#351. 90s London City Trader Made Millions, Then Lost It All to Cocaine - Geraint Anderson

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0:29Why did you write the book City Boy? Well, it was a combination of things, Dodge. I got completely disillusioned with what I was doing. I was not the natural candidate for being a banker. I was basically a bit of a hippie. I cruise into the so-called interview. 55-year-old, head of research, big piss head. We have about four bottles of champagne. I am arsehole. And then he goes, listen, why don't you come with me somewhere else now? So he takes me to a strip joint.

0:52Geraint Anderson: And I thought, ah, okay, I see how this works. So he got you a job working in the city as an investment banker? I wasn't suited for it. Then I saw the madness that started happening. It was always being a nut job. Loads of c***. Just short-term reckless gambling. Yeah. And I just started thinking, fuck, this place is going, this is going down. It was silly money. It was the last days of Rome shit. And by 2006, I was heading up the second highest equity team in London. So I pick up the phone all tentative like that. He goes, well, we're pleased to say your bonus for this year is 600 grand. The worst thing is, after just a few totes on a fucking joint, I've forgotten the entire conversation.

1:30Are you a psychopath?

1:38Geraint Anderson: Hey, guys. We've been running this podcast now for five and a half years. We've had some most amazing business guests on here. Simon Squibb, Daniel Priestley, Barry Hearn. The list just goes on and on from billionaires to people who have built brands. If you want to come on the podcast and talk about your business and sit here with me in the studio and tell your story, go check out dodgewoodall.com forward slash guest and check out the three minute video. We've also left the link below as well. All right. Welcome to the show. Cheers, mate. Lovely to be here. Yeah, looking forward to this one. Let's roll all the way back.

2:08Geraint Anderson: Why did you write the book City Boy? Well, it was a combination of things, Dodge. Basically, first of all, I hadn't got enough cash in the bank so I could leave the bank. Second of all, I got completely disillusioned with what I was doing. You've got to understand, I was not the natural candidate for being a banker. One, I was brought up super religious. My mum was daughter of missionaries in Bolivia. She was unbelievably religious, all that you're going to hell stuff. Had that for like 15 years. Second of all, my dad was a Labour MP. So he was a bit like, just a minute, you're in the heart of the beast now.

2:43You're working for the wrong guys. And third of all, I was basically a bit of a hippie. So you can imagine, when my brother got me my job, I was like, okay, I'm going to do this for a couple of years.

2:51Geraint Anderson: So he got you a job working in the city as an investment banker? Yes. Okay. Basically, I mean, and that's the story in itself, because that first interview was something straight out of Central Casting. You can imagine, I go up there, the day before I've done it, I've cut off my hair, which was down to my arse. I've cut my goatee beard off, and I've taken out all my earrings, which I've got, right? So that's how you were before you got the job? The day before I got the job. Okay. Yeah. I was pissing around selling trinkets on beaches. My mother obviously thought I was going down a really dodgy path.

3:25And she called Joel as my brother, who's super straight, and goes, listen, get this fellow a job. He's going to go down the wrong way. I can see. I'd already done a few dodgy things, which maybe we'll mention. And so my mom's already thinking, this guy, you know, the other two brothers have done all right. One's a vicar. One's a bleeding fund manager in the city. And it's all going to go, you know, this guy. But the third one, unfortunately, he's the wrong one. and then it was as simple as that and so he goes listen go and do this job you and you will be able to go back to go and you will be able to earn in two years enough dosh to make you live 30 years like a king in goa yeah so that sold it to me that was a simple pitch and i was all in all my chips were in so i cut the hair off he gave me an hour lesson about what the fuck the city is what p ratio is what a yield is all that shit yeah i cruise into the so-called interview it's in a fucking corny and barrow right in the city it's the 55 year old head of research looks like henry the eighth big piss head we have about four bottles of champagne i am arsehole by this point i think it was almost like he wasn't really didn't give a fuck about whether i could knew anything about maths and that he wanted a drinking part and then he goes listen why don't you come with me somewhere else now and i was like oh all right then so he takes me to a strip joint you you i bet you're familiar with it was called metropolis it maybe not maybe you're just maybe you're just maybe you're just denying it in case you're my mate dave apparently has been in metropolis okay yeah so you know it's what we used to call the pubic triangle it was browns metropolis and the oldie acts pound in the pint brown that was a part yes yes that's the style and the oldie acts where they put the piece of wood above the pool table and then they basically got the crackles out from you know it's terrible it was low quality stuff and the audience was really weird because it was basically a combination of like the dirty mack brigade from fucking you know mile end and then posh boys in their fucking prada suits it was really odd combination so anyway he takes me to metropolis and i'm like okay this is this is interesting and there's some bird in a sort of i remember i remember it clear as day like a bright yellow bikini that's like a song basically and she's then removing that and spreading herself around and you know bending over backwards and he He goes, what do you think about that bird over there?

5:40And I was like, oh, she seems like a nice girl. She seems all right. He goes, well, let's go and have a quick word with her. So I'm talking to her. And then it becomes apparent that she's his missus, this 55-year-old fat geezer. And I'm thinking, what the fuck? This is a 25-year-old Brazilian super fit bird, like well above anything I'd ever managed. And I'm not saying I'm fucking Don Juan, but I was a 24-year-old reasonably proficient swordsman. You know what I mean? And I just thought, and then he gets a gold necklace out, puts it round her neck, solid gold.

6:16Geraint Anderson: You know, you can tell it was quality gear. And I thought, ah, okay, I see how this works. I'm up for a bit of this action. But to answer your question, which was about why did I write City Boy, I got the job. I wasn't suited for it. Then I saw the madness that started happening where everyone was inside of trading. everyone was being a nut job load of coke just short-term reckless gambling yeah and i just started thinking fuck man this place is going this this is going down and and you know and you've now earned enough money to kind of there's a certain figure i had in my head if i had that then i'm set for life and i thought okay sweet i've got that i've got that i've just split up with my fiancee i've got a major roaring coke habit and then someone came up to me a friend at the um london paper and she said do you want to do an anonymous column newspaper column i thought yeah i'll have a bit of that action and it was like um it was like a like a confessional you know i was just revealing all my sins to half a million to a million londoners every friday and I was also there with my therapist because I was going through a bit of a tricky patch split up with the bird I was going to marry just a month or two before the wedding invites had gone out, all that shit and a raging coke habit and so basically I went yeah I love that and then about a year and a half into that a publisher just said listen you should turn this into a book and I thought that's my get out you know what's the posh word they use?

7:45pivot from stockbroker I pivoted already from hippie dickheads so tricky now I'm going to pivot from stockbroker to you know author exactly so that's a very long answer

7:57Geraint Anderson: so what years are we talking here are we talking late 90s here no I got the job in 96 well we are sorry 96 I got the job 2006 I got the newspaper column City Boy 2008 the book came out and it came out perfect time it came out between Bear Stearns failing and Lehman's failing yes so then I became Rent-A-Gob every fucking radio and TV person in town just used to call me up because no other bankers would talk. To speak up, yeah. Because, you know, the code of silence. You know, you wake up with your fucking nuts in your mouth. It's like mafia. But do you know what, though? Looking back, because I was living in London at that time, Brixton, Clapham, Chelsea, and we were partying hard.

