Ugly Americans by Ben Mezrich
William Heinemann
$140
Ben Mezrich's apparently true story suggests that hordes of rapacious, twentysomething hedge-fund cowboys were driving markets amid the spectacular rise of Asia's tiger economies during the 1990s.
Ugly Americans tells of one young upstart - given the alias John Malcolm in exchange for the inside story. A recently graduate, he's offered investment work in Japan after a chance meeting with an American expatriate. On his first day on the job in Japan's frantic financial markets, he handles US$25 million in trades.
Mezrich - whose Bringing Down the House was a best-selling expose of university wise-guys who took on Las Vegas - avoids condescension, but remains succinct when explaining futures, arbitrage and hedge funds. The mercurial value of a derivative is explained via traders' small talk in a sleazy nightclub - using the metaphor of a struggling model's panties. Many of the key moments in the book seem to go on in the backrooms of hostess bars.
The narrative at times reads as though Mezrich fears that the nuances of the Nikkei 225 are just not quite sexy enough. As if to add spice to the story, Malcolm finds an almost impossibly beautiful girlfriend who, of course, just happens to be the daughter of a prominent yakuza.