After two and a half years of relentless financial pounding, the crisis literature is becoming mountainous. To command the weary reviewer's attention, any new book on the aberrations of the financial community has to have a clear focus and make a compelling case. In Too Big To Save? Robert Pozen, chairman of mutual fund group MFS Investment Management and a former vice-chairman of Fidelity Investments, pulls off the trick.
He will probably be accused, not without justice, of producing a policy cookbook. But as policy cookbooks go, it is first rate. The story of excessive risk-taking and leverage is lucidly told and accessible to the layman, with good explanations of securitisation, toxic structured products and the global dimension of the crisis. The policy recommendations are thoughtful and mostly full of good sense.
