Journalism, so the adage goes, is the first draft of history. In 2008, the Financial Times had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to report, analyse and comment on the most serious financial crisis since the Great Crash of 1929. Here was a global story whose tentacles spread from the US sub-prime mortgage market to the City of London, Iceland, Russian oligarchs, Dubai property barons and numerous other actors. It was a story tailor-made for the FT.