…gripping…[Enrich's] impressive reporting and writing chops are on full display in The Spider Network…From the start, the book reads like a fast-paced John le Carré thriller, and never lets up.

[Enrich’s] impressive reporting and writing chops are on full display in The Spider Network… From the start, the book reads like a fast-paced John le Carré thriller, and never lets up.” — William D. Cohan, New York Times Book Review

“With an unerring eye for detail, Enrich shows in this masterful work how a toxic stew of greed, arrogance and a lust for power led to a criminal scheme of unparalleled dimensions. It should be required reading for anyone who wants to understand the dirty underbelly of the financial world.” — Kurt Eichenwald, Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Informant

“Mr. Enrich effectively uses the unique access he secured to the mildly autistic UBS trader, Tom Hayes, who became the fall guy for the unfolding scandal, to produce a surprisingly human narrative....” — Jonathan A. Knee, New York Times DealBook

“A damning look at the culture of trader chicanery… Enrich has sidestepped the temptation to slip into author-as-prosecutor mode, instead going the wry tour guide route to lucidly (and often hilariously) usher readers through the Looney Tunes world that wrought l’affaire Libor.” — John Helyar, coauthor of Barbarians at the Gate

“David Enrich is a masterful financial story teller using real time communications from the central figures. He weaves into his narrative not only what happened, but how it happened and why. Michael Lewis has a new rival.” — Sheila Bair, former chair of the FDIC and bestselling author of Bull by the Horns

“An absorbing read that provides both a meticulous dissection of an immense scandal as well as a fascinating human story.” — Bethany McLean, author of The Smartest Guys in the Room and All the Devils Are Here

“Dare I say it, but The Spider Network will snare you in its web of deceit, lies, corruption, manipulation and colorful characters. David Enrich’s brilliant investigative expose will reverberate from Wall Street to Main Street.” — Harlan Coben, bestselling author of Home and Fool Me Once

“David Enrich has written an incredibly entertaining, globe-straddling inside account of how one trader turbocharged a greedy cabal that scammed savers and borrowers everywhere. A must read if you want to understand how big banks and traders really work.” — Marcus Brauchli, former Executive Editor of the Washington Post and Managing Editor of the Wall Street Journal

“So how did a socially awkward English math whiz mastermind manipulation of lending rates on a global scale? … In David Enrich’s gripping tale, the characters have nicknames worthy of the Mafia, and their ethical compasses aren’t much better.” — Paul Ingrassia, Pulitzer Prize winner, bestselling author of Crash Course

“A thrilling tour de force of reporting, revelation and reasoning. For anyone who wants to understand what really went on inside a scam of epic proportions, The Spider Network is unmissable.” — Iain Martin, author of Crash Bang Wallop

David Enrich has written an incredibly entertaining, globe-straddling inside account of how one trader turbocharged a greedy cabal that scammed savers and borrowers everywhere. A must read if you want to understand how big banks and traders really work.

So how did a socially awkward English math whiz mastermind manipulation of lending rates on a global scale? … In David Enrich’s gripping tale, the characters have nicknames worthy of the Mafia, and their ethical compasses aren’t much better.

A thrilling tour de force of reporting, revelation and reasoning. For anyone who wants to understand what really went on inside a scam of epic proportions, The Spider Network is unmissable.

[Enrich’s] impressive reporting and writing chops are on full display in The Spider Network… From the start, the book reads like a fast-paced John le Carré thriller, and never lets up.

With an unerring eye for detail, Enrich shows in this masterful work how a toxic stew of greed, arrogance and a lust for power led to a criminal scheme of unparalleled dimensions. It should be required reading for anyone who wants to understand the dirty underbelly of the financial world.

A damning look at the culture of trader chicanery… Enrich has sidestepped the temptation to slip into author-as-prosecutor mode, instead going the wry tour guide route to lucidly (and often hilariously) usher readers through the Looney Tunes world that wrought l’affaire Libor.

David Enrich is a masterful financial story teller using real time communications from the central figures. He weaves into his narrative not only what happened, but how it happened and why. Michael Lewis has a new rival.

Mr. Enrich effectively uses the unique access he secured to the mildly autistic UBS trader, Tom Hayes, who became the fall guy for the unfolding scandal, to produce a surprisingly human narrative....

An absorbing read that provides both a meticulous dissection of an immense scandal as well as a fascinating human story.

Dare I say it, but The Spider Network will snare you in its web of deceit, lies, corruption, manipulation and colorful characters. David Enrich’s brilliant investigative expose will reverberate from Wall Street to Main Street.

This dwarfs by orders of magnitude any financial scams in the history of markets.

04/01/2017
What is a recipe for financial scandal? Take a flawed international interest-setting mechanism, add a culture of greed, lax supervision, and an outlier trader. In Enrich's (financial enterprise editor, Wall Street Journal) book, the prep time is long, but the final result is worth the wait. Proceeding chronologically, this volume introduces rogue trader Tom Hayes as a child in England. Proficient in math but socially awkward, he found work with a bank, then jumped to a succession of larger institutions. Many were willing to overlook his character issues and ethics violations since he often turned a profit their way, and Enrich does an excellent job of portraying Hayes's skewed values, his confederates, and their employers. When discovered, Hayes shouldered the blame and went to prison; others went free. Per the author, many were at fault, but the banks and regulators preferred a simple narrative to cover their own lapses. This book benefits greatly from the author's interviews with the principals and access to court transcripts. While not as exciting as Sheelah Kolhatkar's Black Edge, about Wall Street insider trading, this is an important work in light of the current debate about financial regulation. VERDICT Recommended for readers interested in how a massive financial scandal concocted by oddball traders unraveled.—Harry Charles, St. Louis