Sublime

Up to that moment, in late November 2018, Alameda Research had operated in the shadows. They traded more than 5 percent of the total volume of crypto markets and were still a secret. Jane Street had left Sam with the view that there was no upside to publicity, and that the best thing to do was to avoid it. He’d traded billions of dollars in crypto

To Nathan Rothschild, Disraeli had been a champion of the Jewish race and indeed a remarkable friend to his own family, risking his career by supporting the right of Jews to sit in the House of Commons. Paradoxically, Disraeli had based his argument not on the liberal case for tolerance and equality but on the bolder, more controversial claim that

For the next two decades, Sam Rayburn held power in Washington. Presidents came and went—Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy—but whoever was President, Sam Rayburn was Speaker; he held the post he had dreamed of as a boy for almost seventeen of the twenty-one years after 1940, more years than any other man in American history.

In the words of Bill Gross, who runs the world’s largest bond fund at the Pacific Investment Management Company (PIMCO), ‘bond markets have power because they’re the fundamental base for all markets. The cost of credit, the interest rate [on a benchmark bond], ultimately determines the value of stocks, homes, all asset classes.’

If there was an inner circle of magicians, Grayson sat at the head of that table. Walt described him as “old school,” because he still believed secrets mattered. And although he was revered by fellow magicians, Grayson had a reputation for being an elitist, as well as being so secretive it bordered paranoia. He wouldn’t even touch a deck of cards i

ambitious young man of thirty-seven with a high forehead, thick,

Throughout this time, Ivar appeared entirely without concern. Although he sensed the increasing panic, along with everyone else, he didn’t want anyone in New York to see him falter, particularly given the market’s decline. He knew markets reflected emotions and perception. In finance, there was no such thing as reality. There was only, as Pierpont

the best form of governance in an expertise-based practice area would fit the traditional professional mold: a collegial partnership of peers headed (if at all) by a leader who symbolizes the firm’s commitment to high standards.

The Senate was not in disarray. As the Foreign Relations Committee had been its stronghold against the League, against Progressivism the stronghold was the Finance Committee, still dominated by Allison, Aldrich, John Spooner of Wisconsin, and Thomas Platt of New York. The “Senate Four” or the “Big Four,” as they were known, still met in summer at A