Devil Take the Hindmost: A History of Financial Speculation

New
Paperback
1998
$20.29

Is your investment in that new Internet stock a sign of stock market savvy or an act of peculiarly American speculative folly? How has the psychology of investing changed--and not changed--over the last five hundred years? Edward Chancellor examines the nature of speculation--from medieval Europe to the Tulip mania of the 1630s to today's Internet stock craze. A contributing writer to The Financial Times and The Economist, looks at both the psychological and economic forces that drive people to bet their money in markets; how markets are made, unmade, and manipulated; and who wins when speculation runs rampant. Drawing colorfully on the words of such speculators as Sir Isaac Newton, Daniel Defoe, Ivan Boesky, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, Devil Take the Hindmost is part history, part social science, and purely illuminating: an erudite and hugely entertaining book that is more timely today than ever before.

Synopsis

Is your investment in that new Internet stock a sign of stock market savvy or an act of peculiarly American speculative folly? How has the psychology of investing changed--and not changed--over the last five hundred years? Edward Chancellor examines the nature of speculation--from medieval Europe to the Tulip mania of the 1630s to today's Internet stock craze. A contributing writer to The Financial Times and The Economist, looks at both the psychological and economic forces that drive people to bet their money in markets; how markets are made, unmade, and manipulated; and who wins when speculation runs rampant. Drawing colorfully on the words of such speculators as Sir Isaac Newton, Daniel Defoe, Ivan Boesky, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, Devil Take the Hindmost is part history, part social science, and purely illuminating: an erudite and hugely entertaining book that is more timely today than ever before.

$20.29

Quantity

12 in stock

More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 400
Edition: Reissue
Publisher: Plume Books
Published: 31 Dec 1998
ISBN 10: 0452281806
ISBN 13: 9780452281806

Media Reviews

The subtle ways in which individual investors become drawn into crowd behavior is a much studied phenomenon, covered brilliantly... in the book Devil Take the Hindmost. --The Daily Telegraph (London)

The South Sea Company is one of the great bubble and crash stories. Many books have referred to it. One of the finest is Devil Take the Hindmost. --Debashis Basu, Money Life

Excellent. --City A.M.

[An] essential history of financial manias. --The Observer

A lively history of speculative manias and bubbles by a British banker turned writer. --Susan Adams, Forbes

Author Bio

Edward Chancellor studied history in Great Britain at both Cambridge and Oxford Universities. In the early 1990s he worked for the investment bank Lazard Brothers. He is a freelance journalist, and lives in London.