The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World
Selected Book Details
- Paperback
- Author: Niall Ferguson
- Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
- Release Date: October 2009
- ISBN-10: 0143116177
- ISBN-13: 9780143116172
- List Price: $16.00
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Summaries and Customer Reviews provided by Amazon
SummaryA richly original look at the origins of money and how it makes the world go 'round |
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Good read
Rating:
Well written. Full of insights about financial history. I did not appreciate that the fate of the south in the Civil War was cast with the fall of New Orleans and the subsequent collapse of their monetary system. Lot of information about this kind of stuff and understandable by a financial tyro.
Compton Broders
Interesting
Rating:
This is a quite interesting and insightful book. I very much enjoyed reading it. It takes you over a long history of finance and how various things in today's financial world have developed (e.g. equity, stock markets). This is a must for any finance scholar or with an interest in finance.
The Ascent of Money
Rating:
This is the kind of history I like -- history that tells a story. Niall Ferguson reveals the rise of paper money, fractional-reserve banking, the bond market, the invention of the joint-stock corporation, marine and life insurance, and the housing bubble. This is a great read. I loved his words on collateralized debt obligations: "At the time, the sellers of these `structured products' boasted that securitization was having the effect of allocating risk `to those most able to bear it'. Only later did it emerge that risk was being allocated to those least able to understand it." Despite the crises, Ferguson asserts that developed financial systems are efficient and promote developed economies. Yet, he says, the human mind has an inherent capacity for fallacy. If you believe the tech bubble and the housing bubble are the last bubbles we'll ever see, then think again.
Not a view of the future as much as a look at the past
Rating:
If you want to understand how finance affects the world, or how our current system came to be, this is a brilliant book that gives a wonderful account of the history of financial systems. In fact, I believe Mr. Ferguson makes a better historian than economist. The book is riveting when it is recounting the collapses of our economic past. But when he turns to using this history to prepare for the future, the wheels fall off.
Basically, if you want to know what this book prescribes for you to prepare for economic downturns, I'll sum it up: diversify! Shocking, I know. But, I don't want to poke too much fun at it. The history of insurance, bond markets, governmental borrowing and the profile of Chinese/American relations (he calls this Chimerica), were all very enlightening and will undoubtedly help me make wiser choices in the future. But, if you are looking for a book to help with your personal finance issues, this one is not designed for that. But if you want to know how we got to where we are, or the issues, trials and errors that got us here, then this is an awesome book.
On a rather odd note, I did notice that the author has a deep love for the work of Richard Dawkins. He used his concepts so many times that I thought he should be co-author. I found this very unusual and sad really. Why a world-class economist would use a tired, worn-out analogy as evolution is beyond me. In fact, in the last chapter of the book, Mr. Ferguson spends the majority of the time constructing the case that economics is like evolution. The craziest part of it is that the analogy does nothing to bring any clarity to finance. When one uses analogy, the hope is to build a bridge of understanding for the reader. In other words, use something familiar to bring something less familiar to light. Trying to follow Ferguson's evolution analogy brought no clarity and in fact seemed to muddy the waters. Not what one would expect from a Harvard professor.
But overall, I enjoyed this walk through the museum of finance. It gives us a greater understanding of today by brushing up against the past. While he doesn't give advice on how to recession-proof your portfolio, he does give much background to issues that you will find playing on your mind when you are deciding where to put your next investment.
New perspective on history
Rating:
Bought this book after watching the TV serial on the same subject. This is a great read with an intersting perspective on history. Pleasantly written and fast moving without an over-burden of detail. Really is quite a fasinating story of our forefathers attempting to make a motza threaded through the histories of commerce, exploration, industrialization and war.
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