8:38Geraint Anderson: And I had friends who were working up in the city and it was debauchery up there. And they're making calls, worldwide calls, earning copious amounts of money and then going out, taking us all out, having tables here for 10 grand, 20 grand dropped me in it was on the business it was just free for all it was silly money it was the last days of Rome shit yeah it was literally crazy they were allowed to put it on their business yeah it wasn't even their business they were just saying we're taking out clients and not only that take the boys out it's worse than that if you don't the sort of job I was as half salesman half analyst kind of specialist salesman it's called you were almost chastised if you didn't spend enough they like look at your bill and go what's going on lads it's not good enough fucking you've only spent 10 grand this month so you need to get your shit together you know what I mean because that's how you get the business and my only USP my only unique selling point I was not smarter than those Goldman boys I was not more fucking diligent than those Morgan Stanley boys I was just a bit more fun yes and actually here's something that I'm not particularly proud of I would use Bugle to fucking trap clients in a funny sort of way because if I supplied them of course if I went to Madonna concert and you give them an eighth yeah you got him he's got to do work with you you're never going to grass him up but you know you've got one over in each other they become and that's how I became believe it or not I was an intern in fucking 2000 sorry in 96 and by 2006 I was heading up the second highest equity team in London second highest ranked equity team and it was through nefarious means yes which is why then I began to question whether I might be a bit of a psychopath you see that's the next book was about that but my point is there the people that I know in the city the deals they were doing was by giving people grams of coke and once that person accepted grams of coke and he wants to put his deal through you and you're getting your cut you've got no one that relationship can't be broken because you've got one over him yeah I mean you're never going to actually use that you wouldn't but subconsciously imagine what he's thinking yeah I've just given you a million quids worth of thinking but you put it on your book you get your cut he's happy but actually after five six pounds he's taken that gear off you he can't not work with you and the Goldman boys and the Morgan Stanley boys and the city group boys they tended not to pull those numbers i mean some of them did don't get me wrong but they were more serious they were like they were boring they were basically charmless fucking spreadsheet dickheads yeah to to use the polite term and and and so that was my usp okay this is how i'm going to get them on side and that means they're going to vote for me in these external uh sort of surveys and that's when the headhunters start calling see because if you're highly ranked and then that's when you can leverage off that and say listen i'm leaving this firm unless you double my pay or you guarantee two bonuses so so i had weirdly i had imposter syndrome even right to the very end i thought these these guys are going to find me out soon so you best make money while the fucking yeah it's sunshine yeah sunshine yeah you know i mean and that was a real massive thing and also i kept on thinking the whole fucking charade is going to fall down at some point and in a funny sort of way in 2008 it did and we're still kind of living with the consequences of that.

11:43You know, three things, really big things happened when 2008 happened. One, people's real wages have just flatlined.

11:50Geraint Anderson: So give me an example. At peak, what would your bonus be at peak for you? Or what was your salary? Because they're not, they're big salaries back in the nights, but they weren't crazy, crazy, crazy salaries. But they knew that you were going to have a massive bonus at the end of the year. That's it. So basic was generally about 120. Yeah. In the 90s, but that's 30 years ago, right? That's good. Really good, yeah. Of course, the tax man is taking away fucking close to 50 % of the time. So that's 120, but that's obviously not the main event. The main event is your bonus. Some people get 10 times, some people get two times.

12:21I, my biggest ones were 600 grand. And I got that for the last few. And I was just reminded of something the other day, actually, that happened. So I was on a beach in Goa, right? My last, I used to go to Goa every year. What, before you got

12:34Geraint Anderson: into the city? And after, yeah. I'd just go there and meet my mate who lived out there and I would question, it's in the city boy, this whole stuff, I'd question, like what's the life you're leading look at this geezer he just basically bangs loads of yoga birds yeah that's a really good laugh he's just having a total and a total fucking giggle and and i'm working fucking 12 hour days we're not sure this is the right i think you've got the equation wrong here son uh you know i'd punish myself by every year going to go maybe twice a year sometimes yeah seeing my mate and him just we're going mate i'm living the life of riley and me thinking hmm there he is but basically I was on the beach in Goa visiting this fella in December 2007 so just like a month before I fucking you know sling my hook with the job and someone phones and I recognize it's a fucking phone call from my office and I think oh they've caught me they've found me out because I was still writing these anonymous columns and I'd have been done for gross misconduct like that you know what I mean so I was thinking oh Christ you know you had a good run and that's the way it is but that means you won't be getting the bonus because it's in about a week's time they're going to tell you the fucking bonus as well and that was going to be 600 big ones i knew roughly so i pick up the phone all tentative like that and they go uh anyway mr anderson is that you yeah he goes well we're pleased to say um your bonus for this year is 600 grand i was like so i went from thinking i'd lost fucking my job and also some deferred equity which you get so to try and keep you in your job and wasn't going to get bonus to getting 600 grand the worst thing is after just a few tokes on a fucking joint i'd forgotten the entire conversation to such an extent that someone said what just happened with that call i went oh yeah i forgot i've just been giving 600 grand that's how stupid it gets that's how abstract and weird it gets yeah so you know and anyway i i got where i got i basically ended up uh january the 31st i looked to check my bank account there's this whatever it was 350 has gone in post-tax man yeah met all the girls from secrets in hammersmith they all came back to mind we all had a party my pal Danny Lesle oh sweet do you remember Ebony lovely lady called Ebony I'm not sure I think they're stage names right Mercedes Strawberry Crystal I thought that was her real name you've ruined it all now I bet you were like oh I'll get you out of this game yeah yeah yeah you stick with me love and then the next morning full of recrimination self-loathing what was your tell me your lifestyle how was your lifestyle when you were working in the city where were you living what was your day-to-day what would your meetings look like would you meet people for lunch and then just getting on it explain to the listener and people watching on youtube what exactly that looked like so basically i was a special salesman so i was the front man for the for a team of about eight to nine people we're doing a really boring sector the pan-european utility sector but that's by the by and my particular skill would be going out to lunch as you say going maybe spending three grand at Petrus you know there were bottles of wine you could buy at Petrus for 30 grand I remember saying to the waiter do any people ever fucking buy this yeah you'd be surprised I said if anywhere was left you'd be fucking over here I'll have a I'll have some of that have a gargle yeah I'll have a and it was but it was a lot of there was also a lot of phoning boring Oxbridge pricks yes and trying to convince them to sell this shit and buy that share and they've usually got their very own strong views about what that is.

16:01Then, you know, as I say, often boozy lunches for me and then in the evening more boozing and or going to events. So you might go to your Champions League match. You might go and see Wimbledon for the whole day. You might, that was the best part. That's the only part of the job I miss is that expensive stuff, you know, having ridiculous meals, going to watch amazing football and rugby games. On someone else's account. And someone always, oh, that's the bit I miss. Yeah.

16:27Geraint Anderson: that's stopped worldwide now in the UK that's all stopped yeah I mean I was a bit of a dinosaur even you know people were becoming more PhD maths tickets you know you need to do this it was a very special time I mean I think when we spoke on the phone we were talking about the 90s and we were just saying god that was an amazing period and I don't want to sound like a nostalgic old man no but it was an amazing period it really was because you know freedom freedom and also just without sounding pretentious you know you had fucking USSR had broken up burning wall had fallen down apartheid was falling down the rave scene come about the good friday rave scene amazing Dennis the Menaces and rhubarb and custards you name it just the best pills money can buy and just it all just seemed possible history had ended and lots of cash flying around there was an abundance of money people were passing money around there was a lot of happiness and you could buy a gaff in London four and a half times average salary as opposed to now it's like eight or nine times so you just think I mean and it just and then 2000 yeah yeah you had all that cool coming through yeah it was just i wrote an article on substack saying it was um humanity's final masterpiece i didn't my my friend went final that's that's a bit negative isn't it i said well it might not come around yeah look at it now it's just not you know it was a special time and and we managed to survive it which is the main thing you managed to survive because you used to work in nightclubs right well i had 12 nightclubs every week.

17:51Geraint Anderson: I used to throw parties at nightclubs. You didn't own them? I didn't own them, so I had a brand, and I'd have 12 cities every week all around the country at my peak in my 20s. I'd have a club in Manchester, two in London, Oxford, Birmingham, Leicester, Exeter, Brighton, Bournemouth. So every single week. You were travelling around like a night job. Yeah, but I couldn't do all that, so I'd have three every week. I'd have three on a night. Three on a Monday, three on a Tuesday, three on a Wednesday, three on a Thursday. So the family and tight friends taking the door money, looking after the head doorman making sure he was on the clicker everyone's marrying up and yes yes and that's a bit you have to be quite tough in that business well i would have thought it's a bit tougher than banking i'm just mate it's you're you're dealing with the nightclub world yeah well however you want to put it but you're dealing if you're you're dealing with lots of money yeah because there was no tap there was no tap yeah there was no card there was no nothing people come in and pay on the door and you have 2 000 people in one club playing three quid or four quid to get in you're 12 of those clubs and you've got that over a period of 7, 8, 9, 10 years you had to be bang on the ball you really did and you have to have a lot of trust and you have to have a very good team around you making sure that when the money's being collected on the door that money's going back to the right place no one skimmed off it did you ever do because we used to go from my university we used to get in a car I was at Cambridge I didn't want to say that you know why I didn't want to say that because of the old line how do you know someone went to Cambridge just wait a minute and the wanker's going to tell you.

