The Story of Money

In 1720, the South Sea Company was one of the most valuable businesses in Britain until a spectacular collapse in its publicly traded shares triggered the country’s first major stock market crisis. At the centre of the story was John Blunt, a shoemaker’s son who rose through the ranks of the financial world to become one of the company’s key architects. In this episode, hosts Robin Wigglesworth an...

William E Simon was a bond trader-turned US cabinet secretary under President Richard Nixon. He was also abrasive, polarising and the “father of private equity”, according to Hettie O’Brien, author of The Asset Class: How Private Equity Turned Capitalism Against Itself . She tells hosts Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth how Simon orchestrated a deal that was so revolutionary, and so lucrative, t...

Today, when you think of a dollar, the US dollar probably comes to mind first. But that hasn’t always been the case. In this episode of The Story of Money, Brendan Greeley, the author of The Almighty Dollar: 500 Years of the World's Most Powerful Money, explains the origins of the world’s first dollar, the Joachimstaler, and the hapless Bohemian count who played a role in its creation. Greeley, an...

In the mid-1990s, Albania appeared to be a nation on the rise. Emerging from decades of isolation and communist rule, people poured their savings into investment schemes that promised extraordinary returns. But many of those schemes were little more than giant Ponzi scams. When they collapsed in early 1997, millions of people lost everything. The financial meltdown triggered mass protests and arme...

Today, when people hear the name Richard Nixon, they probably think of Watergate. Few remember another one of his most controversial acts – his suspension of the dollar’s convertibility into gold. The “Nixon Shock” as it became known was a quintessentially America First policy, which shattered the postwar global monetary order. But the US president was far more concerned about juicing the US econo...

A century ago, when depositors lost confidence in a bank, they’d rush to withdraw their cash. In 1971, US president Richard Milhous Nixon faced a similar dilemma. But his problem wasn’t ordinary citizens fearing for their savings. Instead, it was America’s closest allies who were nervously eyeing the dwindling supply of gold in Fort Knox at a time when the dollar’s value was tied to gold and allie...

Priscilla Wakefield was a Quaker, writer and social reformer who believed financial security shouldn’t be reserved for the wealthy. Living in late 18th- and early 19th-century England, she founded the country’s first penny savings bank, giving working women and children a safe place to save. Victoria Bateman, author of Economica: A Global History of Women, Wealth and Power, tells hosts Gillian Tet...

Take 730 delegates from 44 countries, plus another 2,000 or so hangers-on. House them in a remote, dilapidated hotel with holes in the roof and broken furniture. Deliver a train wagon filled with alcohol. Throw in some Russian spies, German prisoners of war, a troupe of bombshell “secretaries” and a magician. And then have the lead protagonist, the world’s most famous economist, almost die of a he...

What is money? And what can a small island in Micronesia teach us about how it works? On Yap, a remote island in the western Pacific, giant calcite “Rai” stones once functioned as currency, where ownership and collective trust — rather than physical possession — defined wealth and status. In this episode of The Story of Money , macroeconomist and author Felix Martin joins hosts Gillian Tett and Ro...

In 19th-century America almost anyone could print their own money – and many did. One of the most notable figures to take this up was a man named James Brown, a charismatic conman who built a fortune producing fake banknotes. In this episode of The Story of Money, Stephen Mihm, a professor of history at the University of Georgia, introduces hosts Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth to “the hardest...

Every now and then a new technology comes along that changes everything – electricity, computers, potentially AI. In mid-19th-century America, that technology was the steam locomotive. It knitted the US economy together, driving the nation’s industrialisation during the Gilded Age. But along the way, it also caused one of the biggest financial crises in American history. FT Alphaville editor Robin...

Long before modern economics, rulers such as Hammurabi in ancient Mesopotamia grappled with a political problem that still haunts our economies today: when people’s debts grow faster than their ability to repay them, the entire economic system can start to crack. Hammurabi adopted a radical solution: cancel debts entirely. Amanda H Podany, professor emeritus of history at California State Polytech...

