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movie review - Margin Call

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

This is a dramatic telling of the implosion of an investment bank during the (totally over) Great Financial Crisis. It features a young risk "quant" who is given some important research by a superior as that man is being walked (escorted out after being fired). The implosion is being precipitated by the bank's senior management because it senses that it's time for one of the periodic contractions that plague the "industry". But when the young quant runs the numbers in the model, he makes some terrifying discoveries. In short, many of the bank's holdings are likely worth nothing and it's time to divest itself of those holdings before The Street catches on.

What I liked about this was two part: when all this went down, I was a "VP" at an investment bank (in the IT department) that had not one but two of the LIBOR scandal dudes on staff; and two, it's a very smooth telling of a crisis, regardless of the telling. I've worked at three investment banks (including two household names) and can state without question that the characters and events and the dialog are all 100% typical of that "industry" (it's a funny industry that produces nothing but its own participants bonuses). The attitude toward risk is very accurately portrayed, and the repercussions (virtually everyone loses their jobs in this thing) are as well.

A favorite. Strongly recommended.