19:18You know what I mean? It's like, you did notice. I said, University of Wisconsin. And it's like being a vegan or doing ayahuasca. Just wait a minute and that prick will tell you. But I used to go in a fucking car and go to Flesch at Hacienda, gay night in Hacienda, not because I'm, you know, for the other team or whatever. But your boyfriend was. Yeah, my boyfriend was. Boom, boom. But it was, did you ever, I'm just out of interest, early 90s, were you doing anything with a Hacienda? Not Hacienda in Manchester, no. Okay. No. Because that was a fucking scene. Absolutely. That was a great scene.

19:49Geraint Anderson: We had all sorts of clubs. I ended up having, I ended up throwing 1 ,500 parties in clubs. 1 ,500 parties in clubs. And now that's over. That shit is over, isn't it? I finished that in 2008 and then I moved into the festival world. But what I'm saying is clubs generally just having a very tough time. Clubs are dead. They're dead. Clubs are dead. There was 1 ,500 clubs before the pandemic. Now they're down to about 300. And those 300 are just holding on tight because there's nothing really happening. People aren't going out. Yeah. You could walk in there and it's easy for people to say, they're on their phones.

20:19Geraint Anderson: Yeah, but it's easy for people to say, oh, people aren't going out. I go out on the streets at night and have a look to actually really see that no one's going out and no one's going out. No one's going out, yeah. It's bonkers. Another reason why the 90s were so fucking good. Absolutely. No one was recording you with phones because you actually could let loose, get your top off, have a gig on. And you'd wake up in the morning and no one's recorded you and you ain't got the fear. Imagine now. You've got a broomstick half-wept but half but imagine going out now and being stupid when we used to party hard the stuff you'd get up to imagine now the fear the next morning someone might have recorded that what?

20:48no someone will have recorded it someone will have recorded it you know what I mean that's the thing so the other thing I was going to say about 2008 which I think is you mentioned you finished that in 2008 that to me is when the rot set in I'll tell you for why one real wages didn't go up so everyone's getting pissed off and they're voting for people who are quite extreme two the bankers and they all got away with it. So everyone's starting thinking, just a minute, the elites are fucking in some kind of deep state bullshit alliance and they're all against us. And then three, interest rates stayed very low for a long time.

21:20Now I know that sounds boring and it essentially is. False economy. But yeah. And then what happens when interest rates are low, money's cheap. Yes. You fucking, anyone with assets is getting super minted because, you know, property, equities, they all are low interest because you can't put your money anywhere else. Yeah. And anyone who hasn't got any assets is staying super cheap. So we've got this inequality, this massive inequality, which again breeds social discontent, populists, especially with the problem with... So I think I honestly... That was the start. 9-11 was the start. 2008 came in.

21:51God, we're being depressing bastards here. It's the truth. And then the mobile phone, social media, internet shit,

21:57Geraint Anderson: you know, really doesn't help matters. But let's try and talk about some more positive. So at peak, how much cocaine were you using per day? So I was, relative to that other fellow you mentioned to me, I was not ridiculous. I was more like a four or five G's a week sort of fellow. Okay, so a gram a day while you're working, Monday to Friday type thing. No, it would be two or three of those would be in the weekend. Because when I was working, I would get edgy. Because at any minute, some bloke could ring up and go, hey, I need you to come around right now and tell me why PowerGen is a buy and National Power is a sell.

22:32And he's an Oxbridge educated guy. Or are you doing it over the phone? So the typical situation would be you'd have a boozy lunch. It would go on and on and on. And then someone would call the man, me. And then you'd go back into the office and try and do as little, just creep around, praying no one sees you because you're so fucking edgy. You know what I mean? Because it's not the correct environment. You know, you want to get into that sort of paper in a party. In a club, yeah. Not in some fucking trading floor where your head of research goes, come in here, I've got to have a quick word with you.

23:02trying not to gurn you know what I mean it's terrible business it's not conducive to a relaxed time so I'd be creeping around spending an orderly long time in the bogs not just for doing lines but for just hoping no one's going to see me but I wonder

23:18Geraint Anderson: how many people were feeling the same like you you know you know this is a word called imposter syndrome one day because you've gone in from being a hippie style free spirited on the beaches all of a sudden you've got your hair chopped and you're into the city now. I've got sportsmen, pals of mine, sports players, they've got into the city and found booze and cocaine. But they were never seen to be that person who would use cocaine because they're ex-professional rugby players or footballers, well, not footballers, but ex-professional sportsmen. So rugby players, majority. So no one really thought that that was their thing, but they were on a massive cover-up.

23:55Geraint Anderson: But at the same time, like you say, they're earning a ton 50, they're getting a million pound bonus or 750 grand bonus. They're like, I haven't really earned this money. yeah yeah like how have I earned this money I've just blagged my way in I've built relationships with people I've done deals with people but under the table giving them something that they're going to put their deal through me that they that then I'm getting my percentage in cut and the business is happening I'm going out dropping 15 grand at lunch and yeah they were living an unbelievable lifestyle in their in their 30s yeah late 20s 30s late 20s 30s that was peak yeah but and then the lads are still involved right now my pals i'm not going to mention names you know you are there's a handful of them but they all look really haggard yeah of course man you've got to you've got to slow down you get that leathery heart syndrome yes as well which i didn't like the sound of so in their the 40s and mid 40s and they've still been not smashing it as hard because you can't because people aren't smashing it as hard anymore they got kids they got pressures they got houses they got cars on tick they got private school yeah they're not getting there they haven't looked after for themselves you know and you can you can see which ones who got out early and gone i've taken mick ash yeah and i'm gonna live in the countryside or whatever why do you think i moved to the country mate okay there you go you know i i it's the fact i even just last night yeah yeah i had ruby murray down in queen's park with my brother-in-law and suddenly i've got the inclination we've had about four pints i'm like oh man i know what i used to what did i used to do there's a tingling that i can't quite remember there's a tingling oh i used to call the man and there would be three or four numbers who'd be there in 15 minutes and i said thank god i don't live here it's one of the reasons i moved to wales to the black mountains to get a million miles away yeah just but you know what fucked it up yeah dark web yeah okay because the first 10 years there sweet as a nut yeah just you know living a few magic mushrooms yeah from the hills yeah healthy nice yeah you know cup of tea lovely cup of tea everyone's a winner and then suddenly the dark web comes along and bitcoin and that and there's various it savvy neighbors who are mates who are going hey i've got some ream sparkle here yeah you want to come over and i'm like oh like fucking you know what was it odysseus being tied to the to the mast i'm like hey missus get them fucking handcuffs on now love because i'm hearing the voices the voices that were dead for 10 years so the dark web is where you can just order anything you want online yeah and it can and it gets sent delivered to you so obviously occasionally some joker would go to newport and get some pub grub but you know yeah some fucking terrible fucking 13 percent shite from some moody geezer in a nasty newport pub and you'd be like oh thank god i don't need this you're gonna nose it's all blocked the next day and you're trying to convince your missus you've got a cold cold you know it's fucking weird in august what's going on here um and but yeah but it was the dark webs yeah screwed things up so I moved out because well particularly because I split up this bird and then you were saying about like it was everywhere in the banking but it was everywhere in London it was rife everywhere advertising fucking publishing marketing sports dentists doctors they were all at it it was snoring a blizzard the devil's dandruff just was everywhere and some people don't believe that though I just like who doesn't no but some people don't believe that it was doctors, dentists, lawyers it was literally, it was rife every joker in town I mean there was that poem by that fellow simply everyone's doing cocaine I can't remember that posh double bar name but it was just everyone you had it was just glamorous and of course if you're a rich young man you're not going to be doing fucking pills on a Wednesday you're not going to be going down corny and barrow like you know doing some ketamine I think I should get a bigger bonus let me just fall into the k-hole here do you know what I mean that's no you want that shit that you see is really glamorous and super expensive like 80 quid a G minimum and then you get the special and then that's the perfect and the next day provided you've got a decent supply of Valium you've got to have yourself four hours kit which is what you need in your 20s that's all you need now I can finally get sick I'm a dead man walking you know how were you paying for it back then it was all cash it was all cash dealers when times have moved on have got their own PayPal accounts apparently I succeeded apparently literally unbelievable it's unbelievable mate I was I just someone in Ireland at the moment someone just showed me the page of the what this dealer offers yeah so he calls himself well I can't really say actually but and it's got every conceivable type of weed every conceivable type of ecstasy like a menu it's a menu yes and I believe it also has like a Facebook thing people going yes this Bolivian flake had a nice aftertaste um I think it was probably from the left side of the mountain and probably the northern northern part of Peru and a bit of Bolivia you know lovely buzz lasting about 25 minutes and fucking the come down was more than acceptable it was it was basically like reviews underneath so they got reviews mate my god no you couldn't make it up so they're literally and it's also not only are they reviews there are reviews done by geezers who are treating it like a fucking french red wine from the loire valley yeah and they're treating it with similar language a bitter aftertaste i felt was slightly disappointing you know i'm saying it was unbelievable shit going on i mean thank god yeah i mean combine that with tinder you'd be in real trouble you've got tinder in one hand i mean you know combine what was um what was some of the bars and clubs i'm just trying to remember some of the bars and clubs that you remember partying in back in the day i know they've all changed hands yeah it's only when i go back to london i go i used to go to that club down there and that club down there and obviously all the names have changed so there was that what's it called the one that prince andrew and that used to go to with the fucking magnums and bougie bougie and there was something like that and that's i got my someone nicked my fucking prada prada jacket when i went there and they'd do that thing where they had the music from Darth Vader you know and they would come in with a Nebuchadnezzar so I think that's 64 bottles of champagne so it's that big that's how big the bottle is and it would have sparklers 64 bottles of champagne in one I think that's the biggest it's called you know they've got Mifusela Mifusela I think I may be talking to you I'd love to have known how much that oh that would be a minimum 5 grand I think so what they'd do is the music would stop because that's where it first started remember they put the sparklers at the top and it would come out but that's when it changed that's when the clubbing scene changed the clubbing scene changed from going to a club having it dancing all of a sudden now you're making the VIP areas bigger than an actual club yes yes and not only that it was about status table service and status so basically what would happen is you'd get into you could see these city boys getting into fights not fights like cock off exactly that's the word I was looking for the technical term and they're doing this thing and the music stopped and I think there was four geezers and they had them and the bottle if in my memory serves me correctly and they'd do that and that was Bougies was one of them and then the next table would go we'll get two of those fuckers we'll show those pricks you know what I mean and all these dolly birds who were there was an eastern influx of eastern European ladies super fit and without generalising entirely let's just say the financial incentive was perhaps more pronounced than it might be with other ladies you know you needed to play that game to get there but there was a few places that was one of the places i used to go to i'd go to proper clubs like the cross yeah you know or bagley's i loved i had some fucking giggles in bagley's so i'd go there with my mates but with the dickheads work your work my so-called workmates yeah i'm being i was two-faced mate you know the realities i made out like they were my best friends to get commission get the votes yeah they weren't and um i feel that's one thing when i do think okay mate you were there were parts of your behavior that you are not proud of because you were manipulative you were ruthless and that's actually when i started looking into the fact about whether i started using when i did this book this recent book about psych being a psychopath are you a psychopath well i'm just about to find out okay so i i've got the psychopath here now yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah just just live on camera uh no um so i i did the psychopath checklist i mean i've got it here in my i was looking at down here and i i it's got things like you know are you lacking in empathy zero you score zero one or two are you um did you have a juvenile delinquency i i was i have been a juvenile delinquent i think i'll tell you a few stories that i did and you can judge for yourself because it's quite weird my path i went from being a bit of a nut job to getting my shit together at 16 to going to that university we mentioned earlier and and i went through it and i scored myself eight or nine out of a possible 40 now above 25 in this country you're deemed a psychopath yeah above 30 in the u.s so i'm eight or nine average american male is four so i'm on the i believe i'm on the spectrum but i'm just about to be assessed by an actual forensic psychologist called Kerry Danes, and she's going to actually assess me.

