vacant without mention of bonuses. Those fat sums of money handed out around December time to those who scored well enough to earn one. The size of a bonus measured the traders worth, and ego. Lewis adds and subtracts some zeros to give us an idea of how first and second-year traders bonuses were subject to a 'floor and ceiling.' And how the business 'froze' around bonus time. It was all anyone thought about. Michael Lewis explains that watching the faces of people coming out of their bonus meetings 'was worth a thousand lectures on the meaning of money in our small society.'

The only difference between 1988 and now is that those excessive trader and executive bonuses are now part of a larger political and public discourse. In 'Liar's Poker,' Lewis describes how large salary bumps and bonuses are used to buy loyalty. But in reality, if an investment house across the street offers a better deal, the trader won't hesitate to go for more zeroes.

Michael Lewis, is a respected financial journalist and non-fiction author. All of his books have been best-sellers for good reason. 'Liar's Poker' is an exemplary example of how truth can be stranger than fiction. Lewis describes life at Salomon like being in a 'jungle.' The players must be fiction, but, nope, they are real.

The scary thing about this book is how timeless, and prophetic it is. Michael Lewis experienced the Wall Street crash of October 1987, and describes it in the book. And here we are, more than 20 years later. History repeating itself.

16 people found this helpful

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David Gallman

Hello Suckers!

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 31, 2009

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Liar's Poker is a bluffing game played by the stock and bond traders at Salomon Brothers. There is series of arbitrary numbers -- the serial numbers on dollar bills -- that the associates make bids on. No one has any idea what the other players are holding, so the actual numbers are less important than the traders' abilities to bluff each other. The game is how they learn and practice putting one over on each other.

The game is also the title and central metaphor for Michael Lewis' 1989 memoir about becoming a bond trader at Salomon Brothers. His book pops up on a lot of best-of-business writing lists. It may seem odd to be reading it twenty years on, but if you really want to understand how the seeds of our current economic crisis were sown, you should read it.

Salomon Brothers basically invented the "mortgage backed security" that are one of the major causes of our economic problems.

What is revealing and relevant about Lewis' book is the dissection of the structure of the brokerage house and the attitudes that dominate it. The company, trader, and salesman's best interest are often at odds with those of their customers. The basic principle of trading is this: bluff the customer into placing big bets on stocks and bonds and take a commission on the sale. If the bet "blows up" the customer, well, "Hey, it's the market. It is unpredictable. Who knew?" (But the company and trader got their piece of the action.) If the bet produces a big return for the customer, then the customer has more money to use to make bigger bets with the now "proven" financial adviser.

In the lexicon of Salomon Brothers, "blowing up a customer" is when the customer loses their entire investment. It is commonly known in the industry that associates fresh from the training program will "blow up" most of their customers for about six months. Salomon Brothers only allows these green traders or "geeks" access to small investors to prevent damage to their big institutional investors, the organizations that will make bets in the tens of millions to billion of dollars.

The working class and middle class salary men who have bought into the common wisdom that the market always goes up over time and will beat inflation get fed to the "geeks" who are the most likely to blow them up. The trader/salesman gets his percentage. The company books the business. The investor takes all the risk and loss.

Lewis' own description of the practice: "In need of a euphemism for what we did with other people's money, we called it arbitrage, which was just plain obfuscation. Arbitrage means 'trading risklessly for profit.' Our investors always took risk; high-wire act would have been more accurate than arbitrage. In spite of the responsibility implied by my job, I was ignorant and malleable when I advised my first customers. I was an amateur pharmacologist, prescribing drugs without a license. The people who suffered as a result were, of course, my customers."

Lewis extends the metaphor. The brokerage house is basically a casino. The traders and salesmen are dealers. The markets, like the odds of winning a game of chance, are vaguely knowable, but entirely unpredictable. The investors are gamblers.

The difference, though, between Vegas and Wall Street is that people who go to Vegas know that they are gambling. People who take their money to Wall Street have been told that they are investing.

Lewis, to his credit, quits his job.

If you find yourself a little flummoxed by all of the financial reporting about our current economic meltdown, read Liar's Poker. It will help you make sense of it all.

10 people found this helpful

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Jack

Super funny

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 18, 2023

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The characters and people he conveys is amazing. 10/10. Put it on your desk and let your friends know your funny, and smart. NAHT. UR A NERD and be proud

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Jorge

Gran Libro

Reviewed in Mexico 🇲🇽 on June 15, 2023

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Muy entretenido y divertido

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Fernando C.

Continua atual mesmo após mais de 30 anos

Reviewed in Brazil 🇧🇷 on May 25, 2021

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A história é excelente para quem se interessa por mercado financeiro. Este foi o segundo livro do Michael Lewis que li (o primeiro foi Moneyball), e gostei muito o jeito que estruturou as histórias e como narrou os bastidores do ambiente de negociação nos mercados. Até traz a tona comportamentos dos envolvidos (que considero ainda bastante atuais) e a dinâmica de funcionamento entre as instituições, como a replicação de estruturas e ideias e como a concorrência funciona dentro dos oligopólios estabelecidos. Para quem não trabalha no mercado financeiro pode ser que faça menos sentido o conteúdo, mas não deixa de ser mesmo assim uma boa narrativa.
Adquiri a versão digital e não encontrei nenhum erro de edição ou problema durante toda a leitura.

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Mitchell John King

Great read

Reviewed in Australia 🇦🇺 on March 7, 2019

Verified Purchase

Entertaining. Michael Lewis turns a good story into a great read. Feels like looking through a time loop into the entrepreneurial days, for good or worse, of financial markets

Fer CG

Bueno

Reviewed in Mexico 🇲🇽 on October 30, 2022

Verified Purchase

Entretenido, en ocasiones divertido. La historia es buena, pero es tan sólo una aproximación a la verdad, quizás por la década en la que fue escrita originalmente. Las obras recientes que tratan el mundo financiero de los 80's son más crudas, más reales, y más sorprendentes.

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rodrigo

Quebraram minhas pernas

Reviewed in Brazil 🇧🇷 on July 1, 2020

Verified Purchase

Sacanagem pagar R$80 num livro que parece ter sido impresso num papel de jornal. Gostaria de saber da Amazon algum posicionamento referente a qualidade do material.
Ps: não julgue um livro pelo material, vale a leitura

2 people found this helpful

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