Burning Down the House
Subtitle: How greed, deceit, and bitter revenge destroyed E. F. Hutton
By: James Sterngold.
Publisher: Summit Books
Published: 1990
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 305
Subjects: E.F. Hutton & Company -- History.; Stockbrokers -- United States -- History.
Description: The collapse of E. F. Hutton, once one of America's most successful financial institutions, is a penetrating tale of greed and power gone amok. In blind pursuit of enormous profits, Hutton spiraled out of control, finally pleading guilty to over 2,000 counts of fraud. But Hutton's problems lay deeper than even the revealing details of its outlandish schemes: It was ripped apart by huge egos, intense personal battles, and a search for a scapegoat — resulting in the bitter final fight for control and a scramble for the spoils as it went under.

_Burning Down the House_ is the gripping inside story of this orgy of greed, told by New York Times reporter James Sterngold who covered the story from beginning to end. At the center of the storm is the raging duel between the hard-drinking, self-indulgent Hutton chairman Robert Fomon, and his hand-picked president Robert (Ritt) Rittereiser, who innocently believed he had finally made it to the top with his appointment. Fomon's antics had entered Wall Street legend: his public humiliation of employees; his heavy drinking, which contributed to his declining health; and a management philosophy that allowed the corrupt schemes at Hutton to flourish. The consummate corporate warrior, Fomon had no plans to hand Ritt real power. But as Hutton plunged toward financial disaster, Ritt naively tried to save the house and his job. Even after being thrown out of the firm, the manipulative Fomon continued to control both Hutton's and Ritt's fates. From the rubble, Fomon walked away with a fortune while Ritt was left out in the cold. Sterngold vividly captures the rise and fall of the brokerage house, the backroom negotiating and shady power plays of some of Wall Street's and America's biggest names:

* **Peter Cohen**, Shearson's chairman, whose Midas touch deserted him when he decided he had to have the dying Hutton;
* **John Shad**, veteran of the Wall Street wars, who was outmaneuvered by Fomon for Hutton's presidency and then endured Fomon's public humiliations until leaving to become chairman of the Securities & Exchange Commission;
* **Peter Ueberroth**, hero of the 1984 Olympics and ex-commissioner of baseball, who joined the Hutton board in troubled times and watched as it sank into chaos, but bluffed Shearson into overpaying by $500 million and earned himself a $1 million fee in the process;
* **Griffin Bell**, former attorney general, whose investigation of Hutton led to his term the "Hutton Salute," a metaphor for the rampant evasion of responsibility. Sterngold's provocative account of the fall of E. F. Hutton is a gripping portrait of Wall Street at the end of the 1980s.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Acknowledgments
pagenum: 7; title: Preface
pagenum: 13; label: Chapter 1
title: Hostage to the Past
pagenum: 17; label: Chapter 2
title: Marrying Well
pagenum: 26; label: Chapter 3
title: An Insecure King
pagenum: 35; label: Chapter 4
title: The Double Double Cross
pagenum: 44; label: Chapter 5
title: The Golden Years
pagenum: 57; label: Chapter 6
title: Cut Loose
pagenum: 72; label: Chapter 7
title: A Real Wrench
pagenum: 89; label: Chapter 8
title: Running Out of Control
pagenum: 101; label: Chapter 9
title: Up the Creek
pagenum: 110; label: Chapter 10
title: Great News for the Mafia
pagenum: 129; label: Chapter 11
title: The Cleanest Firm on the Street
pagenum: 141; label: Chapter 12
title: The Hutton Salute
pagenum: 153; label: Chapter 13
title: Behind the Curtain
pagenum: 166; label: Chapter 14
title: Building the Partnership
pagenum: 176; label: Chapter 15
title: Operation Fruitbasket
pagenum: 186; label: Chapter 16
title: What's an Arb?
pagenum: 198; label: Chapter 17
title: The King is Dead - Long Live the King
pagenum: 211; label: Chapter 18
title: Attack of the Registered Reptiles
pagenum: 222; label: Chapter 19
title: A Small Revolution
pagenum: 232; label: Chapter 20
title: The Bear Begins to Growl
pagenum: 239; label: Chapter 21
title: Anatomy of a Collapse
pagenum: 249; label: Chapter 22
title: A Taste of Revenge
pagenum: 259; label: Chapter 23
title: Burning
pagenum: 266; label: Chapter 24
title: A Sixteen
pagenum: 275; title: Epilogue
pagenum: 283; title: Index
pagenum: 293