A Long Time In Finance

"What is all this about being big?" asked the actor Anthony Hopkins in a famous (if toe-curling) ad from 2000 for Barclays Bank. "You know, seeing the big picture, having the big idea, clinching the big deal; no one wants to clinch the little deal." For decades the British bank followed this restless urge, always trying to get bigger, to keep up with the biggest banks in the world. Neil and Jonathan talk to author and former banker Philip Augar about where it came from, how it led a stuffy old British bank to tie themselves to the one man who seemed able to deliver bigness, Bob Diamond, and how those aspirations turned to dustPresented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.With Philip Auguar.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.In partnership with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Charles Ponzi was the first, FTX perhaps the latest, but few "rob Peter to pay Paul" schemes will ever match the sheer scale and staying power of Bernie Madoff's $64bn heist. As a new documentary airs about the "Monster of Wall St", Neil and Jonathan talk to author and fraud connoisseur Dan Davies about the world's most destructive Ponzi scheme.Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.With Dan Davies.Executive produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.Produced by Ewan Cameron.In association with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this final episode of our six part series, Neil tells the story of the rise and fall of Bernie Cornfeld, mutual fund peddlar extraordinaire and founder of Investors Overseas Services, whose pitch to the aspiring affluent was "Do you sincerely want to be rich?" (Spoiler alert: they didn't end up getting rich.)Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.In partnership with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the fifth of our historical series, Jonathan tells the story of Clarence Saunders - grocer extraordinaire, entrepreneur and valiant battler against the soulless money-makers of Wall Street - and how he attempted the last great corner on the New York Stock Exchange.Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.In association with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the fourth of our series of historical shorts, Neil explains how a competition case before the Restrictive Practices Court in the early 1980s led to the reforms that turned the London Stock Exchange from the Hogwartian Victorian club he remembers from his own time "on the floor" in the Swinging Sixties to the polyglot digital marketplace we know and love today. Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.Made in association with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On May 15 1648, the same day Holland signed the Treaty of Munster ending its 80 year war with Spain, a Dutch canal board issued a bond of 1,000 Carolus guilders to a Mr Niclaes de Meijer of Utrecht promising to pay him 5 per interest in perpetuity. In the latest of our Long Time Shorts, Jonathan explains how that promise is still being kept 374 years later, what Mr de Meijer's bond might be worth today, and why the Dutch are so good (relatively speaking) at meeting their financial obligations. Lang leve Nederland!Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.In association with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the second of our six-part series of historical shorts, Neil takes us back to the 1970s; a benighted time when you could only take £50 per head out of the country on your foreign holidays. We explain the regime that underpinned this miserable system, how it criminalised the otherwise law-abiding middle classes, and why its much feared (by HM Treasury) abolition in 1979 was the dog that didn't bark.Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.Made in partnership with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Introducing a new six part series - "Long Time Shorts", in which we serve up quick hits of financial history every Friday, Monday and Wednesday for the next two weeks. In this first episode, Neil and Jonathan look at the story of French thirty-something Max-Hervé George, whose father bought him a magical insurance policy; how this gave him the gift of 20-20 hindsight, and the agony it caused the insurance company that sold it.Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.In partnership with Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

“For too long in this country, we have indulged in a fight over redistribution. Now, we need to focus on growth, not just how we tax and spend," said Kawsi Kwarteng on September 23. Unfortunately for the chancellor, the bond markets didn't agree with him; yields ballooned, and a few days later he was out, followed swiftly by his boss Liz Truss. So where does that leave the UK's stressed public finances? In the second of our two part series, Neil and Jonathan talk to Britain's top bond vigilante, Jim Leaviss, and investor and writer Felix Martin about austerity, inflation, debt sustainability and where we go next.Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.With Jim Leaviss and Felix Martin.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot.Additional editing by Ewan Cameron.Sponsored by Briefcase.News Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

"Let us be, say I, a free Nation deep in Debt.. rather than a Nation of Slaves owing nothing.” So wrote a pamphleteer in 1720 about the remorseless rise of Britain's National Debt.At a time of mounting concern about the public finances, we launch a two part series on the National Debt, starting with its ups and downs over two centuries with historian James Macdonald.Presented by Jonathan Ford and Neil Collins.With James Macdonald.Produced and edited by Nick Hilton for Podot. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.