January 9, 2009

Bankers are hardly babes in the woods, but it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say that 2008 was the year when financial services professionals lost their innocence. Mighty institutions and powerful executives not only fell from power but in many cases vanished altogether.

Adding to the disillusionment, it was unavoidably evident that these failures stemmed not only from the human traits of pride and greed, but also from fundamentally flawed business assumptions about markets, capital and risk.