Politics & Government
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Dark Towers: Deutsche Bank, Donald Trump, and an Epic Trail of Destruction
#1 WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER * NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
New York Times finance editor David Enrich's explosive exposé of the most scandalous bank in the world, revealing its shadowy ties to Donald Trump, Putin's Russia, and Nazi Germany
"A jaw-dropping financial thriller" -Philadelphia Inquirer
UPDATED WITH NEW REVELATIONS FOLLOWING THE SUPREME COURT'S LANDMARK RULING ON TRUMP V. DEUTSCHE BANK
On a rainy Sunday in 2014, a senior executive at Deutsche Bank was found hanging in his London apartment. Bill Broeksmit had helped build the 150-year-old financial institution into a global colossus, and his sudden death was a mystery, made more so by the bank's efforts to deter investigation. Broeksmit, it turned out, was a man who knew too much.
In Dark Towers, award-winning journalist David Enrich reveals the truth about Deutsche Bank and its epic path of devastation. Tracing the bank's history back to its propping up of a default-prone American developer in the 1880s, helping the Nazis build Auschwitz, and wooing Eastern Bloc authoritarians, he shows how in the 1990s, via a succession of hard-charging executives, Deutsche made a fateful decision to pursue Wall Street riches, often at the expense of ethics and the law.
Soon, the bank was manipulating markets, violating international sanctions to aid terrorist regimes, scamming investors, defrauding regulators, and laundering money for Russian oligarchs. Ever desperate for an American foothold, Deutsche also started doing business with a self-promoting real estate magnate nearly every other bank in the world deemed too dangerous to touch: Donald Trump. Over the next twenty years, Deutsche executives loaned billions to Trump, the Kushner family, and an array of scandal-tarred clients, including convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Dark Towers is the never-before-told saga of how Deutsche Bank became the global face of financial recklessness and criminality-the corporate equivalent of a weapon of mass destruction. It is also the story of a man who was consumed by fear of what he'd seen at the bank-and his son's obsessive search for the secrets he kept.
New York Times finance editor David Enrich's explosive exposé of the most scandalous bank in the world, revealing its shadowy ties to Donald Trump, Putin's Russia, and Nazi Germany
"A jaw-dropping financial thriller" -Philadelphia Inquirer
UPDATED WITH NEW REVELATIONS FOLLOWING THE SUPREME COURT'S LANDMARK RULING ON TRUMP V. DEUTSCHE BANK
On a rainy Sunday in 2014, a senior executive at Deutsche Bank was found hanging in his London apartment. Bill Broeksmit had helped build the 150-year-old financial institution into a global colossus, and his sudden death was a mystery, made more so by the bank's efforts to deter investigation. Broeksmit, it turned out, was a man who knew too much.
In Dark Towers, award-winning journalist David Enrich reveals the truth about Deutsche Bank and its epic path of devastation. Tracing the bank's history back to its propping up of a default-prone American developer in the 1880s, helping the Nazis build Auschwitz, and wooing Eastern Bloc authoritarians, he shows how in the 1990s, via a succession of hard-charging executives, Deutsche made a fateful decision to pursue Wall Street riches, often at the expense of ethics and the law.
Soon, the bank was manipulating markets, violating international sanctions to aid terrorist regimes, scamming investors, defrauding regulators, and laundering money for Russian oligarchs. Ever desperate for an American foothold, Deutsche also started doing business with a self-promoting real estate magnate nearly every other bank in the world deemed too dangerous to touch: Donald Trump. Over the next twenty years, Deutsche executives loaned billions to Trump, the Kushner family, and an array of scandal-tarred clients, including convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Dark Towers is the never-before-told saga of how Deutsche Bank became the global face of financial recklessness and criminality-the corporate equivalent of a weapon of mass destruction. It is also the story of a man who was consumed by fear of what he'd seen at the bank-and his son's obsessive search for the secrets he kept.