33:23Because a lot of what it sounds, whenever people think of psychopaths, they think of Hannibal Lecter or fucking, you know, the Yorkshire Ripper or whatever. Actually, what a lot of it gives you is kind of a mild superpower. Yes. So you're fearless. Yeah. You're very self-confident. You have what's called glib charm. Go on. I thought all charm was glib. You know what I mean? It's fucking superficial charm. You've got things like grandiosity. you think you're a bit cooler and harder than you actually are or maybe you think you're the fucking next messiah you know these are all on a spectrum so you can imagine for bankers being a bit on the psychopath checklist is a fucking no bad thing you make difficult decisions oh what we need to fire 2 000 people yeah let's do it yeah them them them them them yeah no feeling no empathy oh your trade's going fucking so badly against you no no it's going to work out i know and and that's generally you know don't panic and so they so what i'm trying to say is there's even rumors now goldman sachs are looking in their recruitment it used to be a rumor that they were looking for people who are probably bullied at school yeah so they had the requisite drive and i'll show those bastards who took the piss out of me from the council estates i'll show those fuckers yeah uh now word on the street is they're looking for people who are just on the spectrum because they know they make the best bankers and they make great leaders as well you know the best the two most deemed US presidents deemed to be psychopaths psychopathic or the highest on the spectrum would be Clinton and JFK the one who is lowest Jimmy Carter, you know you do the math those two you know great deemed to be great resolute, fearless, super brave decisive leaders and then you've got the fucking peanut farmer who couldn't fucking chew gum and walk at the same time you know what I mean

35:09Geraint Anderson: psychopaths interesting in because psychopaths I think 99.9 % of people think psychopath you've got an absolute loony tune stay away from him but actually the traits you're saying there are a lot of business people a lot of high highly high sports people yeah yeah I would wear that down yeah that that sheer focus yeah that sheer out determination determination to get the results and competitiveness that kind of urge and so yeah it's it I've done three years looking into it now for for the book and I suddenly, as I said, I suddenly started thinking, just a minute, and it's weird, Dodge, the other thing that's happened that's quite funny is that the narrative, so the book is a parody, right?

35:46It's like the idea of -

35:48Geraint Anderson: Well, so you've written another book? This book, yeah. So City Boy. City Boy, I've written a sequel to it now. Cool. It's called How to Con Friends and Manipulate People, The Subtle Art of Being a Total Psychopath. So you've written a second book, How to Con and Manipulate People. Yeah, but it's a joke. It's a parody, right? What it is, right, is it's a self-help book written by people, by a guy. It's not really me. I write it. It's the voice who loves fucking Trump, Andrew Tate, Elon Musk, all those Manosphere lads. And he basically says, let's just take this to its logical conclusion. The only way you're going to thrive in today's world, my friend, is by being a psychopath.

36:25But you're probably not one of the lucky ones. I call them the lucky 1%. So I'm going to teach you how to fake it till you make it. so the gag is is that things have got so nasty in politics and in fucking you know business that the only way you're going to survive now is by being a psychopath but the irony is that i thought this was a parody i'm only doing it as a gag but it's like there's a lot of very very effective information in there i learned from the city you know 12 years in the city but then the narrative's changed everyone's now be they podcast as journalists they're saying you're a psycho so I suddenly went shit guys maybe you fucking are yeah yeah and it's literally happened over last and my wife's girl I told you so she would know she was going your empathy what you've only scored yourself a one on that you've got a fucking two at least what emotionally shallow two but but you know promiscuity I was only for about 30 years I was you know extremely promiscuous then you had

37:26Geraint Anderson: thrill-seeking my whole life yeah until recently has been thrill-seeking you a ballsy character yeah i'm not you know without being funny you know i just i do i'm the sort of bloke who i'm i've got no doubt and this is might sound weird if there was a plane was going through a crash i don't think my heart rate would go up yeah and that's one of there's a lot of ways of telling your heart you know one thing they do to psychopaths is they'll get an electric shock thing and they say we're about to give you a really fucking serious electric shock any normal person their heart rate goes up they start sweating they don't register they get on with it yeah they feel as much pain as the next one 10 seconds later they'll go we're about to do the same thing heart rate doesn't do so you can imagine that is a super power they've got a super emotional detachment and I suddenly started thinking god I've been in situations like obviously there's been I'm not saying I'm fearless but there was a time for example we're watching an england football game where when it was hammersmith 20 years ago my mate this bloke's using the n-word very liberally my mate says stop being a fucking racist prick yeah but this guy's a local gangster yeah yeah and he basically starts hasting my mate and my mate says i'm out of here i'm gonna get the shit kicked out of me i thought nothing more of it yeah gay men's england have won i'm happy i go into the bog i'm surrounded they follow me in seven of the lads.

