Review: Flash Boys

Flash Boys by Michael Lewis
My rating: 0 of 5 stars

Flash Boys is one of this non-fiction books, that reads like a thriller. Once I started, I could barely keep my hands off it. The tale is gripping, the writing is crisp and the subject matter quite interesting. In the high stakes world of Wall Street finance, Flash Boys is the tale a of a band of brothers, a group of rebels who unearthed a loophole in the system, and decided not to exploit it. Had they joined the bandwagon, they would have been richer by millions of dollars, and their firms, perhaps by billions of dollars, and this book would not have been born. Praise be to them, that these amazing people led by Brad Katsuyama, decided to take a corrupt and selfish system head-on. These people took an incredible amount of risk, and could have been very easily engulfed by the monster they were trying to slay. Fortunately, for them, and for everyone else who was also suffering, unknowingly, the Flash boys were able to bring the matters to light. It warms one's heart to learn that there are people who, in spite of the spoils, in spite of the odds stacked against them, would still choose to right a wrong. Incredible.

To quote the author, Michael Lewis, on this subject:

"If this story has a soul, it is in the decisions made by its principal characters to resist the temptation of easy money and to pay special attention to the spirit in which they live their working lives. I didn’t write about them because they were controversial. I wrote about them because they were admirable. That some minority on Wall Street is getting rich by exploiting a screwed-up financial system is no longer news. That is the story of the last financial crisis, and probably the next one, too. What comes as news is that there is now a minority on Wall Street trying to fix the system. Their new stock market is flourishing; their company is profitable; Goldman Sachs remains their biggest single source of orders; they still seem to be on their way to changing the world. All they need is a little help from the silent majority."


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