Chapter 1
The warning signs were there. I just couldn’t see them. My
nose was in my BlackBerry—“crackberry”—except when I was
talking into it.
“Can you get me the numbers on Argentine debt denominated
in Japanese yen?” I said. I was on with my Asia investment
team leader.
The cabdriver glanced at me in the rearview mirror as if I
were speaking Martian.
“Michael, give it a rest,” said Ivy. “We’re supposed to be
on
vacation.”
Ivy and I were stuck in traffic on the busy Dolphin
Expressway, having just flown in from New York. We were
headed to the port of Miami for a Caribbean cruise that was
luxurious by anyone’s standards, all expenses paid—one of
the
perks of being a top young producer at Saxton Silvers, one
of
Wall Street’s premier investment banking firms.
“This is the last phone call, I promise.”
She knew I was lying, and I knew she really didn’t mind.
More than any woman I’d ever dated, Ivy Layton understood
my world.
We’d met when she was a trader at Ploutus Investments, a
multibillion-dollar hedge fund with offices in Manhattan
and—
where else?—Greenwich. It was also Saxton Silvers’ biggest
prime brokerage client. Ivy’s boss managed the fund and
steered
all that business my way because he was incredibly
intuitive and
completely understood that on the day that I was born the
angels
got together and decided to create a—puh-LEEZ. Chalk it up
to the fact that I was one of the lucky bastards who had
correctly
timed the burst of the IT bubble, making me a financial
genius in a field of idiots. Idiots who apparently believed
that
overpaid CEOs of dot-com darlings didn’t have to do anything
but pick out flashy corporate logos for negative earnings
reports
and watch the NASDAQ rise like a helium balloon on steroids.
I gave Ploutus a reality check on a barfing—yes, barfing—dog
that looked like a sock puppet but turned out to be the
proverbial
pin in the bursting bubble. Ploutus made me the go-to
guy on Wall Street, which would never change so long as
those
aforementioned angels continued to sprinkle moon dust in my
hair and starlight in my . . . whatever.
“Whoa,” Ivy said. “I haven’t seen this many fifty-story
cranes since Shanghai.”
I glanced up from my BlackBerry. She was right. Downtown
Miami had more empty towers under construction than South
Beach had palm trees. I tried to imagine the skyline without
the works in progress—what it must have looked like just
three
or four years earlier. Maybe a handful of skyscrapers over
fifty
stories.
“Condo crazies,” said the cabbie. “I bought one
preconstruction
in dat building over there.”
Our driver was a Bahamian immigrant, which was cool. It
was as if we were already in the islands.
“Congrats,” said Ivy.
“And one in dat really tall one, too,” he said, pointing
upward.
“Two condos in downtown Miami?”
“Plus three more in Fort Lauderdale.”
I was going back to my BlackBerry, but Donald Trump
with the island accent had snagged my full attention. “You
own
five condos?”
“Yeah, mon.”
“No offense, but—”
“I know, mon. I drive a cab. But my mortgage broker says
no problem.”
“Who’s your mortgage broker?”
“A friend who live in Little Haiti. He used to drive a taxi
like me. Dresses really smart now. We call him the Haitian
Sensation. Got me a NINA loan for one-point-six mill.”
NINA—no income, no assets, no problem. Just find a property
appraiser to certify that the real estate was worth more
than the
amount of the loan and $1.6 million was yours. All you
needed was
a credit score and a pulse. Actually, that pulse thing was
optional,
too. Reports of dead people getting loans were
proliferating. To
me, the whole subprime market was beginning to stink like
an old
fishing boat, and I was glad to have absolutely nothing to
do with
mortgage-backed securities—even if they were making a few
guys
at each of the major investment banks filthy rich.
“They tell me so long as the property value keep going up,
I’m safe, mon. I just flip dis condo, make a nice flippin’
profit,
pay off dat flippin’ mortgage, buy another flippin’ condo.
Just
keep on flippin’ and flippin’.”
“That’s the flippin’ theory,” I said.
He changed lanes abruptly, blasting his horn at a speeding
motorcyclist who apparently thought he owned the expressway.
Our driver was suddenly agitated, but it wasn’t the traffic.
He looked genuinely worried. I could see it in his eyes in
the
rearview mirror.
“So,” he said in a shaky voice, “you think it keep going up,
mon?”
Sure, if the law of gravity somehow changed. “We can only
hope,” I said.
I went back to my BlackBerry. Ivy was now listening to her
iPod, moving to the music. Salsa. I didn’t know she was a
fan,
but apparently a visit to Miami made her feel more connected
to her half-Latin roots.
We exited the expressway and were headed into downtown
Miami. The port was all the way east, near a waterfront mall
that Saxton Silvers had financed.
“What the hell is that?” Ivy said.
I looked up. Flagler Street was Miami’s east-west version
of main street, and we were a block or so north of it. If
your
principal needs in life were Yo ♥Miami T-
shirts, sugarcane
juice, and any kind of electronic device imaginable, this
was
your little slice of paradise. For me, it was an area I
couldn’t get
through fast enough—especially today. It was only two
o’clock
in the afternoon, but the shops had already closed, the
doors and
windows protected by burglar bars and steel roll-down doors.
Something was up.
“Looks like Biscayne Boulevard is closed,” the driver said,
stopping at the traffic light.
Biscayne was Miami’s signature north-south boulevard,
four lanes in each direction that were divided by an
elevated
tram and rows of royal palm trees down the middle. Office
towers lined the west side of the street, and to the east
beautiful
Bayfront Park stretched to the waterfront. Over the years
it had
served as everything from the famous hairpin turn in Miami’s
first Grand Prix road race to the televised portion of the
Orange
Bowl Parade route. These days, the Grand Prix had moved
elsewhere, the parade was no more, and Biscayne Boulevard
had been swept up in the high-rise construction craze. We
had
to get east of it to reach the port. But on this sunny
Thursday
afternoon, all cross streets were a virtual parking lot.