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39:53And I've got my pecker in my hand. I'm having a piss, which is a vulnerable situation. And they are pushing me, all of them, in the fucking urinal. And I'm going, okay, this is not very good. They're going, you're fucking with that geezer. No one tells us fucking what to say in this fucking pub. This is our pub. And I'm going, at being very brave, I go, listen, I only met that geezer tonight he's actually my best mate so this is all happening and then they go fuck off then

40:22Geraint Anderson: and I go alright and as I'm leaving the pub the bogs I thought I'm going to show you lot so I just went England England England I walked out I saw geezer having a fag this is the really odd ending to the story by the way so I go can I have a fag and my hand is doing that yeah but I'm not relative do you know who that was? Daniel fucking Craig was it? just before he started James Bond that's giving you the time and I explained the story to him and I could see his eyes were just like why is I recognised him from our friends in the north I was like why is this geezer telling me this fucking story I couldn't give a shit but he did give me a fag bless him by the way he's about one inch taller than me I mean he's 5 '9 yeah so he's you know he's got himself a blonde midget done well for Bond I thought 6 foot 3 it gives you know blonde midgets like me real hope was there ever a time when you're working in the city where you lost a lot of money yes well you know if you if you've read city boy the the classic story and it is a true story again basically i've had an all-nighter yeah and it's sunday it's a sunday all-nighter which was a schoolboy era frankly and i'm really thinking i shouldn't go into work but i know i have to because my colleague's fucking on holiday.

41:41I walk into the office. I'm absolutely edgy as fuck. I've had no kit and I've still got bugle in my system. I look on the screen. I'm praying that nothing is going to be announced by the regulatory news service, but this was not my day. A power station has exploded in Utah. The company that my mate is actually overseeing called Scottish Power, I'm now going to have to go onto a trading floor of 200 people. and tell them what to do, what this means for the share price. But it's not a company I particularly know. So my heart, at this point, I'm absolutely edgy as fuck. I didn't used to like going on the trading floor anyway, but that's what it is.

42:23I've got no choice. He's not there. I'm his backup. I'm his number two. I need to speak. 200 people on the trading floor. And by the way, it is also shown live to Frankfurt, Milan, Paris, and a few other places. and it will be shown later to New York when it wakes up.

42:39Geraint Anderson: So I'm like, oh, guys. And I don't really know what it means. I'm like, oh, fuck. You got yourself in the right pickle here, you prick. Anyway, I go up. I'm standing there. And I get into my stride. I'm like, yeah, you're okay. Yeah, okay, I'm going to go and say, look, this power station, it's worth roughly 300 million. Let's take that off the share price. You know, there's 1.2 billion shares. therefore this is a roughly 7p event whatever you know so that's you know because it was a key buy that's the other thing it was one of our key buy recommendations anyway suddenly everyone stops talking and they're all staring at me and i'm like what what now what what fresh hell is this and then i look at one of the screens which has got my face at about five foot by five foot and the blood is coming down my nostril onto my nice crisp white shirt so that's not that is not a strong look that's not cool you know down at bagley's 1992 no problem on a trading floor dresden climb baserstein no thank you so i i go i get some bogwell i shove it up and i go to the i go to the bogs get some bogwell shove it up and obviously as i come out you know i don't know if about training floors, but it's like a playground.

43:57You are getting roast, you're getting the piss taken out of you. Oh, you know, Breakfast with Keith Richards, was it, Gez? You know, Gary, didn't call me Gez. You know, I've always had these, ever since I was a kid, trying to fucking style it out. Oh, brutal. That was, that was, and oh yeah, that's, that's, you asked me how I lost money. The traders going, oh, this is the other thing. The traders ring me up going, listen mate, the shares are down 15, you said this was only a 10p event. I went, yeah, pile in.

44:25Geraint Anderson: listen mate it's down 25p now yeah keep piling in and then he's like mate i've sold out you just lost us 1.2 million quid you prick because to be very simple terms the actual share price implication may have been only 10p but what i didn't realize is the market's going how do you know that other power station they've got in utah is okay how do you know and so it's giving it's factoring in the worst case scenario. So I fucked up majorly. You can imagine I went home that night. I just thought, yeah. Do you know what I find it weird that when you look in, because I clocked it at the time when all the boys were up in the city and partying hard.

45:03Geraint Anderson: They're in control of, they're in control of all the finances around the world. Yes. Making some of the big decisions. Yeah. But they're all off their nut. I know. Well, like, I'm not saying all. Yeah, I'd say, I'm not saying all. It's actually about 10, 15 % only, genuinely. There's, there's, especially now. No one would ever know. No one would know. No one would ever know. You say 10, 15%. These boys were partying hard. Yeah, yeah. Hard, like Wednesday afternoon. Yeah, but that's what I was saying. I know Wednesday, Thursday, you know what I mean? Wednesday and Thursday were massive back there.

45:33Geraint Anderson: Everyone going to China White and everyone going to a different place and bouncing from one club to the next club. And they're going and making huge decisions on behalf of some of the biggest companies in the world. I know because I think it's natural, isn't it? You're earning all this cash. you're working really hard you're aware life's you know you could get run over by a bus tomorrow it's a one stop gig and you're thinking I'm going to fucking have a good time as well as doing this shit no I totally get it I'm just saying imagine if I wonder how it'd been how the city would have been if everyone was straight I don't know if it had done as good there wouldn't be as many deals going on I don't mean straight but I mean not going around the clock and you know full on I mean there'd be less fucking screw ups I'll tell you that that's my point that's what I meant to say there'd be less You know, there's that fat finger syndrome where some traders suddenly bought one billion quid's worth, no, sorry, 10 billion quid's worth of stuff instead of like 100 million.

46:25You know what I mean? They call it fat finger syndrome. That's blatant. All those boys should be tested ASAP. Then you've got just poor trading decisions that, you know, but, you know, risk-taking is, it gives you confidence. In fact, I'd argue Coke makes you a bit slightly psychopathic just momentarily. Well, give you the confidence, go, right, whack it on there. Yeah, fuck it. Let's have some. yeah let's have aggressive confident let's talk about me grandiosity you know uh hyper into taking risks you know whether it's going brassing in fucking east end or whether it's it's you know putting two million fucking buy call options on on some bp or whatever you know what i mean it's all the fucking same shit and it is there is some proof that actually women basically make make better fund managers in a way because they are more risk averse you know it i know that's a massive generalization yeah i'm sure you've met some birds who are not risk but you know and it's it's a different thing we we have all got our different skills and unfortunately coked up young men especially when you've got a bonus system that is what's called i call it asymmetrical you make loads of money you get a massive bonus you lose loads of money you might lose your job but they can't take they can't take the money back off yeah so it's asymmetrical so what does that encourage and then you combine that with the fact you think the fucking casino is going to fall down at any minute yeah you think fucking how long and then you're thinking how long have i got in this

47:49Geraint Anderson: game to be earning these bonuses young man's game i need to earn as much bonuses quick as possible to get out if i need to get out i can get out yeah yeah exactly that's so you've got all those pressures yeah so it's a get rich quick scheme you know they just i mean as i say i went in there for two years you know as i said with my background it just that and my brother saying mate you're going to be able to do 30 years of living like a king in goa and then i did i was like one of those fucking geezers in a film noir i went okay i'll just do one more one more bank literally one more bank job just one more bank job i did that for 10 years and then ended up i was heading up the highest second answer for ranked team i really i wish i could say the highest ranked team the geezers been in contact with me the both who did who did this who did the highest it was city group it was a guy yeah so i've had kent bray on he was the managing director of city group i don't if you heard that podcast I did with him I think I did yeah brilliant he is so honest so honest laid it on the thing laid it on the cards and he was the manager so do you know Gary Economics yes what's Gary saying ah Stevenson is it Gary Stevenson he's just knocked YouTube on the head he said he's doing his head in he's done that's a wrap because I think everyone's going to come in at all angles but Gary used to work for Kent and then Kent's called him out going hold on you weren't the biggest trader you definitely wasn't weren't doing the biggest trades on the floor out of everyone this is the truth and then I think yeah and actually the truth is what it's about and you know what everyone in the city knows that fellow Gary Stevenson was lying about being the biggest trader it's just like the worst kept secret in the square mile however I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt because what I suspect has happened is that his publisher went you want this book to sell then you've got to write that now I wouldn't do that shit I've said in City Boys some of these stories are not my own some of these stories I've nicked and I had to for legal reasons I had to you know if there was a short fat bloke you know I'd make him a tall skinny bloke exactly just to make sure I couldn't get nicked because when I did a fucking book signing in Waterstones in Edelhall Market who were the first three people in the queue?