Editorial Reviews
"In Dark Towers, David Enrich tells the story of how one of the world's mightiest banks careened off the rails, threatening everything from our financial system to our democracy through its reckless entanglement with Donald Trump. Darkly fascinating and yet all too real, it's a tale that will keep you up at night." -- John Carreyrou, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times bestselling author of Bad Blood
"Enrich compellingly shows how unchecked ambition twisted a pillar of German finance into a reckless casino where amorality and criminality thrived." -- New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice)
"Riveting. … A cracking read. … Devastatingly accurate. … This is an important book because it reveals how one bank, with questionable business practices to put it mildly, made it possible for Trump to bounce back from multiple bankruptcies, cast himself as a business visionary, and eventually run for president and win." -- Sunday Times (London)
"A revelatory book about the rise and fall of the world's biggest bank. … Has all the elements of a page-turning mystery novel" -- Washington Post
"Dark Towers is a devastating tale of a big bank gone bad. ... Enrich draws the reader in by focusing on the people in his story, displaying an Arthur-Miller-like eye for the worn-down Willy Lomans of today's Wall Street." -- Financial Times
"A jaw-dropping financial thriller." -- Philadelphia Inquirer
"Enrich delivers a master class in financial sleuthing. ... A first-rate read." -- The Guardian
"Exposes chaos and corruption at the bank that holds Trump's secrets." -- NPR.org
"In this case, ‘epic' is right - Dark Towers is a mystery, a thriller, a father-son drama. Did I mention Donald Trump? It's a distinctly American drama of greed, hubris and power that kept me racing to the finish." -- James B. Stewart, Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author of Den of Thieves and Deep State
"In this masterful account of a bank gone bad, David Enrich turns financial journalism into gripping, page-turning crime reporting. Tracking the sordid history of Deutsche Bank-from financing robber barons, Nazis, and rogue states to laundering Russian money to underwriting Donald Trump to threatening global economic security - Enrich deftly delivers a compelling narrative that intertwines harrowing institutional corruption and engaging personal tales. It's a wild ride and a great read." -- David Corn, co-author, Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin's War on America and the Election of Donald Trump
"A deep-reaching look at the inner workings of Deutsche B...
"Enrich compellingly shows how unchecked ambition twisted a pillar of German finance into a reckless casino where amorality and criminality thrived." -- New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice)
"Riveting. … A cracking read. … Devastatingly accurate. … This is an important book because it reveals how one bank, with questionable business practices to put it mildly, made it possible for Trump to bounce back from multiple bankruptcies, cast himself as a business visionary, and eventually run for president and win." -- Sunday Times (London)
"A revelatory book about the rise and fall of the world's biggest bank. … Has all the elements of a page-turning mystery novel" -- Washington Post
"Dark Towers is a devastating tale of a big bank gone bad. ... Enrich draws the reader in by focusing on the people in his story, displaying an Arthur-Miller-like eye for the worn-down Willy Lomans of today's Wall Street." -- Financial Times
"A jaw-dropping financial thriller." -- Philadelphia Inquirer
"Enrich delivers a master class in financial sleuthing. ... A first-rate read." -- The Guardian
"Exposes chaos and corruption at the bank that holds Trump's secrets." -- NPR.org
"In this case, ‘epic' is right - Dark Towers is a mystery, a thriller, a father-son drama. Did I mention Donald Trump? It's a distinctly American drama of greed, hubris and power that kept me racing to the finish." -- James B. Stewart, Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author of Den of Thieves and Deep State
"In this masterful account of a bank gone bad, David Enrich turns financial journalism into gripping, page-turning crime reporting. Tracking the sordid history of Deutsche Bank-from financing robber barons, Nazis, and rogue states to laundering Russian money to underwriting Donald Trump to threatening global economic security - Enrich deftly delivers a compelling narrative that intertwines harrowing institutional corruption and engaging personal tales. It's a wild ride and a great read." -- David Corn, co-author, Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin's War on America and the Election of Donald Trump
"A deep-reaching look at the inner workings of Deutsche B...
Readers Top Reviews
A. ValvoStuart Parki
For someone who does not work in financial services I can see where the author might succeed in creating sensationalist narrative. But, for the smart reader it's clear to see there is little here worth reading. It's a pain and simply ploy to capitalize on the Trump name in an election year. And, it's a pretty shameless attempt at that. Don't waste your money. There is nothing new here that a simple internet search would provide.
Jo Coke
The author has exposed in graphic detail what extreme greed and lax oversight can lead to. Although Deutsche was a dirty bank long before current times (it financed Auschwitz and the adjacent gas factory), its demise as a power could have been forestalled. Enrich is careful to provide only verifiable facts when more can be extrapolated by the reader. Excellent read.
Leopold BloomRobert
This book is absolutely DREADFUL. I read a review of it in the WaPo, and thought it would be something along the lines of “Too Big To Fail” – a great book about the 2008 crash. So I ordered it from Amazon. Well. The book has very little to do with Donald Trump, and consists mainly of a long litany of fussy, soap-opera, mini-biographies of every character that appears. That, and a chronicle of serial suicides. The main character is “Val” who is portrayed as an unemployed heroin-addict, whose main function in life is to steal money from his wealthy mother. Hint to readers: anytime you see the word “Val” immediately skip the next 20 pages ... trust me, you will not miss a whit of substance. This book is a classic example of a decent 100-page story, crammed into 360 pages of utterly extraneous detail !! It just goes on, and on, and ON ... describing totally uninteresting characters involved in boooring incidents of reckless financial mismanagement. Ho-hum ... yawn ...
Cramertivity
Worth reading. Not a lot of new info (if you've been following the troubles at Deutsche Bank over the years) but it presents a fascinating journey into the corrupt side of investment banking. Plus some eye-opening info about how Donald Trump managed to get some huge loans when every bank in the US had cut him off. There's also a few pages about how the Trump family is connected to former Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy.
DisneyDenizenCramert
Highly readable account of the endless ethical missteps of Deutsche Bank. Unreal.
