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Street Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm on Wall Street Hardcover – May 12, 2009

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Kate Kelly (Author)
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Kate Kelly (Author)
3.9 out of 5 stars 43 customer reviews
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Product Details

  • Hardcover: 256 pages
  • Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover; 1 edition (May 12, 2009)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1591842735
  • ISBN-13: 978-1591842736
  • Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 0.9 x 9.3 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #909,231 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

1.0 out of 5 starsI'm baffled by the applause for this book
By Aaron C. Brown TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE VOICE on July 18, 2009
Format: Hardcover
Two previous reviewers suggested you read House of Cards instead, and got slammed by negative comments and "unhelpful" ratings. I'll take my chances seconding that recommendation. House of Cards covers the history of Bear Stearns, gets most of the technical details and chronology right and (despite the inflammatory subtitle) is fair and balanced.

I do admit Street Fighters is a faster read. It cuts out all the boring history, and gets right to the three-day collapse. Characters are simple and financial details swept under the rug. Excitement is provided by constant overstatement. No one rests after working hard, they "drop from exhaustion," or, if they take an Ambien first, "lapse into a drug-induced" stupor. No one gets a telephone call at night, they are "jolted awake." Someone is "slammed," "electrified," or "devastated," nearly every page and almost as often we find it is the worst day of someone's life.

Okay, that's just style and if you like your writing lively, that's fine. It also helps if you like to hear about people washing their hair, taking showers, buying iPhones or playing on-line games. You'll find out who's a snappy dresser, who eats greasy food and especially what kind of houses different characters own. I don't care for that stuff, but I suppose it gives some people a feel for the situation.

My biggest gripe about the book is the author's treatment of disputed information. Time and again we get stories from anonymous or indirect sources in full-size print in the text, with an asterisk at the end to a fine-print notice that a named direct witness denies the story.Read more ›
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5.0 out of 5 starsA dramatic TKO on Wall Street
By Robert Morris HALL OF FAMETOP 500 REVIEWERVINE VOICE on May 21, 2009
Format: Hardcover
As I began to read this account of "the last 72 hours of Bear Stearns, the toughest firm on Wall Street," so powerful are Kate Kelly's narrative and descriptive skills that it soon seemed as if I were seeing a film rather than reading a book. Colorful characters, fast-moving plot, vivid images, lively dialog, riveting conflicts and confrontations, increasing tension, and then....

The book's narrative begins at 5:30 P.M. on Thursday, March 13, 2008, and continues until 8:30 PM on Sunday, March 16, 2008, followed by an Epilogue in which Kelly reviews subsequent developments at other firms (e.g. Lehman, AIG, Merrill) and provides a follow-up on Bear Stearns' key leaders. From Thursday through Sunday, at a pace that astonished everyone involved, the once-proud firm of "street fighters...lean, scrappy, and hungry for profits," a firm that had "an underdog's spirit, and relished the chance to knock more well-heeled firms down a peg or two," saw its stock take a "breathtaking drop." It had sold for $172 in January of 2007, was selling for $57 on March 13, 2008, and continued to plunge so far and so fast ($30.00 on March 14) that when Bear received J.P. Morgan Chase's final offer, the stock was valued at $2.00.

How to explain Bear's decline and fall? Kelly offers several reasons. Here are four:

1. Dysfunctional leadership (e.g. its CFO, Sam Molinaro, was "hopelessly disorganized" amidst toxic infighting between and among the firm's leaders)

2. Decision-making that Jim Collins describes (in How the Mighty Fall) as "grasping for salvation" in Stage 4 of a five-stage process of organizational decline

3.Read more ›
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4.0 out of 5 starsThorough, fascinating look at the last few days of life at Bear
By avid reader on July 18, 2013
Format: Paperback Verified Purchase
This book is absolutely fascinating. I'm giving it four stars instead of five only because the level of detail Kelly goes into in the second half of the book may dampen readers' interests a bit - but just a bit. Anyone who has ever worked on Wall Street, has pulled an all-nighter preparing for a deal, drafted documents in anticipation of bankruptcy, or just has an interest in watching the "train wreck" that was Bear Sterns in its final days will find this a very rewarding read. The personalities of the players come to life in Kelly's writing style, and clearly she knows her stuff when it comes to the world of high finance in general and subprime lending in particular. Again, the 4-star review is less a criticism of this excellently-written book than it is an allowance that the great level of detail provided may make its audience less wide than otherwise. But all in all, an absoutely fascinating and methodically-researched piece of reporting. Well done
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2.0 out of 5 starsRecommend House of Cards Instead
By Richard Seagraves on April 21, 2011
Format: Paperback
House of Cards is a much more sophisticated account and is a more signficant piece of literature. Given the Wall Street Journal's terrible failures in reporting the underlying fundamentals of the crisis, as documented in detail by David Einhorn in Fooling Some People All of the Time: A Long Short Story, it is clear that the WSJ business reporters have key agendas in their documentation of these catastrophes. I am particularly hard pressed to find WSJ business reporters who were key at driving true analyses of the underlying CDO markets. Yet.. leave no doubt, they are quick to mud sling and make a few bucks when everything hits the fan.

If you want to learn more about the WSJ's attitude in this period... pick up Mr. Einhorn's book. In fact, I believe Ms. Kelly is mentioned as it pertains to her psuedo journalism.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars

Awesome product. Great Seller.

Published 18 days ago by Joseph J. Maletz
5.0 out of 5 starsEnjoyable book

It was a fast read and the authur understood the events. Very good book detailing the events.

Published on July 19, 2014 by MIO
2.0 out of 5 starsInteresting subject matter but writing leaves something to be desired

The book is a condensed version of events surrounding the collapse of Bear Stearns. Details center mostly around the personal lives of the actors as opposed to the investment... Read more

Published on February 28, 2014 by h
5.0 out of 5 starsGreat book

Great read, if you want an easy read that details the final days of bear sterns in an entertaining and informative way this is it. Read more

Published on July 8, 2012 by Tom
5.0 out of 5 starsA GRIPPING, HOUR-BY-HOUR ACCOUNT OF THE LAST THREE DAYS OF BEAR...

Wall Street Journal reporter Kate Kelly said in the Preface to this 2009 book, "I selected the most dramatic three days of teh Bear saga and examined them hour by hour... Read more

Published on June 13, 2012 by Steven H Propp
3.0 out of 5 starsStreet Fighters: The Last 72 Hours of Bear Stearns, the Toughest Firm...

Overall the book was a decent read but the language used was a bit simple. There are only a few references to the financial workings of bear sterns and virtually no references to... Read more

Published on November 1, 2011 by arod
2.0 out of 5 starsWhere's the Beef?

I agree with other reviewers. This book offers very little insight into the collapse of Bear. I might have to check out House of Cards now. Read more

Published on June 18, 2011 by dasn0wman
3.0 out of 5 starsA dramatic description of the Bear Stearns collapse

Street Fighters is not about the reasons why Bear Stearns failed and how did its management came to this mess. Read more

Published on July 18, 2010 by Anton Kovalyov
5.0 out of 5 starsBears' failure without the boring detail

I was pleasantly surprised how captivating this read was after hearing about some negative reviews before I read it. In fact, it was hard to put down the book. Read more

Published on June 27, 2010 by LJ Haasbroek
3.0 out of 5 starsCanary in a Gold Mine

There's a certain bitter distinction in being the first domino. Bear Stearns, mortgage backed behemoth and the i-bank with the most street cred and attitude, stood from the outset... Read more

Published on March 3, 2010 by John Van Wagner

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