“We’re not moving, mon.”
We sat through a complete light change and still didn’t
budge.
I got out of the cab to see what was going on. Up ahead,
traffic
had ground to a halt as far as I could see. I stepped up
onto the
doorsill for a better view. The one-way street was like a
shadowy
canyon cutting through tall office buildings. Peering over
the
endless row of stopped cars in front of us, I got a cross-
section
view of the intersection at Biscayne and spotted the
problem.
Barricades appeared to be blocking all vehicular access to
the
boulevard. Mobs of people were marching down all eight
lanes.
I climbed back inside the car and said, “Some kind of
protest
rally.”
“Oh, yeah,” said Ivy. “FTAA is in Miami this year.”
The Free Trade Area of the Americas was an effort to unite
all the economies of the Western Hemisphere, except Cuba,
into a single free-trade area that reached from Canada to
Chile.
Each year since 1994, the leaders of thirty-four
democracies met
to work toward eliminating barriers to trade and investment.
Opposition was passionate, critics fearing the
concentration of
corporate power and the worst of everything that came with
it: layoffs and unemployment, sweatshop labor, loss of
family
farms, environmental destruction. Thousands of those critics
had descended on downtown Miami today to decry the FTAA’s
eighth ministerial meeting.
“Not sure where to go,” said our driver.
“Obviously not this way,” said Ivy.
He somehow maneuvered around stopped cars and headed
north on Miami Avenue, the plan being to cut east to
Biscayne
on a higher cross street. It was worse. Not only were the
cars
immobilized, but pedestrian traffic was also jammed. We saw
a sea of young people, most of them wearing bandannas over
their noses and mouths, many wearing protective goggles or
helmets. A few wore gas masks. Two men had climbed atop
lampposts to wave red flags, one with the image of Che
Guevara
and the other with Mao Tse Tung. Banners and posters dotted
the crowd, the messages ranging from Give Peace a Chance
to Support the Police: Beat Yourself Up.
“This looks bad,” said Ivy.
I got out of the car and again climbed to my perch on the
doorsill, peering out over the roof.
“Michael, get back in the car!”
I heard Ivy’s warning, but I had to look. Never had I seen
such a showing of police muscle. Rows of fully armored and
helmeted police moved in formation, meeting the crowd of
demonstrators with a line of riot shields and control
batons. As
police advanced, the anti-FTAA chanting intensified.
Greed kills
Die, Asses of Evil.
Fuck the Aristocratic Assholes.
Anarchy Today, Anarchy Tomorrow, Anarchy Forever!
Demonstrators either yielded to the oncoming wave of
police or were pushed back into the throbbing crowds behind
them.
“There’s nowhere to go!” people shouted. “Nowhere for us to
go!”
Squeezed between the surge of police and the barricades
behind them, the crowd had run out of room and was growing
angrier by the second. A small group at the front fell to
the ground, their actions seen as resistance by club-
wielding
officers.
“Michael, get in here!”
It was crazy, but I was mesmerized. I saw about a dozen
canisters launch in volleys from somewhere behind police
lines.
Tear gas. They landed in the crowd, unleashing panic. One
hit
a demonstrator in the head and knocked him to the sidewalk.
People were soon stepping over other people, coughing and
wheezing as they ran. A few held damp rags to their mouths,
which eased their breathing but did nothing for the skin
and eye
irritation. A woman in agony ran past screaming “Pepper
spray,
pepper spray!” A crack of gunfire erupted, and people
on the front line writhed in pain from rubber bullets,
beanbags, and
chemical-filled pellets. It was impossible to count the
number
of rounds fired, but it had to be in the hundreds. Angry
youths
cursed as they picked up the smoking canisters of tear gas
and
hurled them back at the oncoming police.
“Michael, get back inside!”
Someone grabbed me and threw me against the car. It was a
man—incredibly strong—dressed all in black, a helmet
protecting
his head. A bandanna covered his nose and mouth, but his
eyes were still visible and they were downright
threatening. His
knee came up and hit me in the groin, and my face was
suddenly
on fire with pepper spray.
“It’s only gonna get worse,” he said in a voice that chilled
me, and then he was gone.
Ivy pulled me back into the car and yanked the door shut.
The driver switched on the locks. I couldn’t see, and the
sting
was almost unbearable. Ivy had bottled water in her purse,
which she poured on my face to wash away the spray.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
I blinked hard, but it would take a while to find relief.
Ivy glanced out the car window. “There’s a medic tent over
there,” she said, pointing toward the courthouse on the
corner.
“They actually set up medic tents?” I managed to say.
Apparently Miami learned from former host cities to expect
protests and injuries.
“I see people getting treated for pepper spray,” she said.
“Come on, let’s go.”
She paid the cabdriver and told him to keep the change. He
thanked her and handed her a business card.
“My cell number is on there,” he said. “Call me if you
know anyone. Maybe it’s you, your housekeeper, your doorman.
Whoever.”
“Anyone who what?” asked Ivy.
“What we were talking about,” he said. “Anyone who wants
to buy a condo. I get you a killer deal on a very good
payoption,
negative-amortization loan, mon.”
The expression on Ivy’s face was one of complete
incredulity.
“Let’s go,” she told me.
I pushed open the door. We grabbed our bags, and together
we zigzagged through the crowd and confusion, stopping only
when we reached the Wellness Center beneath the giant flag
of
Che Guevara flapping in a breeze tinged with tear gas.