Month: September 2018

A decade after Lehman fell: the best articles

A selection of the best articles I’ve read on the 10th anniversary of September 15, 2008.

Can we survive the next financial crisis?

Why claims that the 2008 bailout was a “success” should make you angry

Crisis firefighters still uninterested in fire prevention

The broken conversation about financial regulation

10 jaar bankencrisis (in Dutch)

Zo word je een topbankier

Vandaag begint het nieuwe academiejaar aan de Vlaamse universiteiten.

Wie apotheker wil worden, volgt farmaceutische wetenschappen. Advocaten in spe studeren rechten.

Wie droomt van een carrière bij een financiële instelling kan terecht in de richting financie- en verzekeringswezen aan de hogeschool. Aan de universiteit is er echter geen ‘vakopleiding’ voor bankiers.

Hoe kan je dan toch een topbankier worden? Continue reading “Zo word je een topbankier”

So you want to be a banker

Want to be a lawyer? Go to law school.

Want to be a doctor? Go to med school.

Want to be a banker? Go to… bank school?

You don’t have to study economics to get into banking. Many bankers have degrees in philosophy, geography, mathematics, civil engineering, law, or history.

Bank managers don’t care that their employees have studied Old French poetry or Kant’s Kritik der reinen Vernunft. To employers, a university degree indicates perseverance and an ability to learn new things.

However, there are some specific things you can learn to get ahead. The following four skills will boost your career in finance. Continue reading “So you want to be a banker”

Ten years after Lehman Brothers

The ten year anniversary of Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy is fast approaching. Some quick thoughts on what has changed and what we’ve learned over the past decade, with a focus on Europe.

  1. Banks are much safer now than they were in the summer of 2008.
  2. There’s a remarkable lack of entrepreneurship in banking. A few fintechs offer payment services, but payments are only a small part of banking. Where are the new banks?
  3. Related to point 2, and something I’ve changed my mind about over the years: bailing out the banks was the right thing to do. I highly doubt that we would have experienced much creative destruction by letting the financial system collapse. That being said, the way the bailouts were done was horrible.
  4. The way the European establishment handled the euro crisis was an abomination. Fiscal and monetary coordination across Europe would have resulted in lower unemployment, lower debt, lower taxes.
  5. Notwithstanding the importance of money in people’s daily lives, financial literacy is still limited.

Elke dag (Money) Laundry Day

Facebookpost over de rol van banken in de strijd tegen crimineel geld:

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