The Last Trade

Book excerpt: James Conway has written the corporate thriller for our age, an age when the power of new media and the hunger of Wall Street converge to form a deadly entity capable of bringing the global economy to its knees. Drew Havens made a killing for the Rising Fund, which, thanks to his prognostications, was the only hedge operation to anticipate and capitalize on the mortgage crisis of 2008. Havens sees things others can’t, from the collapse of the American real estate market to the multibillion-dollar rise of his ruthless and charismatic boss. Havens is rich beyond his dreams, but his work has cost him his marriage. And now it may cost him his life. It starts with the brutal murder of his young protégé and, over the course of six days, six other brokers around the world, each killed after executing a trade linked to the Rising Fund. And as the violence escalates to an international level, Havens frantically tries to construct a model that will reveal the catastrophic event that only he can see coming—and confirm that his boss and the Rising Fund are at the center of it.