Well, just read the news and you will find that behind the biggest names in the world, with the sudden turn of wind, even the most prestigious giants fall instantly. But what I am interested in is not the discussion of this financial fall, but the beginning to the discussions of morality in all of this.
It was asked on CNN a couple of days ago why it was that people did not have much sympathy for those who lost their jobs on Wall Street and Canary Wharf. Indeed, I have a couple of friends myself who became victims of the credit crunch, and some of them are having really hard time adjusting to low life again after experiencing the high life. But one of the reasons given were that they earned far beyond any other industries and the amount of bonuses they received for their service to these investment banks meant that they would be able to survive. Sun had discussed this problem of morality in the investment banking industry many times before. Although I haven’t yet had the chance to sit down and have a chat with him about Lehman, I know for one we are glad to see this global adjustment to a more moral conduct in the banking industry (well, I could see problems with respect to competition when mergers such as HBOS and Loydes TSB). Perhaps I am no one to make judgments on this and I hope a lot of my friends, close friends, don’t loose their jobs over this crash - but I personally believe that the world would be a better place when the market is more driven by creativity and productivity rather than the ability to draw money from trading and being the middle man. For instance, YGG who is probably the brightest engineer I know, would be a much better contributor to society if he were to create technology rather than generating income from trades.
Maybe its just that I never really did understand the meaning of investment banks and their importance to today’s society. Yes, in a way, there would be a knock on effect if these giants were to fail, but would the world be a better place without them (from an outsider point of view)?
We’ll wait and see…Like all great things, they end someday.