49:50Three compliance people from my thing they would have loved and I thought this is going to be ironic mate you do a whistleblower account you've earned your two and a half mil and sorry well that's the number I wanted

50:01Geraint Anderson: Is that the number you wanted to hit? What number did you want to hit before you left the city? Oh, two and a half. And I got two and a half. Two and a half mil? Yeah. Okay. And then, you know, you can invest that. And if you can't get a 10 % return, roughly, you've got to ask yourself some questions. So the first three, I thought, this is ironic. You've written this book now, and they're going to take it all off you, you prick. You've got to get back to square one. Were you nervous writing the book? I was on Coke when I wrote the book. Okay. Yeah, we're like, whack that in there, whatever. Either on Coke or coming down from Coke.

50:30I was like that. people were going, if you can get a thousand words done in a day, you're doing well. Oh, I'm doing fucking 10 ,000. What are you going to do? I'll do 15 tomorrow. I did. Honestly, I wrote that book. I mean, I also was copying and pasting from the column I did in the London paper, which made it be.

50:48Geraint Anderson: So was it the London paper? Was it you were writing for? Yeah. I wrote from the very first one to the very last one. I was the only geezer who was a commentator for the four years. Who knew that you were writing for this paper, but they, obviously you couldn't put your name to that column. that's right it's just city boy who knew that you were doing it so obviously it was i had two years when i was not in the city and two years after and basically to cut like i occasionally some client would say we'd be over lunch he'd go it's you in it mate it's you you're city boy and i go no comment yeah but that's immediate giveaway yeah yeah and i'd go well what makes you think that what you want about he said because you told me that story three weeks ago now here look here it is in the fucking article you prick or i was with you three weeks ago you mentioned some sort of ugly dickhead from from you know goldman sachs that's me but um the bad thing is is then he'd become part of the inner circle of trust you see okay which in itself was quite nice as well you know sure and then that expanded next when then i left then i then i started writing it at work because i really couldn't have given less of a shit about my job at this point i think i wanted to be fired to be fair i wanted them to say out out but just just Just because you are, so did you find, were you an addict before you came into the city or did your addiction grow while you worked in the city?

52:08it started, I'd obviously sampled everything. At Cambridge, I was, all guns were blazing, but we couldn't afford, you know, beat Cambridge. But we, you know, it's all just pills and mushrooms and acid.

52:23Geraint Anderson: As you do. As you do, yes. If you want to get a decent degree, expand your mind. but uh but basically yeah that's when it started and that's when you got the money and you're like okay and it's also the correct pharmaceutical form you know you don't want to be as i said before you don't want to sort of see your fucking head of research's face turning into foie gras while you're having a fucking flashback at 9 30 on a monday morning no thanks uh and uh basically i yeah i then it got and i know when i said it you know it was it wasn't like the the other fellow who was doing 30 G's I can't even understand how that fellow is still with us God bless his heart must be like something amazing so you should reach out to Kent no I'd like he sounded like I'll put you both after this I'm going to put you both in context I think you'll have a right laugh yeah yeah I think he sounds like a man I'd like to have a drink with even though he doesn't drink he can have a sparkling water I'll have a Guinness I'd love to make but you know I'd say then and then it continued after so I would say there's a 20 period 20 year period of four, five, six G's a week.

53:29Yeah, okay. But then you're doing all the others as well, you see. And that period of, you can imagine, the period between leaving the city and meeting my good lady, now good lady.

53:38Geraint Anderson: What, from 2008 you left the city? And when did you meet your missus? It was literally the end of, it was the end of 2008. Yeah, we got together. We actually knew each other. As the old gag goes, we were friends and then we got married. Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah. Now, man doesn't know what happiness is until he's married and then it's too late. No, I'm only joking. But, yeah, Yeah, well, that year was the year of living dangerously. You know, you're going to Burning Man, you're going to Glastonbury, you're going to every conceivable festival, every conceivable house party. You're inviting randoms you've met at some moody pub in Notting Hill to come and live with you, like two sort of random German girls, just because it seemed a good idea at the time.

54:16What the fuck are you up to, you prick? You know, just terrible, terrible behaviour. But, you know, good laugh.

54:22Geraint Anderson: so at what period in that time from 1996 to 2008 were you like I need to get out of this game I'm not enjoying I'm not enjoying the cocaine like I used to enjoy I'm not enjoying the boozing like I used to enjoy there must have been a period where you were hitting a real rock bottom it was the last two years I'd split up for no apparent reason with this girl I was going to marry we were still in love I was still in love with her I just did it because I thought you're too young to get married so let's call this a day that's no that's you know actually love it what's her name Sophie are you in contact ever still yeah yeah we're mates I met her at Wilderness Festival the other day oh nice I'm going this weekend are you oh mate I should delay my flight back to Kerry I do it's very middle class isn't it you'd see David Cameron walking around in green wellies when I went I'd have a right laugh there's a V-shaped valley dance around until 3 in the morning and little people are swimming in there there's a pocket little thing in the woods yeah it's the most It's the poshest most middle class festival in all, but maybe that's, you know, maybe it's Boomtown.

55:25I'm a bit too old for Boomtown. Boomtown's quality. I have heard good things about it.

55:28Geraint Anderson: Boomtown is on another level. If you want to go to a festival and you want to forget everything for 72 hours and have the best experience of your life, Boomtown in Winterstar is on another level. It's off the charts. I've heard tremendous things. It's off the charts. But I might be a bit long in the teeth for that. No, you wouldn't. No, you wouldn't. All right. It's every age group and everyone's having the best time of their lives. yeah because the production it's like a 10 million pound festival it's a 10 million production so they've got hundreds and hundreds of actors everywhere coming out of the trees or in a house they've built this house there's actors everywhere it's just it's the magical it's just magical yeah mysterious magical festival I might give that a bash maybe there's still still life in the old dog mate you've still got it in you just make sure you either stay in a hotel or you've got a nice yeah proper proper I've got a camper proper camper yeah no I mean it's it's it's all been you know that's the thing the addiction makes it sound like a terrible thing people do drugs for a reason they can't be to escape and have fun yeah and and and then towards the end so I'd say to answer your question 2006 was splitting up with that bird and then just thinking oh you made a terrible mistake combine that with thinking oh this why are you doing this job it's just killing you you know you're getting up at six you're stressed full of stress all these pricks trying to tell you you're wrong all the time bosses people backstabbing you're having to be a bit of a psychopath just to fucking that's a good question there how much backstabbing goes on in the city shit loads the bonus pool is a finite amount of money you know if John's getting another hundred grand that's a hundred grand off your potential fucking bonus you know what I mean so if you can and this is what the book the new book is all about it's taking the piss but it says here's how to blow your trumpet subtly but make sure your boss knows here's how to have a conversation with a headhunter who is in fact your auntie marge just while your boss is walking down the you know the corridor so that he knows you're sought after yeah here's how to fucking brown nose your boss how to fucking brown nose lick bum all those other things that sound like they're in a special interest german film you here's how to um to basically make a rival look dodgy you know put a copy of um something like shaving Ryan's privates in his drawer and make sure the boss sees it.

57:53You know, this sort of thing. There's whole techniques and that's the gag. That's what the book's gag is.

57:58Geraint Anderson: So basically what you're telling, you're telling how people, what went on in the city and what you've got to do if you want to get... Yeah, because the city, the premise really is that what I thought was unique to the city, that backstabbing, manipulative, ruthless, nutty, fucking, win at any cost shit, you know do bend the rules break the rules whatever that to me has expanded now now it seems to me you've got you've got people like you know elon musk saying uh empathy is the cause of weakness for western civilization i thought empathy was quite a nice thing personally i thought quite nice for me to be able to go what's dodge thinking about what's what's his interest how can i you know accommodate those then they've got you know people like trump it's all about manipulation lies non-stop lies non-stop manipulation no shame post-shame post-truth world we're living in then you've got the manosphere bros who are basically i don't know enough about them but i've just studied andrew tate specifically and i just see a man who talks about manipulating women in a kind of semi-psychopathic way like they're just pawns for sex or ways for me to attain wealth and power yeah so i suddenly went just a minute i need i'm going to take the piss out of these people by trying to show them that they are actually acting and behaving and espousing views that would not be dissimilar to those of a psychopath yeah and that's why you know but i'm in so doing i then have a chapter at the end called but seriously folks and i'm gonna give you a copy of the book dodge where it goes actually you may have been slightly seduced by this book and you may think it's a fucking like a manual for success but this is what's actually it's about it is not the way forward because this is the way for a horrible society and a way of making your life and those around you unpleasant.

