Cover

Contents

Abbreviations

Acknowledgements

Introduction: The End of a Great Illusion

‘Liquidity’ and the Crisis of Invented Money

Liquidity Illusion and the Global Credit Crunch

1. The Stages of the Meltdown

The Prelude: The American Sub-Prime Crisis

From Sub-Prime Crisis to the Global Credit Crunch

From Global Credit Crunch to Global Recession

2. The Tale of Northern Rock:Between Financial Innovationand Fraud

The Controversy Over Financial Innovation

Offshore: The Uses and Abuses of SPVs

Northern Rock and Granite

3. How the Crisis HasBeen Understood

Ex-Ante and Ex-Post Visions of the Credit Crunch

Structural Theories of the Credit Crunch

Cyclical Theories of the Crisis

4. Some Uncomfortable Puzzlesof the Credit Crunch

Dismissed: The Warning Signs and the Whistleblowers

Ponzi Capitalism: A Crisis of Fraud?

5. 2002–7: The Three Pillarsof the Liquidity Illusion

Liquidity and the Paradigm of Self-Regulating Credit

Playing with Debt – Together. Liquidity as a‘State of Mind’

The Alchemists: Turning Bad Debts into ‘Money’

6. After the Meltdown: Rewritingthe Rules of Global Finance?

The Three Stages of the Policy Response

The Crisis and Geopolitics: A New Special Relationship?

Conceptual Dilemmas and Traps

Conclusion: A Very Mundane Crisis

Notes

Bibliography

Index