Stories of Capitalism: Inside the Role of Financial Analysts

by Stefan Leins (Author)

The financial crisis and the recession that followed caught many people off guard, including experts in the financial sector whose jobs involve predicting market fluctuations. Financial analysis offices in most international banks are supposed to forecast the rise or fall of stock prices, the success or failure of investment products, and even the growth or decline of entire national economies. And yet their predictions are heavily disputed. How do they make their forecasts—and do those forecasts have any actual value?

Building on recent developments in the social studies of finance, Stories of Capitalism provides the first ethnography of financial analysis. Drawing on two years of fieldwork in a Swiss bank, Stefan Leins argues that financial analysts construct stories of possible economic futures, presenting them as coherent and grounded in expert research and analysis. In so doing, they establish a role for themselves—not necessarily by laying bare empirically verifiable trends but rather by presenting the market as something that makes sense and is worth investing in. Stories of Capitalism is a nuanced look at how banks continue to boost investment—even in unstable markets—and a rare insider’s look into the often opaque financial practices that shape the global economy.

Review
“Stories of Capitalism makes an important contribution to the growing field of the anthropology of finance by looking closely at the narrative economy surrounding financial analysts. It also offers a close ethnographic analysis of how the Swiss banks changed their image from that of secretive gnomes to one of swashbuckling risk-takers in less than a decade. It should be read by all social scientists interested in financial actors and institutions.”
(Arjun Appadurai, author of Banking on Words)

“Leins opens up a bedeviling puzzle. Why do financial analysts exist? Their job is to create forecasts, but economic theory calls such prognostications voodoo. Leins takes readers inside the Swiss banking world and shows how, despite their failings in theory, financial predictions play a critical role. Their reports mitigate uncertainty and allow the engines of finance to roll forward.”
(Caitlin Zaloom, author of Out of the Pits)

About the Author
Stefan Leins is a senior lecturer of social anthropology and cultural studies at the University of Zurich and a member of the research program Anthropology of the Economy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.