Going to get an opportunity to meet him at school soon, and trying to think of an interesting question. Financial topics are the obvious choice, but baseball is not bad either(never read moneyball though, just know the jist). Going to attempt to pound out his new book before he comes, but not much time between the release and when he comes…
Why did he quit finance?
CFA or M…
Isn’t he the one who wrote The Blind Side? Ask him how he feels that the movie made on his book got oscar nominations?
Moneyball was good and the Blind Side was awful, what happened?
Will CFA help me get a FO analyst job?
pupdawg82 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Isn’t he the one who wrote The Blind Side? Ask him > how he feels that the movie made on his book got > oscar nominations? He did write the the book, but I did not see the movie nor read the book. Probably going to stick to topics I generally understand(plus I would bet someone else will bring that one up)… At least with baseball, I understand all of the metrics he basically highlighted.
Do you still think Warren Buffet is a dummy who doesn’t understand the new economy? (Re: the New New Thing – he wrote that garbage during the tech boom). Do you still think John Meriweather is a genius? (Re: Liar Poker – one of the heros of the book who later presided over the collapse of LTCM and yet another HF collapse during the credit crisis). Do you still think that MBSs are very safe investments because “the law of large numbers dictates that very few mortgages in a bundle will default at once?” (Re: Liars Poker). How is Tabitha Soren (his wife) doing? Do you know Kurt Loder? How does one major in Art History, work as a salesman for 2 years and then presume to know anything about finance or football?
$tarving_Banker Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Will CFA help me get a FO analyst job? I doubt anyone knows the answer that that one!
Forgot about Moneyball: Why didn’t you mention steroids? Its easy to draft a bunch of nobodies who turn into stars if said nobodies do a bunch of steroids (Giambi, Tejada and several others). How does Oakland suck so much?
“How does one major in Art History, work as a salesman for 2 years and then presume to know anything about finance or football?” Dont forget baseball! Although you see scattered references throughout Liar’s Poker, so i am thinking he had to be some huge fan already. Its actually a really good question worded the right way though. Pretty wide range of topics to basically hit home runs with each time.
joemontana Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Forgot about Moneyball: Why didn’t you mention > steroids? Its easy to draft a bunch of nobodies > who turn into stars if said nobodies do a bunch of > steroids (Giambi, Tejada and several others). > > How does Oakland suck so much? I am a HUGE football fan, but Moneyball was actually a huge deal. Statistics are amazingly important in baseball. I can not think of another sport where statistics in some cases matter more then the ACTUAL numbers at least as far as valuing talent goes(scouting).
joemontana Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- How does one major in Art > History, work as a salesman for 2 years and then > presume to know anything about finance or > football? He worked at Solly when Solly was THE place to be, I’ll take that kind of perspective over someone with a nice polished finance degree any day. I do agree with your take that he’s a bit of a loudmouth @sshole so I like the other questions.
joemontana Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > > How is Tabitha Soren (his wife) doing? Do you > know Kurt Loder? How does one major in Art > History, work as a salesman for 2 years and then > presume to know anything about finance or > football? this one’s hilarious, I might just ask it. He will be speaking at a local bookstore next week.
Thanks for the all the ideas people. I think this thread helped me brainstorm a bit wider and think of some better stuff.
NakedPuts Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > He worked at Solly when Solly was THE place to be, > I’ll take that kind of perspective over someone > with a nice polished finance degree any day. I do > agree with your take that he’s a bit of a > loudmouth @sshole so I like the other questions. 100% true – However: - He was a salesman in London, not a trader in the NYC headquarters. He lasted just a few years. - His depiction of Meriwheather’s responsibilities is disputed. I’ve read that Meriweather was more of a supervisor/mentor of traders rather than a trader himself by the 1980s - He arrived at SB after the heady early 80s days when Ranieri’s guys really catapulted SB into the stratosphere It seems that he printed company legend rather than fact. He was a quasi-insider at best. He didn’t really seem to understand what some of those securitization guys were doing. I read Liar’s Poker during the credit crisis and I laughed out loud out some of his statements about risk. And yes- I have read many of his books. He is a gifted story teller and a fine prose writer. He is not an expert on anything, however, and one should not ask him hard questions about finance/economics. He simply writes books that are good to read on the $h*****r.
I would ask him if he knew that his publisher WW Norton was going to market him as the author for “Panic”, when he really only edited the book.
^ don’t ask that question but I think rather than asking “what would you ask michael lewis” , srwarrington, you should ask yourself, what do you want to spawn from your conversation with mike, and back into intelligent questions from there.
Your absolutely correct Philip, but really there is nothing to gain from this in a personal sense. He is coming to speak to a small group of us and is going to field some questions. The better the questions the better the discussion. I figured alot of people have read his books. A few people have mentioned interesting topics at least. His new book will probably offer some more current topics of discussion as well. Plus I can probably ask very technical questions on the new stuff if I want.
Ask him what he would ask Michael Lewis if he had a chance to talk to Michael Lewis. Bonus points if he answers that he would ask Michael Lewis what Michael Lewis would ask Michael Lewis if he could talk to Michael Lewis.