The World For Sale: Money, Power, and the Traders Who Barter the Earth's Resources

What resources are most important to humanity? What do we know about the main beneficiaries of their trade?

This book tells the story of the emergence and global influence of traders - traders of raw materials, the fastest and most aggressive market participants who buy, accumulate and sell the earth's resources. Their interests have long been not limited to economics: control over the flow of oil, grain or metals has made traders influential political players, violators of international sanctions, and catalysts of unprecedented corruption. They have gained political power right under the noses of Western regulators and politicians, eliminated opponents with foreign hands, helped the autocratic regime of Saddam Hussein sell oil despite the embargo, provided Russia with cash to circumvent sanctions, manipulated OPEC and put entire countries on the needle of resource dependence.

To understand why resource-rich nations are plagued by poverty and dominated by kleptocrats, you need to know everything about traders. And The World for Sale is an indispensable guide on this path.