"A savvy financial journalist with a moral sensibility... Lowenstein steps behind the numbers to examine the culture that led to the creation and the bursting Of the stock market bubble at the turn of the millennium.., with authority, force, and just the right amount of outrage."

--JOHN P. MELLO, THE BOSTON GLOBE

"The best interpretations of the marketplace and the so-called new economy come from ... Roger Lowenstein, a master (as I first learned from his book When Genius Fai/ed) at making our financial pirates as interesting as those who sailed with Long John Silver."

--ROBERT SHERRILL, TIlE NATION

Hailed by The New York Times Book Reviewas "one of the best financial journalists there is," bestselling author Roger Lowenstein now turns his attention to the tumultuous 1990s in Origins of the Crash. With his singular gift for turning complex financial events into eminently readable stories, Lowenstein lays bare the labyrinthine events of that manic period. In an enthralling narrative, he ties together all of the characters of the great boom and bust and offers a unique portrayal of the culture of the era. Just as John Kenneth Galbraith’s The Great Crash was the canonical text of the Great Depression, Lowenstein’s Origins of the Crash is destined to be the book that will frame our understanding of the 1990s.

Acknowledgments

ORIGINS OF A CULTURE

EARLY NINETIEs--A CULTURE IS RICH

ENLIGHTENMENT GETS OUT OF HAND

NUMBER GAMES

DOORMEN AT NOON

NEW ECONOMY, OLD ERRORS

ENRON

BANKRUPT

YEAR OF THE LOCUSTS

EPILOGUE

Notes

Index