The alchemists : three central bankers and a world on fire / Neil Irwin.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Irwin, Neil.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Banks and banking, Central--History.

Banks and banking, Central.

Monetary policy--History.

Monetary policy.

History.

Financial crises--History.

Financial crises.

Global Financial Crisis, 2008-2009.

Physical Description:

xvii, 430 pages, 16 pages of plates : illustrations ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

New York : The Penguin Press, 2013.

Summary:

Explores the work of the world's most powerful central bankers-- --Ben Bernanke of the U.S. Federal Reserve, Mervyn King of the Bank of England, and Jean-Claude Trichet of the European Central Bank--offering a view from the cockpit of the global economy as the three men struggled to keep it from going down.

Contents:

Opening the spigot

Rise of the alchemists, 1656-2006. Johan Palmstruch and the birth of central banking ; Lombard Street, Rule Britannia, and Bagehot's dictum ; The First Name Club ; Madness, nightmare, desperation, chaos : when central banking goes wrong

in two acts ; The anguish of Arthur Burns ; Spinning the roulette wheel in Maastricht ; Masaru Hayami, tomato ketchup, and the agony of ZIRP ; The Jackson Hole Consensus and the Great Moderation

Panic, 2007-2008. The Committee of Three ; Over by Christmas ; A wall of money

Aftermath, 2009-2010. The battle for the Fed ; The new Greek Odyssey ; The King's speech ; The perilous maiden voyage of the QE2

The second save, 2011-2012. The chopper, the troika, and the Deauville debacle ; The President of Europe ; Escape velocity ; Super Mario world ; Governor Zhou's Chinese medicine ; Back to Jackson.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 399-414) and index.

ISBN:

9781594204623

1594204624

OCLC:

796756230