59:44Now, I've got to tread a fine line because some people say, well, you did those and you were really successful. But look, at the end of the book, he recommends killing the chief executive. He says, look, he could come for revenge. Machiavelli says, if you're going to aim at a king, you best kill him. There's a lot of Machiavelli in it, you know. So it's, hopefully people will realize it's a parody. Although some people have said, when I was doing a book signing, this geezer goes, comes in, he's read it, he's a 19 year old kid. And he goes, mate, I read your book. It's really good. i was going you realize it's a it's a parody yeah you know what i thought it was a parody

1:00:15Geraint Anderson: and i was like he was really smart of course it's a fucking parody he kills his chief executive at the end i'm not recommending and then someone else said to me an american friend i got to read it through because it's getting published in america on september the second he goes um you know yanks are going to think this is serious don't you i said what you want about every about three two to three paragraphs there's a gag making sure you realize it's just a fucking parody he goes no, no, no, no. You are overestimating Americans' ability to deal with irony, my friend. You know, we don't know shit about irony.

1:00:45You know, we talk loudly at dinner parties about how rich we are, for fuck's sake. Get your shit together. You need to adapt this because the Americans are going to see it as a manual.

1:00:54Geraint Anderson: How much bullying went on in the city when you were there?

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1:01:33so you know hr and compliance over my 12 year period started getting their shit together i remember there was a story about this lady and something happened and one of the traders had a few drinks pulled her up on his shoulders but how can i put this client man united were playing at home if you know what i'm saying so you know it was the curse the the and so this was very visible to everyone because her ass was up there and god you know and that was nice and people got a bit you know there were only five female mds in our bank of 250 five females you get me it was ridiculous like like back then it's just changed a bit now but as i said before it's like the playground man it is a playground it's a trading floor and if you can't hold your own And one thing I was able to do when they said, you know, why are you such a fat bastard?

1:02:30I'd say, because every time I fuck your wife, she gives me a biscuit. You know what I mean? So it's, yeah. You know what I'm saying? If you could hold your own. So that's what, that's the advantage I had over the other Oxbridge pencil necks. Yeah. Or because they, they might be very good at spreadsheets and all that shit, but when it came to the piss taking, I could, I could not only, I could actually, I'd initiate it. I'd go, come on then, Barrow Boy Trader from fucking, you know, whatever market, Smith, you know, probably because a lot of the traders are proper working class lads. They might be doing...

1:03:03Geraint Anderson: From East London or Essex, all coming down to earn a pound note. They're the best. But you know what's interesting is the ones that start off, like some of my pals are telling me that the ones who go and get the lunches for everyone. Yeah. Like the young kids who come on there and work the way through. They're the ones I like. Yeah. They're the ones who come in and go, just give me an opportunity. And at lunchtime, everyone's fried money. I'm going get me that get me this get me this he brings back lunch for everyone and then he's worked his way through to become a millionaire when he's come from nothing that's it they're the stories I like no I agree I'm sorry I'm sorry yours is fucking completely opposite you can fuck off you prick you nepotistic little brat bastard from Cambridge Cambridge but do you know what I mean though like you're one end of the spectrum who's gone in there and been successful coming from Cambridge but also the young lads who have had nothing and going just someone give me an opportunity.

1:03:51And I'd say that fellow Gary Stevens and bless him. He's of that. He's of that. He's of the council estate, clever, worked hard, conviction of his own belief. Yeah, no, mine was the classic kind of nepotistic way. My brother gets me a job.

1:04:05Geraint Anderson: Do you not think that, well, you probably got your job, but thank you. What's your brother's name? Hugh. Hugh. He's a vicar. He's a vicar now, yeah. And he worked in the city. He worked, and just a year after I got in, he called it a day, but long enough to get my foot in the door. But the thing is, don't you think like life throws you without sounding like some fucking American Hollywood film, you get a couple of chances. You've got to grab them. You grab them with your book. So I got given two, I'd say. One, my brother got me that job. But if after a month I was shit, they would have said, fuck off.

1:04:34I was on a rolling month contract. So second one was when the girl, Bridget, she got me the gig doing the anonymous column in the London paper. But if it wasn't funny or shit, again. So you know what I'm saying? Life, unless you're really unlucky, life is going to throw you a few bones and you've got to be smart enough and then diligent enough to work those and go yeah this is actually my skill set

1:04:58Geraint Anderson: I always say the more curious you are the luckier you get yeah yeah yeah and I use that I use that all the time more questions you ask more doors open more doors open you get an opportunity you get an opportunity and we get the opportunity jump in with both hands and anyone listening out there in their 20s try everything and jump in and give it a go and even your 30s and 40s I know it's more even us give it a go don't put me in your category mate yeah I'm 54 yeah fuck's sake sorry mate this ain't going out you can cut that bit but I was going to say the old do you remember Arnold Palmer the golfer yes his gag was always oh yeah the harder I practice the luckier I get that was his line which I've always liked like that as well but everyone uses that I like the more curious you are the luckier you get staying curious it doesn't it keeps you young it keeps you interested did and when you're curious you're paying you're opening conversations and you're asking people how they are and what they do and what how do you do that and you're giving an interest into people yeah you're giving interest into people and then you're listening and understanding and then it opens doors then you can open doors for other people yeah yeah and put people in contact like i do with ken with there you go virtuous virtuous yeah it all comes but that's probably without you know getting down on my hands and knees probably why you like this and why you're good at it because you actually you're you're you're not got a script which is the first time ever that's a whole new the news freestyle everything and so but you're also interested you're genuinely interested so that that in itself i think as soon as you there's nothing more boring than an uncurious mind that's another quote and i completely agree people just think that you know even at 70 people who remain curious they're gonna be life is a wonderful thing the world's a wonderful thing your little 80 year fucking sojourn on this planet is a fascinating thing so I'm all in with that do you know what's interesting what you're what you're saying there I freestyle everything no computer no notes I just have a wicked chat whatever walk of life you're from I've gone on other people's podcast I haven't done a lot and I'm going to do more my team are saying I've got to go on more podcasts which I will do but the podcast I've been on one of them's got a computer in front of him and I'm having a conversation and I'm mid conversation telling a story and he's taken his eyes away and gone down to Peter looking for the next questions.

1:07:10Geraint Anderson: He's not listening. Not listening. So when I do it, I freestyle. I haven't lost, I don't lose contact with anyone's eye for the whole time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because you're not a phone addict as well. You know kids these days, they're fucking, they just. Well, look, not just kids, mate. I think adults as well. Yeah. We always use this. Kids are stuck on their phones and adults are as well. Yeah, yeah. And I have to take responsibility as well because I don't own a computer. Yeah. I run my businesses. I just do everything off my phone and WhatsApp and phone calls. and no email. Yeah, but it's noticeable though because you do and that's a way of assessing as well whether I'm talking shit or whether I'm making up whatever, so you don't want to lie to you because I've got a funny feeling you might see through it.

1:07:50A hundred percent.

