The Secret Club That Runs the World: Inside the Fraternity of Commodities Traders

Terrific read. While my career isn't in finance/economics, I'm a 'well-informed citizen' and business owner who keeps up with FT, WSJ and the like. Kate Kelly has written a book that has begged to be written for a long time. And she wrote it exceedingly well: the reporting is strong (former WSJ) and the writing is crisp and readable, even for a general audience. I read her first book about the Bear Sterns collapse a couple years ago, and couldn't wait for the next book. Expectations exceeded. GREAT read.

A great narration of some of the important moments in commodity trading. You come out awed by some of the main actor's actions. Well written book.

To say I was disappointed with this book would be an understatement. This is not so much a book on what is Commodity Trading and how does it work, and more of a here are the main players in commodity trading and this is what they done. This is a good concept of a book, but it only satisfies the people who know what commodity trading is and how it works. The book offers a very minor description of what it is and how it works, plus the language and the stories go in to so much detail that those who don't have an MBA will not be able to get it. The stories of some of the people she highlighted were interesting, but it was too heavy in business lingo for a common person to understand or get too angry at what they do. Big disappointment for me.

For people who work in or follow world financial markets, this book probably provides nothing revelatory that they didn’t already know. However, for us lay people who do not understand the world of the outrageous shenanigans described here, Kelly takes us into a strange world and guides us through some of the fog.As in her first book, Kelly writes almost a page-turner with day-to-day activities and details of the many deals, transactions, and intrigues of the greed-stricken, ego-laced, and power-driven people who inhabit this world.By the end of the book I wanted to advocate extremely strict regulation of the commodities markets and, in fact, of most of the institutions in the financial world. Kelly, however, is a professional journalist who investigates and describes this mainly unregulated world but does not advocate one way or the other.The book’s title perhaps overstates the case but certainly hints at important financial activities that do not receive enough scrutiny.

Well written and entertaining book about a small group of people and corporations that directly influence prices of commodities which in turn effects everyday purchases like fuel and airline tickets, groceries, etc. Nice job by Kate Kelly to get the main characters to open up on how and why people try to determine commodity values and then to attempt to apply their reasoning to making lots of money. It doesn't always work out well for them but I don't think too many readers would feel sorry for them.

Kate Kelly took on a large task in attempting to piece together the world of commodities trading from scratch. This is noble of her, but my compliments related to this book end here.Overall, this was a very superficial glance at the commodities space. Rather than explain any inner-workings of the industry, Kelly just describes a few average bios of traders. This isn't necessarily bad (see: Market Wizards), but the bios themselves seemed contrived and were often uninteresting/unimportant (why was Fan even mentioned in this book? Because of her gender?). There are plenty of "ooey-gooey" stories out there amongst commodities traders, but Kelly only really touches on one of them (Marc Rich).The few "details" about commodities trading that Kelly does go into are both cursory and inaccurate at times (contango/backwardation). We are given very broad views of trading strategies and only really ever learn the market direction that a trader was taking. That being said, the reader will surely finish this book knowing that an option is the "right to buy/sell" as opposed to an obligation, since Kate Kelly must mention this line 5+ times throughout the book.

Reading this book I can't help myself in coming to the realization that the whole "Market/Stock Market" is a total fix. To think otherwise is foolish! The BIG players "take and take" while setting the stage as they please as part of a money game that is unregulated for the most part. Well written and an eye opening read! It is too bad that the hard working people in the world are victims to the affects of this greed on a daily basis.

I bought this book after seeing the author interviewed on CNBC, where she is a journalist. I have a strong interest in the financial markets, am an active investor, and understand the basics of the commodities business. All I can say is that the promo piece was great, but the book was poorly written, uninformative, and did not live up to its title or hype. Would not recommend this book to anyone.

An interesting look into commodities trading in the early 2000s

Good story telling and properly researched and numbers put forward, abrupt endingI would love to read more from the author

Great book. Well written.

An interesting well written and researched book.. Not sure about the title.. Big players in commodities maybe? Even then some big names are missing...

Good inside into the industry for an outsider but a bit simplistic for someone with some background in finance or commodities.