What makes a person choose justice over self-interest?
When Everett Stern landed his dream job as HSBC Bank’s new Anti-Money Laundering Compliance Officer, he never imagined the career move would lead to international notoriety as a whistleblower.
During his time at HSBC, Stern discovered that the bank deliberately failed to maintain anti-money laundering policies, allowing for billions of dollars of drug proceeds and terrorist funding to be laundered through the U.S. financial system. Stern knew he could not stand by and allow this to continue. In 2011, he alerted the U.S. authorities of his findings. The ensuing investigation resulted in HSBC being issued with an unprecedented $1.9 billion dollar fine.
But the pursuit of justice came at a high personal cost to Stern. His banking career was over, and the experience left him disillusioned.
In Dark Money and Private Spies, Stern finally shares the full account of his experience with the corruption, espionage, and injustice that plague today’s financial and legal systems. He details both the precursors to his defining moment and the explosive aftermath, which saw him blacklisted from the financial industry. From his current position as a Senate candidate and Intelligence Director of a private intelligence agency, Tactical Rabbit, Stern offers unique insight into this booming sector. Part true crime thriller and part condemnation of America's failed systems, it’s a sobering tale of one whistleblower’s fight for justice.
The suspenseful opening chapters focus on the HSBC scandal, explicating with welcome clarity the nuts and bolts of money laundering and banking coverups. From there, he explores his personal life, the incidents and circumstances that shaped him into the person he is, while also digging into larger philosophical questions about how one finds his or her purpose in life and what is the price one pays for acting on their principles.
For the most part, Stern’s journey from a dejected whistleblower to founding his own intelligence company, Tactical Rabbit, makes for a gripping read. However, he chooses not to weave details about money laundering scams and terror financing throughout the book, instead relegating this discussion to the beginning and the end, meaning the memoir loses some narrative drive in its middle. Still, Dark Money and Private Spies is an illuminating read for anyone curious about the scandals of high finance—and what it takes to expose them.
Takeaway: This illuminating memoir reveals financial scams and the guts it takes to uncover them.
Great for fans of: John Perkins’s Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, Tim Mueller’s Crisis of Conscience.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: B+
Marketing copy: B+
