Ever since the earliest days of commerce, businesspeople have organized themselves into partnerships. They formed groups with a common interest and worked together as a single unit, assuming both the risks and rewards of the business. It was a natural way of achieving a common goal. If the business succeeded, all of the partners made money. If it flourished, the partners even sometimes became rich. However, success wasn't assured and if the business failed, they all suffered together. In addition to a multitude of other industries, this was the model that dominated how Wall Street firms operated up until the 1980's. Beginning in the 1980's, it was not uncommon to find that a freshly-hired trainee - a kid literally right out of college - knew more about the new financial instruments than the CEO of the firm that hired him. In some instances, the kids were learning about the finer points of newly-invented instruments before their managers knew they even existed. These were the new breed of traders scattered across the trading desks. The individuals whose stories compose the contents of this book are some of the smartest people you'll ever read about. They had an intimate understanding of the markets and how best to make money from them, but they also had an equally in-depth knowledge of some of the flaws in the markets. Or sometimes, flaws in the systems at the banks themselves. They used their knowledge to make money. And when that failed, they often used their knowledge of how they system was structured to hide their losses. And when that failed, there was no turning back. Scott E.D. Skyrm is one of the leading figures in the repo and securities finance markets today, and regularly quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, Bloomberg News Service, Reuters, Market News, and Dow Jones. He is highly regarded as a former salesman, trader, trading desk manager, and global business head in fixed-income, securities finance, and securities clearing and settlement. He recently left Newedge, where he was their "Global Head of Repo, Money Markets, and Fixed Income Clearing." He now is writing commentaries on the repo market, the short-end of the Treasury market, Federal Reserve policy and general Wall Street topics. He has worked on Wall Street for over 22 years and has taken billion-dollar risks on the trading floor, managed a multi-billion dollar balance sheet, and consistently ran one of the most profitable trading groups at every firm where he worked. Prior to Newedge, he managed the repo desk at ING Barings, worked summers at Shearson Lehman/American Express and started his full-time career at The Bank of Tokyo.

""Skyrm makes complex financial scenarios accessible to all interested readers in an informative and entertaining manner. We can all learn something from this book." -Thomas Peterffy, Chairman, CEO, and President of Interactive Brokers "Skyrm put together the story of MF Global like no one else could in providing the ultimate autopsy covering destructive financial engineering that's played such a big role in our capital markets." -Lawrence G. McDonald, New York Times best selling author of A Colossal Failure of Common Sense "God is in the details...first come the reporters, then the lawyers. Skyrm's book is the necessary antidote. Only someone who has 'done' it can explain it. Perhaps the best 'counterfactual' rationale for reading The Money Noose: If John Corzine had been able to before, there would likely have been no after." -Stan Jonas, Managing Partner, Axiom Management Partners In 2010, President Barack Obama signed into law the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. MF Global was bankrupt less than a year after the law's passage. THE MONEY NOOSE is a general accounting of the facts that led to MF Global's collapse, as well as the story of the major players involved. It is a chaotic story, one in which individual actions taken in and of themselves are relatively minor. But the sum of those individual actions equal the same end result. How, then, can investors protect themselves from this outcome? The best answer is education. Investors need to be fully aware of what is involved in the investment process, and that includes an understanding of seg funds. It is, after all, their money. This book is designed to tell the story of MF Global, what went wrong and how things came to an abrupt end. In those regards, it's an incredible story. Scott E.D. Skyrm is one of the leading figures in the repo and securities finance markets today, and regularly quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, Bloomberg News Service, Reuters, Market News, and Dow Jones. He is highly regarded as a former salesman, trader, trading desk manager, and global business head in fixed-income, securities finance, and securities clearing and settlement. He recently left Newedge, where he was their "Global Head of Repo, Money Markets, and Fixed Income Clearing." He now is writing commentaries on the repo market, the short-end of the Treasury market, Federal Reserve policy and general Wall Street topics. He has worked on Wall Street for over 22 years and has taken billion-dollar risks on the trading floor, managed a multi-billion dollar balance sheet, and consistently ran one of the most profitable trading groups at every firm where he worked. Prior to Newedge, he managed the repo desk at ING Barings, worked summers at Shearson Lehman/American Express and started his full-time career at The Bank of Tokyo.