The Greatest Trade Ever: The Behind-The-Scenes Story of How John Paulson Defied Wall Street and Made Financial History

In 2006, hedge fund manager John Paulson realized something few others suspected-that the housing market and the value of subprime mortgages were grossly inflated and headed for a major fall. Paulson's background was in mergers and acquisitions, however, and he knew little about real estate or how to bet against housing. He had spent a career as an also-ran on Wall Street. But Paulson was convinced this was his chance to make his mark. Colleagues at investment banks scoffed at him and investors dismissed him. Even investors skeptical about housing shied away from the complicated derivative investments that Paulson was warming to. But Paulson and a handful of renegade investors such as Jeffrey Greene and Michael Berry began to bet heavily against risky mortgages and precarious financial companies. Timing is everything, though. Initially, Paulson and the others lost tens of millions of dollars as real estate and stocks continued to soar. Rather than back down, however, Paulson redoubled his bets, putting his hedge fund and his reputation on the line.
In the summer of 2007, the markets began to implode. By year's end, John Paulson had pulled off the greatest trade in Wall Street history, earning more than $15 billion for his firm-a figure that dwarfed George Soros's billion-dollar currency trade in 1992. He made billions more in 2008. Some of the underdog investors who attempted the daring trade also reaped fortune; others who got the timing wrong met devastating failure.
Written by the prize-winning reporter who broke the story in the Wall Street Journal, The Greatest Trade Ever is a superbly written, fast-paced, behind-the-scenes narrative of how a contrarian who foresaw the escalating financial crisis that outwitted Chuck Prince, Stanley O'Neal, Richard Fuld, and Wall Street's titans, amid the personal hubris and carnage of economic collapse, made financial history.

About the Author :
GREGORY ZUCKERMAN is a senior writer at the "Wall Street Journal, " where he has been a reporter for twelve years. He pens the widely read "Heard on the Street" column and writes about hedge funds, investing, and other Wall Street topics. Zuckerman appears on CNBC twice a week to explain complex trades. He is a two-time winner of the Gerald Loeb Award for coverage of the credit crisis, the demise of WorldCom, and the collapse of hedge fund Amaranth Advisors, and he is a recipient of other awards.

Review :
"Simply terrific. Easily the best of the post-crash financial books."
--Malcolm Gladwell
"Mr. Zuckerman is a first-rate reporter who is also able to explain the complexities of real estate finance in layman's terms. At times, "The Greatest Trade Ever" reads like a thriller."
--The New York Times
"How Paulson and a handful of contrarian investors pulled off this once-in-a-lifetime coup is the subject of "The Greatest Trade Ever" ... a fascinating and believable counter-narrative to the growing pile of books recounting the disastrous mistakes made by many of the supposedly smartest minds on Wall Street. It is also a surprisingly dramatic work...In "The Greatest Trade Ever," Zuckerman skillfully shows how Paulson and a few cohorts anticipated a disaster and figured out a way to profit."
--BusinessWeek
"More than a cinematic narrative of how Paulson and others figured out how to short the market. We're also reminded of how opaque and illiquid some financial instruments are, how little Wall Street executives understood them, and how difficult it was for more knowledgeable bankers to say that the subprime emperor had no clothes."
--Bloomberg.com
"Zuckerman has a story to tell, a thread to follow, and it just happens to turn out that by following the saga of John Paulson, Zuckerman reveals all kinds of fascinating perspectives on complex finance, the real estate bubble and Wall Street and Washington's difficulties in putting the two together."
--TheDeal.com
"A magnificent insider look at how Paulson and others profited off of subprime's demise, detailing both the formulation and implementation of such a trade...Zuckerman's work is both insightful and gripping."
--Marketfolly.com
"Greg Zuckerman was the first to tell the world about John Paulson's sensational trade...He's written the definitive account of a strange and wonderful subplot of the financial crisis."
--Michael Lewis, bestselling author of "Moneyba