The Panic of 1907: Lessons Learned from the Market's Perfect Storm

The Panic of 1907: Lessons Learned from the Market's Perfect Storm
by Robert F. Bruner, Sean D. Carr

The Panic of 1907: Lessons Learned from the Market's Perfect Storm
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Book Summary Information

Author: Robert F. Bruner, Sean D. Carr
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2009-04-27
ISBN: 0470452587
Number of pages: 296
Publisher: Wiley
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Book Reviews of The Panic of 1907: Lessons Learned from the Market's Perfect Storm

Book Review: Panic of 1907
Summary: 2 Stars

Caveat: Its been more than a month since I read The Panic of 1907 (Panic). I read it for the pleasure of reading history so I took no notes. Consequently, this review will be a broad stroke, impressionistic recount of my take-aways. In addition, the book I read immediately after this was The Creature from Jekyll Island (Jekyll)and so my whole take on our banking system and its progenitors is negative.

There are two short comings here: 1) Panic reads like a hymnal from the Church of Morgan, filled with Morgan hero worship and 2) the lessons offered are not worth knowing. The picture drawn of Morgan resolutely plowing through the streets of the financial district on foot, parting a sea of worried weaklings with the power of his reputation and confidence, seems melodramatic and fawning. As to the lessons drawn, the idea that we (or regulators?) should be on the lookout for the development and convergence of a handful of unmeasurable economic, sociological and political conditions seems like a mushy formula for detecting the advent of financial disapointment.

And what of this very word, "panic", which in general usage describes supposedly irrational, disruptive and usually futile attempts by bank depositors to recover their money? The word may be unduly pejorative and suspect in the mouths of bankers. When a bank precipitously "calls in" loans from borowers whose circumstances have changed for the worse, that is accepted as a prudent, sadly necessary response by a lender. When depositors take the same action against a bank whose fortunes have changed, that is uncharitably called a panic. Seems like a distinctly one-sided way to view things.

Here's where Jekyll comes in. Jekyll preaches that the way to detect a bank's succeptibility to panics is to ask whether the bank's business is fractional reserve lending. If it is, then your job is done. You have identified a bank that has rendered itself incapable of making all, most or even many of its depositors whole at any given time. Don't sniff around for indicia of danger wafting through the air, look for them in the business practices of the bank. Of course, Jekyll also suggests that banking panics are now all but permanently bannished by the inflationary attentions of the Federal Reserve and its sidekick, the FDIC (the EMS of depositor trauma). God bless mighty Morgan for leading us all out of the desert of recurring, destructive depositor uprisings and to the safer world of American central banking (the money trust) where these annoyances are now literally, very literally, papered over.

Summary of The Panic of 1907: Lessons Learned from the Market's Perfect Storm

"Before reading The Panic of 1907, the year 1907 seemed like a long time ago and a different world. The authors, however, bring this story alive in a fast-moving book, and the reader sees how events of that time are very relevant for today's financial world. In spite of all of our advances, including a stronger monetary system and modern tools for managing risk, Bruner and Carr help us understand that we are not immune to a future crisis."
?Dwight B. Crane, Baker Foundation Professor, Harvard Business School

"Bruner and Carr provide a thorough, masterly, and highly readable account of the 1907 crisis and its management by the great private banker J. P. Morgan. Congress heeded the lessons of 1907, launching the Federal Reserve System in 1913 to prevent banking panics and foster financial stability. We still have financial problems. But because of 1907 and Morgan, a century later we have a respected central bank as well as greater confidence in our money and our banks than our great-grandparents had in theirs."
?Richard Sylla, Henry Kaufman Professor of the History of Financial Institutions and Markets, and Professor of Economics, Stern School of Business, New York University

"A fascinating portrayal of the events and personalities of the crisis and panic of 1907. Lessons learned and parallels to the present have great relevance. Crises and panics are as much a part of our future as our past."
?John Strangfeld, Vice Chairman, Prudential Financial

"Who would have thought that a hundred years after the Panic of 1907 so much remained to be written about it? Bruner and Carr break significant new ground because they are willing to do the heavy lifting of combing through massive archival material to identify and weave together important facts. Their book will be of interest not only to banking theorists and financial historians, but also to business school and economics students, for its rare ability to teach so clearly why and how a panic unfolds."
?Charles Calomiris, Henry Kaufman Professor of Financial Institutions, Columbia University, Graduate School of Business

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