The Big Short Analysis

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Summary: The film title The Big Short reflects the central point of the story. A “short” in the financial industry is a term describing selling a stock (or other financial commodity) without owning it. It is also used to describe the position where you have sold a stock short. Therefore the risk takers in this story definitely did make ‘a big short’ by setting Michael Burr’s idea into action. Therefore, in a nutshell, The Big Short is based on the true story of four men in the US financial world who saw what the big banks, media and government didn’t: the a glitch in the financial industry which inevitably could lead to the collapse of the US economy. These men decided to make a risky investment that took them into the sinister, dark underworld…show more content…
Democratic: Michael Burry prefers working with people in his company - he enjoys listening to the different opinions of his colleagues and not just coming up with his own ideas to put forward and insisting they are followed. 2. Autocratic: The banker of Deutsche Bank is offered 200 million dollars, and his accomplice rejects – however he interrupts him and accepts Burry’s money. This shows how the leader makes all the decisions without taking opinions of the employee’s. 3. Laissez-faire: Michael Burry definitely portrays this style of leadership (coming from the French)firstly preferring a more casual approach to office wear (as opposed to traditional Wall Street suit and tie) and wore shorts, chose bare feet and a Supercuts (cheap)haircut. Laissez-faire management within the company allowed Burry to do largely as he pleased and lead the others, allowing them to make their own decisions. Burry was allowed to perform tasks by himself and think for himself without getting approval from the managers. 4. Transactional: Mark Baum adopts this style of leadership as he offers the huge benefits of Jarred’s scheme to his bank colleagues. He offers them the idea of backing the scheme so he could also cash in on the results, therefore getting a huge amount…show more content…
Investments If an investment takes place when someone invests money for profit then The Big Short fell ‘short’ of actually making any kind of investment to make the enormous amount of money that they did – as NO MONEY was invested. Instead, Burry bet against the banks and used the bank’s mistakes to generate huge sums of money. The history behind why the banks failed the US citizens is the fact that the U.S. government had designed a policy to encourage people to own their own home. The government believed everyone should be living the ‘American Dream’. A wonderful idea and plan - except for the details! Two things happened in the 1990s and early 2000s that destroyed the American Dream for hundreds and thousands of U.S. citizens: 1) mortgages were approved for buyers who were not in a financial position to make/honour their payments, and 2) banks bundled and sold these mortgages as if they were a solid investment. This shows once again that there were no honourable, ethical investments made in The Big Short, just a devious move from someone who could see the flaws in the banking
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