Michael Lewis on Why the World Is Still Reading “Liar’s Poker”
Odd Lots
Bloomberg
4.5 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 10 February 2022
⏱️ 46 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The book “Liar's Poker” came out in 1989. Its depiction of Wall Street culture — obnoxious, crude, drunk on risk — may seem very different to today's big bank trading floors. Nonetheless, the book is still a popular read. In some places, interns are even assigned to read it. So why the enduring appeal? And what are the lessons from the book, over 30 years since its release? On this episode, we speak with its author Michael Lewis, who recently recorded an audio version of the book, while also doing a short companion podcast. He reflects on his latest rereading of it, and what it means today.
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| 0:54.1 | Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odlots podcast. I'm Joe Wyzantel. |
| 1:00.4 | And I'm Tracy Alloway. So Tracy, one topic that we actually don't talk about that much, |
| 1:06.7 | that we have a few times is like Wall Street itself. Like we talk about markets, |
| 1:11.8 | all different kinds, talk a lot about icons and like theoretical finance, like actual Wall Street, |
| 1:17.2 | banking, etc. We probably could talk about it more. I feel like we do quite a few market structure |
| 1:24.8 | episodes, but you're right. We don't get so much into, I guess, the experience of actually |
| 1:31.3 | working in those markets. No, we don't. And of course, it's an interesting time. I mean, |
| 1:36.4 | it's always an interesting time, but so many other banks are doing extraordinarily well. And I feel |
| 1:41.5 | like for both of us, our career is post great financial crisis, we like, I think the standard |
| 1:47.8 | thing is like each year, it's like, oh, bonuses are down at this bank or trading is down or |
| 1:52.5 | and it feels like that at least right now for the moment, it's a very a lot of up eros on Wall Street. |
| 2:00.2 | But I do feel like there's a weird dichotomy at the moment in the sense that the banking |
| 2:05.2 | and trading results have been excellent and it's definitely boom times for Wall Street. But on the |
| 2:11.1 | other hand, a lot of people are expressing unhappiness about the actual job at the moment, right? |
| 2:17.6 | You have a lot of younger bankers, especially who just don't seem that into Wall Street at the |
| 2:23.0 | moment. No, you know, they all want to go work on crypto. They're, you know, they're probably |
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