1:07:50Geraint Anderson: I've done 400 of these in the last, what is it, coming up to six years now. 400 episodes. I love it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love people. Yeah, yeah. I love all walks of life of people. Yeah. And also I know like the way this has been successful is because people are on the podcast they're laying the cards on the table if you're trying to hide something or you're not telling the truth I can pick up the people watching and listening can pick up you know so I just like it when people say bam that's me well I'm very pleased you didn't ask about my you know my juvenile delinquency days I was pleased what do you mean by juvenile delinquency damn what do you mean by that though just a nuisance as a kid I'm just so I'm just gonna have you ever been nicked yes for what burglary so when I was 15 I went on my first holiday to Malta me and my two mates it's the first time I'm allowed without adults we meet these Etonians they are super entitled one of them says I'm going to earn 180 grand when I'm 18 I'm going to blow it all on heroin I thought no you're not we're going to burgle your place and we're going to nick all your stuff that's what we did and then unfortunately we were seen doing it so we didn't know this at the time but the Maltese police were after us but thank fuck they didn't catch us because we told we would have got two years and then unfortunately though there's an unfortunately when we got back through to gatwick two of the lads were waiting at the passport control with a copper and we're straight into gatwick nick and it's like my head is so thin i can slip it through the thing where they put the food in yeah so i'm putting my head in my mate thinks he's fucking you know sliced alone he's doing press ups and that but they're all right because they're over 16 so they don't have to have their parents in on the interview but i do my dad a labor mp my mom this super religious fucking daughter of missionaries so i am sitting there oh man but i slip my head through the through the slit it's not that it's like this and i go lads we're all in separate cells we can't confirm our stories i go it's a good job it wasn't planned and it's a good job we were all drunk wasn't it lads that's that's the scam i don't want to i don't want my parents to find out that this was a planned thing and we weren't drunk so anyway that my parents are there for the um interview my one of the most unpleasant harrowing things i've had to do and uh you know my mom is crying her eyes out on the way back didn't say a fucking word no one says a word they've just they've thought i've done all right with two the other one both brothers one went to oxford one to cambridge by the way that i'm now you know done various other things got in trouble with police in various other ways you the black shoot with the family oh without a shadow of a doubt and so we they think and i just get a three-year caution so it's all fine and dandy but to them it my life's over this is the way it's going but then i get my shit together and go to that university we mentioned and everything changes but it was it was a low point and it was a again that kind of thrill seeking that bending breaking rules with with impunity various other things i did um which got me in trouble with the police uh i i was you know that started making me think just a minute you were thrill-seeking bet rule-breaking dickhead but it would be normal if you're some tough lad from a council estate but i was brought up very very religiously very very straight both my brothers super fucking straight yeah so why and that's were you rebelling maybe yeah yeah i think i think maybe there's a bit of that because you must have there was you looking around going this ain't for me this ain't for me this ain't for me i'm gonna go and be a rebel and i'm gonna go and do what i'm gonna do and i'll see you lot later and actually it turned out all right it did it did and weirdly the rebellion so-called rebellion you know what you really rebellious went to cambridge and then you went to the city and then you're now living in the country man that's one hell of a rebel that is you know what are you doing today because i see you on tv i see you on lots of clips and everything that you've done over the over the years what's your what's your world today my world today is writing books and promote and what you've seen me do all that shit on the bbc and all that stuff that's trying to promote the book okay and i haven't got my digital presence up i want to try and do this thing called instagram i don't i didn't don't think it's going to catch on but i'm going to give it a bash and you know get my shit together because i've got another book up this one's about psychopaths yeah the next book you've done city boy the next one's about psychopaths and then this next one which will come out hopefully in two years god willing is going to be called let's talk about me the subtle art of being a total narcissist because actually what we have in this world of selfies and instagram and uh you know people not caring about others in any way is really an epidemic of narcissism yeah and that's do you not think this has all come about in the last three or four years i'd say the last 20 years no no but i think the last three four years when everyone's talking about personal brand everyone's taking photos and selfies like selfies wasn't around i don't know what year would selfies first come on the scene I reckon selfies with those sticks I reckon it's more than three or four I reckon the selfies on the stick might be ten years people all of a sudden facing the camera that way normally taking a photo of other people and people just people just not really giving a shit about others and it's not so much being psychopathic where you're just this ruthless manipulator treating everyone like pawns in your relentless search for wealth and power it's more like look at me look at me aren't I great here look let's Photoshop some abs onto me let's Photoshop me onto a fucking super yacht with these three Fitbirds why has it all gone like that I think that mate will be here all night I know but I'm saying it's kind of spiralled out of control I think social media has got a massive yeah massively I'd say that's the big one and then phones that do brilliant photos etc is a big one and then to be a little bit philosophical I think the decline of religion so you haven't got a god to worship for the vast majority of people let's worship me instead combine that with people who are narcissistic who are clearly doing very well for themselves so trump is not a psychopath trump is a malignant narcissist okay too thin-skinned petulant impulsive reckless to be a true psychopath as i do you know you mentioned that word narcissist there i just had a it's coming out i think next week well mind you when this comes out actually it's already out okay sweet yes yes but actually we had a expert and he wrote written a book called The Narcissistic Wife oh and I was like I did this podcast I was like oh my god because no one really knows what narcissistic is if you broke it all down but he was breaking it down saying people are married to narcissistic and it can go the other way as well I'm not just saying that and your mother can be narcissistic absolutely absolutely and they're talking about how the husband comes home walks on eggshells she gives him a cold shoulder there's so much to it there's all these folks listening to this now going no but that's what I'm saying and that's the reason why I did it yeah this expert from America because I got three or four mates who are out of their relationships and we're all on a ski holiday and we got talking about your missus ex-missus and all that like I didn't realise I was with a narcissistic wife it was a fucking nightmare and my other pal next and you I was like I need to do a podcast on this just so blokes can listen and go, oh my God, that's me.

1:15:09Geraint Anderson: I need to do something about this. Because blokes just think, oh, it's just her indoors. But actually to hear a breakdown of it was... Yeah, yeah. And all that sort of amazing spend that people do on plastic surgery, on collagen, Botox. I see women make their bums bigger like a Brazilian bum. Just wait 10 years, that will happen anyway. Always look at your missus mum first before marrying. Believe me, yeah. Thankfully, my mother-in-law, if you're listening jane is fantastic lovely that's lovely but yeah no it's narcissism is a funny old thing because it's not about just about power and wealth yes like it would tend to be or control and you've probably heard of the dark triad the dark triad is machiavellianism which is basically a self-conscious way to control others uh psychopathy which is this empathy free remorseless conscienceless uh approach to life yeah and then narcissism which is really i'm special i'm entitled people who don't recognize that i'm brilliant are pricks and in fact i'm going to do if you're malignant then you're cruel and bullying to those people okay and of course there's a massive crossover if you're a malignant machiavellian narcissist i mean jesus everyone's worked with some of those things though you know what i mean and it's and actually this book again without banging about my book it is attempting to help you identify identify these fuckers yeah and and it says so what it is is it's helping you to do that by showing getting you into the mind of one of understanding so then you can recognize it yes rather than feel like yeah oh there's something it's about that energy of that person i don't like what is it that you to understand what emotions don't ring true they look like they fucking learned them on oprah yeah because they're brilliant at mirroring so they don't you know they'll go i am supposed to cry now but you know it's then they're me it's all bullshit yeah it's it's it's there's a lot of them about and there's and now people look at it as a spectrum used to be binary he's a psycho he's not now people go and that's why you know without i'm going to find out if i'm on how where where i am on the psychopathy spectrum but i know i'm a little bit yeah i know that for a fact yeah and i think everyone's on a spectrum of something these days well we're all self-diagnosing when we were growing up it didn't matter maybe you're just you're just mad you get on with it yeah yeah like crack on all of a sudden no i've got a diagnosis of all these different things yeah ADHD it's not doing anyone any good fucking neurosis anxiety disorder fucking a bit OCD no that's what Sean Ryder said about about the Happy Mondays he said we were all we were all lunatics he said nowadays we'd all be saying oh well you've got ADHD and ADHD and you're fucking you're a nutjob you're a bit psychopathic and you're a bit we were at me leave us alone I guess that's part of the fucking narcissistic age as well isn't it we're all self diagnosed let's talk about me that's what my book's going to be called let's talk about me you know what I mean is that the name of your book the new one The old one is How to Con Friends and Manipulate People.

1:17:53But I say old, it's like three weeks old. But yeah, it's weird.

1:17:57Geraint Anderson: So where can people find you? Because I want to, you know, this is a really lovely conversation. I've really enjoyed it. Fun and you've told some great stories in there. Where can people find you to actually look at your two or three books? Okay, so obviously the book City Boy and How to Con Friends and Manipulate People. Was that on Amazon, I take it? Amazon, yeah. And that's all cool. And all good bookshops, obviously. I'm trying to do this thing sub stack where I'm writing articles which is quite good that's Garant Anderson that's just my name and then I'm trying this newfangled thing Instagram I'm going to give it a bash cityboygez GZ are you on LinkedIn?

1:18:31Geraint Anderson: I'm on LinkedIn yeah Garant Anderson so anyone can reach out to you on a DM or whatever yeah yeah I love all that shit and I'm I basically went into hibernation when I had kids to some extent you know three months in Mexico surfing six weeks in Kerry Island just by the beach and then the rest of the time was chilling and bringing up kids and now basically don't call it a comeback though Dodge but you got that next boost now what's the next thing and I'm getting into it and I'm enjoying it I'm enjoying doing this sort of shit and it's just fun fun fun life ain't over at 54 this has been a lot of fun cheers and I really appreciate you coming down no mate I've loved every minute genuinely you're a good man cheers mate nice one good man cheers hi guys I really hope you enjoyed that as much as I did Can you do us a favor and leave us a review as it massively helps us grow the show?

1:19:22Geraint Anderson: Cheers, guys.

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