Post: #1

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Phenomenal documentary and very informative.

Niall Ferguson follows the money to tell the human story behind the evolution of finance, from its origins in ancient Mesopotamia to the latest upheavals on what he calls Planet Finance.

http://www.niallferguson.com

Bread, cash, dosh, dough, loot, lucre, moolah, readies, the wherewithal: Call it what you like, it matters. To Christians, love of it is the root of all evil. To generals, it's the sinews of war. To revolutionaries, it's the chains of labor. But in The Ascent of Money, Niall Ferguson shows that finance is in fact the foundation of human progress. What's more, he reveals financial history as the essential backstory behind all history.

Through Ferguson's expert lens familiar historical landmarks appear in a new and sharper financial focus. Suddenly, the civilization of the Renaissance looks very different: a boom in the market for art and architecture made possible when Italian bankers adopted Arabic mathematics. The rise of the Dutch republic is reinterpreted as the triumph of the world's first modern bond market over insolvent Habsburg absolutism. And the origins of the French Revolution are traced back to a stock market bubble caused by a convicted Scot murderer.

With the clarity and verve for which he is known, Ferguson elucidates key financial institutions and concepts by showing where they came from. What is money? What do banks do? What's the difference between a stock and a bond? Why buy insurance or real estate? And what exactly does a hedge fund do?

This is history for the present. Ferguson travels to post-Katrina New Orleans to ask why the free market can't provide adequate protection against catastrophe. He delves into the origins of the subprime mortgage crisis.

Perhaps most important, The Ascent of Money documents how a new financial revolution is propelling the world's biggest countries, India and China, from poverty to wealth in the space of a single generation—an economic transformation unprecedented in human history.

Yet the central lesson of the financial history is that sooner or later every bubble bursts—sooner or later the bearish sellers outnumber the bullish buyers, sooner or later greed flips into fear. And that's why, whether you're scraping by or rolling in it, there's never been a better time to understand the ascent of money.

Post: #2

Great book; Niall Ferguson is a boss. Gets it (as anyone that has spent ANY time looking at the history of finance would, much less the amount he has).

You'll probably enjoy Ferguson and Taleb beat up on the CEO of Pepsi (Indra Nooyi) as she painfully tries to defend the banking elite / status quo in the mega-corporate world (a system she came up in) in this roundtable. Eric Schmidt joins later on.





Somewhat unrelated, but a laugh: Nooyi *seriously* tries to make the case that Pepsi offers well-rounded, nutritious products to the unfortunate emerging markets they're snatching up.

Post: #3

(04-12-2013 08:53 AM)trey Wrote:  Great book; Niall Ferguson is a boss. Gets it (as anyone that has spent ANY time looking at the history of finance would, much less the amount he has).

You'll probably enjoy Ferguson and Taleb beat up on the CEO of Pepsi (Indra Nooyi) as she painfully tries to defend the banking elite / status quo in the mega-corporate world (a system she came up in) in this roundtable. Eric Schmidt joins later on.





Somewhat unrelated, but a laugh: Nooyi *seriously* tries to make the case that Pepsi offers well-rounded, nutritious products to the unfortunate emerging markets they're snatching up.

Great find! Haha yeah screw her. I am really enjoying this.

Seeing how financial events triggered many of the major world events is a red pill situation for me personally. They don't teach you this kind of stuff in school. Usually it's like "yeah so this document/legislation was passed and suddenly the entire world changed"....

.....yeah not so much...

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Post: #4

I have the book but haven't read it yet. Might have to change that.

Post: #5

(04-12-2013 11:12 AM)Ovid Wrote:  I have the book but haven't read it yet. Might have to change that.

Just watch the video!

It's really pretty much identical.

Post: #6

Will get back to this lol the video is 4 hours.

Post: #7

haha, Niall Ferguson is a boss. I really liked reading his books "House of Rothschild".

Apparently the Rothschild were bankers to the German prince of Thurn and Taxis (one of the richest German old families)

I have no doubt he has a good grasp on the historical topics...

Post: #8

(04-12-2013 04:39 PM)DVY Wrote:  haha, Niall Ferguson is a boss. I really liked reading his books "House of Rothschild".

Apparently the Rothschild were bankers to the German prince of Thurn and Taxis (one of the richest German old families)

I have no doubt he has a good grasp on the historical topics...

An entire portion of his book/video is dedicated to the Rothschilds. I think they come up at several different points actually. Very fascinating.

I'll have to check that book out!

Post: #9

4 hours? Cliffs?

Post: #10

Yeah the video itself is really long.

However, this 4 hour youtube video is actually split up into four different one-hour sections.

Check it out and see.

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Post: #11

@YMG- its actually 2 books... =)

Post: #12

Whoops! My bad.

Post: #13

The Ascent of Money documentary is one of the best ones I've ever seen. I posted it in on the forum soon after I joined a couple years ago. Great video.

Post: #14

Its meant to be a series. I watched it on PBS a few years back and then once more one lazy summer day about a year ago. Excellent film.

The Rothschilds had more money then Bill Gates back in the late/early 1800's-1900's to put it in perspective for some people.

Post: #15

Incas probably had money, because whenever u have a medium for exchange of goods that is money. All societies had money and bartering was reserved only for extreme situations.

Post: #16

It's a good book, gonna start the documentary. Hopefully it is just as good.

Post: #17

Financial crises are common events. They happen regularly. They often coincide with war and historical events. So, after the event, it is easy to say that the cause of the event was a financial one.
However, the fact that many financial crises don't lead to wars, or any more historical events than another period, states what is quite obvious. Financial crises, and other financial events, do not necessarily lead to historical events. This current world, in a huge financial crisis, is proof of that. Scarcely anything has happened as a consequence of the financial crisis 2007-?.

Financial reasons are often connected to huge events, and are often even the cause, however, they are rarely THE reason. Correlation yo, not causation.
Then again, an economic historian claiming that the world is determined by financial events? Who would have funk that happening? How about a Marxist happening to say that world events are a consequence of class power struggles?

And as for all the comments saying Taleb and Ferguson putting the Pepsi representative down....the best put down in the video was from her. To paraphrase ''Forgive me, i am surrounded by philosophers, economists, professors and writers. All thinkers. I'm a doer.''

Then she followed that up with ''greed is good. Ok, too much greed is bad, but greed is good.''
So, yes, she is an idiot. Not because of the obvious greed as a motive, oh, whatever. Too long to elaborate.

Anyway, finally, Ferguson isn't as smart as he seems to think, or at least likes to pretend, that he is. Among historians he is considered a bit of a joke. The fact is he Ivy League means nothing. In fact, the fact he is Ivy League says it all. Then again, being considered a joke by other historians, academia, isn't really a bad thing. However, that's another matter.
He skims through history, conveniently forgetting a million things. It's like a scientist who ignores some variables just so he can reach a conclusion that suits his hypothesis. Read it up, no credible historian takes Ferguson seriously.

To conclude, the most valuable part of this video is the point Taleb makes that debt is 1:1 connected to confidence and that debt never has and never will accept complexity. Confidence is a fragile (ha! see what i did there?) thing that can't be quantified.

Post: #18

(06-20-2013 09:31 PM)Mersault Wrote:  Read it up, no credible historian takes Ferguson seriously.

That may be because he just makes up shit up to advance is own ultra right wing agenda. He's another mouthpiece for the ultra wealthy and powerful. How may times has he predicted the economic collapse by now? He's been wrong about the economy so many times that he even libertarians are eventually going to ask him to calm down... but then again, as an ultraconservative who doesn't live in the real world that is to be expected.