The Bank That Lived a Little: Barclays in the Age of the Very Free Market Audiobook (Free)

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of THE LENDER that Lived just a little by Phillip Augar, read by Jonathan Keeble.

Based on unequalled usage of those involved, and informed with compelling rate and drama, THE LENDER that Lived just a little may be the story of one of the most familiar brands on the British high street since Big Bang in 1986. Philip Augar identifies at length three years of boardroom intrigue driven by ruthless ambition, grandiose dreams and a desire for wealth. It really is a tale of a struggle about THE LENDER That Lived a Little: Barclays in the Age of the Very Free Market for long-term supremacy between rival strategies and their adherents – one camp desperate for Barclays to join the top table of global banking institutions, the various other preferring a smaller sized domestic role more commensurate with the bank’s sober Quaker roots. This proper disagreement continues to separate opinion within Barclays, the City and beyond.

This is a fantastic corporate thriller, an internal chronicle of personal feuds, but a lot more besides: Augar implies that Barclays’ experiences are a paradigm for Britain’s social and economic life over thirty years, which saw the City move in the edge of the economy to its very centre. These decades created unprecedented success for a little number, and made the reputations of governments and people but then remaining most of them in tatters. The leveraged culture, the winner-takes-all mentality and our present era of austerity can all be traced towards the influence of banks such as Barclays. Augar’s publication tells this rollercoaster tale through the perspective of several of its participants – and in addition of those suffering from the hold they found have on Britain.