The Asset Class

A brilliant and penetrating analysis exposing the larceny that powers the private equity industry. This rollicking tale uncovers tricks that are ultimately so simple and brazen that the mind is repelled, and in the process shows a great undertow sapping our economies and feeding public rage – NICHOLAS SHAXSON, author of THE FINANCE CURSECombining muckraking with moral clarity, Hettie O’Brien tells an utterly original story about how private equity targets people at their most vulnerable, sniffing out weakness to splinter what is left of the postwar social democratic order. Illuminating and infuriating – QUINN SLOBODIAN, author of HAYEK’S BASTARDSA superbly vivid journey through what deserves to be one of the greatest scandals of our age. The Asset Class shows we cannot understand the turbulence and injustice of the present without understanding private equity – WILLIAM DAVIES, author of NERVOUS STATESThe Asset Class is a riveting page-turner; it reads like a thriller that is also deeply educational and masterfully accessible. I will be recommending it to anyone - my students, colleagues, family - who wants to make sense of the murky new owners of their university halls, place of work or utilities provider – ROSIE COLLINGTON, author of THE BIG CONIn this truly brilliant and deeply disturbing analysis, Hettie O’Brien opens our eyes to the destructive forces of leveraged finance and the investors whose fortunes keep rising thanks to their embrace by governments” – KATHARINA PISTOR, author of THE CODE OF CAPITAL

Hettie O’Brien is a journalist at the Guardian, where she writes for the Guardian Long Read. She previously worked at the New Statesman and as a reporter in Washington covering the Federal Trade Commission. She lives in London.