Last week I was down at Captain’s Bar, enjoying a few glasses of my favourite whiskey and reminiscing about some of the best bond deals I’ve worked on. My old colleague was there, and with him a flock of fresh-faced bankers. The young whippersnappers seemed eager to listen to my stories of success, and were, rightly so, oohing and aahing at my tales of the Wild West of the bond market.
After throwing out some impressive sovereign bond deals I had worked on, and name-dropping a few big time political leaders, I started talking about my work in Indonesia back in the day. Of course, my work at the time focused on the country’s national resources, namely coal and palm oil.
The second the words “coal” and “palm oil” rolled off my tongue, the young bankers looked uncomfortable. One woman gave me a look like I had just kicked her puppy. I, of course, ignored their reactions and continued telling them about my feats of greatness.
After some time of uncomfortable shuffling, the young bankers all wandered off to find another retired banker to probe for stories and information. My old colleague laughed when I questioned why my audience had disappeared so quickly.
“You’re not environmentally friendly!” he said, as he snorted into his drink.
Apparently, with banks kowtowing today to every social justice warrior’s environmentally friendly demands, they are busy erasing the noble history of where we came from. Banks are not just avoiding doing “dirty” deals; they are pretending the deals that made them the big bucks in the past never even existed.
I guess I got out of the industry just in time!