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  • Published: 25 October 2012
  • ISBN: 9780141975849
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 576

High Financier

The Lives and Time of Siegmund Warburg




'Beautifully paced, dramatically subtle and psychologically shrewd, this is Ferguson at his finest' Peter Stormonth Darling, Spectator

In this groundbreaking biography, based on more than 10,000 hitherto unavailable letters and diary entries, Niall Ferguson returns to his roots as a financial historian to tell the story of the extraordinary Siegmund Warburg.

A refugee from Hitler's Germany, Warburg rose to become the dominant figure in the post-war City of London and one of the architects of European financial integration. Seared by events in the 1930s, when the long-established Warburg bank was first almost destroyed by the Depression and then 'Aryanized' by the Nazis, Warburg was determined that his own bank would learn from the past and contribute to the economic recovery of Britain, the unity of Western Europe and the birth of globalization.

Siegmund Warburg was a complex and ambivalent man, as much a psychologist, politician and actor-manager as a banker. In High Financier Niall Ferguson reveals Warburg's idiosyncracies but above all he recaptures the meticulous business methods and strict ethical code that set Warburg apart from the mere speculators and traders who inhabit today's financial world.

  • Published: 25 October 2012
  • ISBN: 9780141975849
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 576

About the author

Niall Ferguson

Niall Ferguson is one of Britain's most renowned historians. He is a Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, a Senior Research Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford University, and a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. The bestselling author of Paper and Iron, The House of Rothschild, The Pity of War, The Cash Nexus, Empire and Colossus, he also writes regularly for newspapers and magazines all over the world. Since 2003 he has written and presented three highly successful television documentary series for Channel Four: Empire, American Colossus and, most recently, The War of the World. He, his wife and three children divide their time between the United Kingdom and the United States.

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Praise for High Financier

Beautifully paced, dramatically subtle and psychologically shrewd, this is Ferguson at his finest

Peter Stormonth Darling, Spectator

Ferguson is a talented writer, capable of grace and insight, but it is his ability as a historian that shows most strongly in High Financier

T. J. Stiles, The Washington Post Sunday

Its many finance lessons aside, High Financier is a pleasure to read simply as a work of literary skill. It is not only prodigiously researched but also splendidly written-clear and vivid and precise, perhaps even of enough merit to satisfy a word-stickler like Siegmund Warburg

Wall Street Journal

A timely, original and engaging biography of Siegmund Warburg

Sathnam Sanghera, The Times

This book is both a notable contribution to economic history and a fascinating portrait

Geoffrey Owen, Telegraph