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How a banker would make a presentation to Darth Vader

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If my life were a Star Wars movie, I'm pretty sure I'd be working for the Empire. I imagine that the Empire had a lot more bankers than the Rebel Alliance. Although there wasn't a lot of discussion of economics in the movies, it seems pretty clear that the universe had money and capitalism. Han Solo was willing to give Luke Skywalker and Obi Wan Kenobi a ride in the Millennium Falcon to Alderaan for 2,000 credits now and 15,000 later and Lando Calrissian was prepared to negotiate with the Empire in order to protect the off-take contracts for his mining business. So if the Empire had capitalism and money, then it had bankers.

What's more, Darth Vader would have had a great need for bankers. He had a lot of infrastructure projects that would have required substantial fund raising and he would have had enormous working capital needs to keep his transport and logistics operations running. And that's without mentioning the need for advice on his numerous mergers and acquisitions, although in the case of Darth Vader, it was probably mainly acquisitions.

Not that being a banker to the Empire would have been an easy job. Darth Vader, for example, would have been a difficult person to pitch ideas to. Not being able to see his expression under the big black mask would have made it difficult to tell whether he was receptive to the presentation material. And his tendency to use his telekinetic powers to suffocate folks that he was unhappy with would have meant that presenting a fee quotation or financing charges would have been quite stressful.

Then of course there is his devotion to mystical forces and belief in destiny. I expect he would have been generally inclined to ignore the advice of his consultants and make up his own mind. It's always annoying when clients behave like that, not to mention when they have disconcerting personal habits like breathing really loudly through their mouths.

On the plus side I imagine he was probably pretty aggressive, and I doubt he would have been particularly concerned about the impact of his investments on retail investors or anybody else. He certainly wouldn't mind putting together a portfolio of mortgage-related investments that was likely to collapse and then selling it to unsuspecting clients.

'Thank you for your time Mr, erm, Darth, Vader,' I say, handing him my card. He uses his mind to make it fly across the room and into the trash can.

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