Book- The Spider Network: How a Math Genius and a Gang of Scheming Bankers Pulled Off One of the Greatest Scams in History

528 pages!

SHORT-LISTED FOR THE FINANCIAL TIMES BUSINESS BOOK

OF THE YEAR

The Wall Street Journal's award-winning business reporter unveils the bizarre and sinister story of how a math genius named Tom Hayes, a handful of outrageous confederates, and a deeply corrupt banking system ignited one of the greatest financial scandals in history.

The paperback edition includes a new chapter discussing further fallout from the scandal.

In 2006, an oddball group of bankers, traders and brokers from some of the world’s largest financial institutions made a startling realization:

Libor—the London interbank offered rate, which determines interest rates on trillions in loans worldwide—was set daily by a small group of easily manipulated functionaries.

Tom Hayes, a brilliant but troubled mathematician, became the lynchpin of shadowy team that used hook and crook to take over the process and set rates that made them a fortune, no matter the cost to others.

Among the motley crew was a French trader nicknamed “Gollum”; the broker “Abbo,” who liked to publicly strip naked when drinking; a Kazakh chicken farmer turned something short of financial whiz kid; an executive called “Clumpy” because of his patchwork hair loss; and a broker uncreatively nicknamed “Big Nose.”

Eventually known as the “Spider Network,” Hayes’s circle generated untold riches —until it all unraveled in spectacularly vicious, backstabbing fashion.

Praised as reading “like a fast-paced John le Carré thriller”

(New York Times),

“Compelling” (Washington Post)

“Jaw-dropping” (Financial Times)

The Spider Network is not only a rollicking account of the scam, but a provocative examination of a financial system that was warped and shady throughout.

528 pages.