Those Swiss Money Men.

by Ray. Vicker

Paperback

Published January 1, 1975

Reviews

[Sukumar Honkote · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book gives in depth information about the culture of Swiss financial institutions of the 70s. It also gives the reader a great understanding on how Switzerland participated in the geo-politics and created laws to ensure that it has a formidable banking industry. The book describes the role Swiss banks played in the events that lead to abandoning the gold standard and the consequent devaluation of the dollar. There are few stories of Swiss bankers turning rogue and nearly gambling the banks' money.

Overall the book provides a great window into the world of Swiss bankers. You come to know what made them the legends they are. The author tends to spend more than the necessary time in building up the image and explaining the culture of Swiss banking, sometimes repeating himself. The author has spent considerable time researching about the scandals he talks about in the book. Michael Lewis does a much better job of writing such stories. Overall, it is a decent book but not a page turner.

[Doug D · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of it was interesting, some of it was dry. All of it is terribly outdated at this point. If the GoodReads scale were given at a 1-10 basis, this would be somewhere around 2.5. I did really enjoy the second section, and the issues that had arisen from export costs and securities/commodities trading. For that reason, I give this book three stars.