I just watched this movie this afternoon. It is about the 2007-2008 financial crisis. I just divorced my ex-wife in 2006, and I was working at my previous company. Since I was renting and did not have any investments, I was not really impacted by the financial crisis. There may have been a layoff at work, but I kept my job at the time. House prices did drop as a result, and we purchased our current house in December 2009. The market did drop further but as we all know now, rebounded with a vengeance, especially in Southern Califonria.
Even though I work in finance, I learned quite a bit from the movie, especially investment terms. I also like the way the movie was filmed/edited. There were many reality TV show sidebars that were included in the actual scene. The “explainers” by random celebrities were great too.
It is kind of racist, playing off the stereotype that all Asians or Chinese are good at math. However, it is also a bit ironic since most of my finance career has been building models in Excel, and being an ex-engineer has definitely helped. When I applied to business school, my cousin-in-law was teaching at NYU Stern. She said I should apply there, hinting that she may be able to help with the admissions process. Would I have ended up on Wall Street as an analyst versus starting my finance career in corporate planning?
Recently, I have been invited to invest in a bond fund managed by a church cell group member. Even though I was the treasurer of a large company for three years, I know next to nothing about investing, and have zero knowledge about the bond market. My friend did explain a lot of things over several lunches, but it is still mostly a big black box for me. Since his bond fund is also mortgage-backed securities focuses, I should have him explain the movie to me.
Life with chronic diseases 