Financial regulation

Did you know that a secretive thing called private equity owns almost 10 per cent of the UK economy? Did you know that it controls the jobs of several million people and may well own your local hospital, water supply, children’s school or even your home? No? Here is a book that aims to straighten you out on all that. Private equity is one of those things that you either know about or don’t. If you are in the finance business you know, because it is the story of the past quarter century. If you are not in that world, if leveraged buyouts and limited partners and debt pushdowns are

On the outskirts of Fort Worth, Texas, there is a two-storey factory churning out a vast number of dollar bills every day for the United States Federal Reserve. When Oliver Bullough visited, he counted 129 pallets in one room, collectively containing more than $4 billion. He also watched a woman use a jack to casually shift another $64 million across the concrete floor. Yet he barely used cash on his visit to the Lone Star state, relying on credit cards and smartphone apps, apart from when tipping waiters. As he points out, this is increasingly typical: many fewer Americans or Brits are bothering with cash, and when they do it