Dear Mr. Buffett : What an Investor Learns 1,269 Miles from Wall Street

by Tavakoli, Janet M.

• ISBN13: 9780470406786
• ISBN10: 047040678X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-01-09
• Publisher: Wiley

Summary

Janet Tavakoli takes you into the world of Warren Buffett by way of the recent mortgage meltdown. In correspondence and discussion with him over 2 years, they both saw the writing on the wall, made clear by the implosion of Bear Stearns. Tavakoli, in clear and engaging prose, explains how the credit mess happened beginning with the mortgage lending Ponzi schemes funded by investment banks, the Fed bailout and its impact on the dollar. Through her narrative, we hear from Warren Buffett and learn how his enduring principles caused him to see the mess that was coming well in advance and kept him and his investors well out of the way.

Author Biography

Janet M. Tavakoli is the President of Tavakoli Structured Finance, a Chicago-based consulting firm to financial institutions, institut-ional investors, and hedge funds. She gave advance warning of major collapses including Long-Term Capital Management, First Alliance Mortgage, the thrift industry, and the current credit bubble. BusinessWeek called her "The Cassandra of Credit Derivatives." Tavakoli is a former adjunct associate professor in the Finance Department of the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business, where she taught derivatives. She is also the author of several professional finance books, and is frequently quoted in the business press, including the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, BusinessWeek, the New York Times, and many others. She also appears on CNN, CNBC, CBS Evening News, Bloomberg TV, First Business Morning News, Fox News, Fox Business News, ABC, and BBC.

Table of Contents

Preface.Acknowledgments.Chapter 1: An Unanswered Invitation.Chapter 2: Lunch with Warren.Chapter 3: The Prairie Princes versus the Princes of Darkness.Chapter 4: The Insatiable Curiosity to Know Nothing Worth Knowing (Oscar Wilde Was Right).Chapter 5: MAD Mortgages-The "Great" Against the Powerless.Chapter 6: Shell Games (Beware of Geeks Bearing Grifts).Chapter 7: Financial Astrology-AAA Falling Stars.Chapter 8: Bear Market (I'd Like a Review of the Bidding).Chapter 9: Dead Man's Curve.Chapter 10: Bazooka Hank and Dread Reckoning (AIG, Fannie, Freddie, Lehman, Merrill, and Other F luid Situations).Chapter 11: Bond Insurance Burns Main Street.Chapter 12: Money, Money, Money (Warren and Washington).Chapter 13: The Fogs of War, Religion, and Politics.Chapter 14: Finding Value.Notes.Bibliography.Index.