The Rise and Fall of the City of Money

The Rise and Fall of the City of Money PDF Author: Ray Perman
Publisher: Birlinn Ltd
ISBN: 178885229X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 512

Get Book Here

Book Description
It started and ended with a financial catastrophe. The Darien disaster of 1700 drove Scotland into union with England, but spawned the institutions which transformed Edinburgh into a global financial centre. The crash of 2008 wrecked the city's two largest and oldest banks – and its reputation. In the three intervening centuries, Edinburgh became a hothouse of financial innovation, prudent banking, reliable insurance and smart investing. The face of the city changed too as money transformed it from medieval squalor to Georgian elegance. This is the story, not just of the institutions which were respected worldwide, but of the personalities too, such as the two hard-drinking Presbyterian ministers who founded the first actuarially-based pension fund; Sir Walter Scott, who faced financial ruin, but wrote his way out of it; the men who financed American railways and eastern rubber plantations with Scottish money; and Fred Goodwin, notorious CEO of RBS, who took the bank to be the biggest in the world, but crashed and burned in 2008.

The Rise and Fall of the City of Money

The Rise and Fall of the City of Money PDF Author: Ray Perman
Publisher: Birlinn Ltd
ISBN: 178885229X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 512

Get Book Here

Book Description
It started and ended with a financial catastrophe. The Darien disaster of 1700 drove Scotland into union with England, but spawned the institutions which transformed Edinburgh into a global financial centre. The crash of 2008 wrecked the city's two largest and oldest banks – and its reputation. In the three intervening centuries, Edinburgh became a hothouse of financial innovation, prudent banking, reliable insurance and smart investing. The face of the city changed too as money transformed it from medieval squalor to Georgian elegance. This is the story, not just of the institutions which were respected worldwide, but of the personalities too, such as the two hard-drinking Presbyterian ministers who founded the first actuarially-based pension fund; Sir Walter Scott, who faced financial ruin, but wrote his way out of it; the men who financed American railways and eastern rubber plantations with Scottish money; and Fred Goodwin, notorious CEO of RBS, who took the bank to be the biggest in the world, but crashed and burned in 2008.

The Story of the Commercial Bank of Scotland, Limited, During Its Hundred Years, from 1810-1910

The Story of the Commercial Bank of Scotland, Limited, During Its Hundred Years, from 1810-1910 PDF Author: James Lawson Anderson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Banks and banking
Languages : en
Pages : 176

Get Book Here

Book Description


Legislating Instability

Legislating Instability PDF Author: Tyler Beck Goodspeed
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674969014
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 221

Get Book Here

Book Description
From 1716 to 1845, Scotland’s banks were among the most dynamic and resilient in Europe, effectively absorbing a series of adverse economic shocks that rocked financial markets in London and on the continent. Legislating Instability explains the seeming paradox that the Scottish banking system achieved this success without the government controls usually considered necessary for economic stability. Eighteenth-century Scottish banks operated in a regulatory vacuum: no central bank to act as lender of last resort, no monopoly on issuing currency, no legal requirements for maintaining capital reserves, and no formal limits on bank size. These conditions produced a remarkably robust banking system, one that was intensely competitive and served as a prime engine of Scottish economic growth. Despite indicators that might have seemed red flags—large speculative capital flows, a fixed exchange rate, and substantial external debt—Scotland successfully navigated two severe financial crises during the Seven Years’ War. The exception was a severe financial crisis in 1772, seven years after the imposition of the first regulations on Scottish banking—the result of aggressive lobbying by large banks seeking to weed out competition. While these restrictions did not cause the 1772 crisis, Tyler Beck Goodspeed argues, they critically undermined the flexibility and resilience previously exhibited by Scottish finance, thereby elevating the risk that another adverse economic shock, such as occurred in 1772, might threaten financial stability more broadly. Far from revealing the shortcomings of unregulated banking, as Adam Smith claimed, the 1772 crisis exposed the risks of ill-conceived bank regulation.

The History of the Royal Bank of Scotland, 1727-1927

The History of the Royal Bank of Scotland, 1727-1927 PDF Author: Neil Munro
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Banks and banking
Languages : en
Pages : 508

Get Book Here

Book Description


British Banking

British Banking PDF Author: John Orbell
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1351954687
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 674

Get Book Here

Book Description
This substantially expanded new edition of the Guide to the Historical Records of British Banking contains details of over 700 archive collections held in local record offices, university and local libraries and of course, banks. This monumental reference work facilitates a wider knowledge and understanding of the history of British finance.

A History of Banking in All the Leading Nations

A History of Banking in All the Leading Nations PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Banks and banking
Languages : en
Pages : 514

Get Book Here

Book Description


Free Banking

Free Banking PDF Author: Randy Kroszner
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Free banking
Languages : en
Pages : 40

Get Book Here

Book Description


Experience of Free Banking

Experience of Free Banking PDF Author: Kevin Dowd
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134945604
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 288

Get Book Here

Book Description
First Published in 1992. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Scottish Banking

Scottish Banking PDF Author: S. G. Checkland
Publisher: Glasgow : Collins
ISBN:
Category : Banks and banking
Languages : en
Pages : 826

Get Book Here

Book Description


Shredded

Shredded PDF Author: Ian Fraser
Publisher: Birlinn
ISBN: 0857906232
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 498

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is the definitive account of the Royal Bank of Scotland scandal. For a few brief months in 2007 and 2009, the Royal Bank of Scotland was the largest bank in the world. Then the Edinburgh-based giant - having rapidly grown its footprint to 55 countries and stretched its assets to £2.4 trillion under its hubristic and delinquent former boss Fred Goodwin - crashed to earth. In Shredded, Ian Fraser explores the series of cataclysmic misjudgments, the toxic internal culture and the 'light touch' regulatory regime that gave rise to RBS/NatWest's near-collapse. He also considers why it became the most expensive bank in the world to bail out and why a culture of impunity was allowed to develop in the banking sector. This new edition brings the story up to date, chronicling the string of scandals that have come to light since taxpayers rescued RBS and concluding with an evaluation of the attempts of the bank's post-crisis chief executives, Stephen Hester and Ross McEwan, to dismantle Goodwin's disastrous legacy and restore the damaged institutions to health. 'A gripping account - RBS was a rogue business, operating in what had become a rogue industry, with the connivance of government. Read it and weep' – Martin Woolf, Financial Times