Does scientific, artistic or political brilliance translate into investing success? It’s a topical question with hedge funds today accused of sucking talent away from the rest of the economy. So, the FT’s Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth sat down with reporter Toby Nangle, who has dug into the archives to assess the investment portfolios of Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Winston Churchill, John...

The economist John Kenneth Galbraith once quipped that “there can be few fields of human endeavour in which history counts for so little as in the world of finance.” This show sets out to prove the opposite. Each week, FT columnist Gillian Tett and FT Alphaville editor Robin Wigglesworth dig into the ideas, personalities and institutions that have shaped global finance. From unregulated banking in...

For our final episode: Education start-up Byju’s quickly became the pride of India during the Covid-19 pandemic. But almost as fast as the company rose, it collapsed. The fallout has already resulted in millions of dollars’ worth of US court sanctions and allegations of witness tampering. The FT’s Mumbai bureau chief Chris Kay has been following the legal drama and examines what Byju’s demise mean...

After years of fast-paced growth, private credit is facing intense scrutiny. In recent months, investors have made requests to withdraw billions of dollars from the $2tn sector’s funds. The FT’s US private equity and deals editor Antoine Gara and US investment editor Eric Platt explain how we got to this critical moment, and what may be next for this pocket of Wall Street.    ...

This week, we are revisiting a favorite episode. The natural diamond industry is facing an existential threat: lab-grown diamonds. They are chemically and physically identical to natural stones but they are a fraction of the price. Eleanor Olcott, the FT’s China technology correspondent, travelled to the epicentre of lab-grown diamond production in the central Chinese province of Henan to see how...

Introducing Opus Dei , a new season of Untold from the Financial Times. Host Antonia Cundy uncovers the cultural and political influence of a controversial Catholic organisation in America. Opus Dei exists to help people get closer to God, but some members say they found other agendas – and unexpected harm – entangled in that spiritual mission. The first episode of Untold: Opus Dei launches March...

US President Donald Trump handed crypto companies a huge win last year when he signed a piece of legislation to regulate an important part of the digital currency world: stablecoins. But ever since then, Wall Street banks have been fighting to change parts of the law. The FT’s digital markets correspondent Nikou Asgari explains what’s provoked US banks and who might have the upper hand in this con...

Behind the Money has been nominated for an NYC Podcast Award in the Best Interview Podcast category. It’s an Audience Choice award, which means we need your help to win. Vote for us here .  And while you’re at it, vote for some other FT podcasts that have also been nominated. Our Tech Tonic podcast was nominated for Best Science & Tech Podcast. And our Swamp Notes podcast was nominated fo...

This week Michela and the FT’s US banking editor, Joshua Franklin, interview the co-creators of the hit television show, Industry . In its fourth season, the show follows the lives of ambitious young people making their way in London's financial centre. The season finale aired earlier this week, and in this episode, Michela and Joshua discuss with the creators, Mickey Down and Konrad Kay, the over...

Raids by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement have made national headlines. But behind ICE’s operations, a sprawling web of private companies – from global powerhouses to niche family-run businesses – have secured hundreds of millions of dollars in government contracts. Peter Andringa from the FT’s visual investigations team spent months crawling through federal documents and data sets to pu...

Partners Group pursued an innovative approach to private equity: The firm built a business serving a market of individual investors. Now, a recent executive order from US President Donald Trump is set to unlock that marketplace on an even grander scale. The only thing is, Partners might not be the one to reap the rewards. The FT’s US private equity and deals editor Antoine Gara and private capital...

When the hedge fund Elliott Management pursued the acquisition of the oil refinery business Citgo a few years ago, the deal was already a complicated one. A US court had ordered its current owner, Venezuela, to sell the business, and the country was not happy about it. But, things only got thornier after the US President Donald Trump removed the Caribbean nation’s leader Nicolás Maduro. The FT’s U...

US President Donald Trump on Friday made his pick to lead the Federal Reserve: Kevin Warsh. The former central bank governor with ties to Wall Street is seen as a mainstream pick. Still, some economists say if Warsh is confirmed, he will trigger a sweeping rethink of the Fed’s role at the centre of the world’s biggest economy. The FT’s US economics editor Claire Jones explains who Warsh is, what h...