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The Informant: A True Story
From an award-winning New York Times investigative reporter comes an outrageous story of greed, corruption, and conspiracy—which left the FBI and Justice Department counting on the cooperation of one man . . .It was one of the FBI's biggest a senior executive with America's most politically powerful corporation, Archer Daniels Midland, had become a confidential government witness, secretly recording a vast criminal conspiracy spanning five continents. Mark Whitacre, the promising golden boy of ADM, had put his career and family at risk to wear a wire and deceive his friends and colleagues. Using Whitacre and a small team of agents to tap into the secrets at ADM, the FBI discovered the company's scheme to steal millions of dollars from its own customers. But as the FBI and federal prosecutors closed in on ADM, using stakeouts, wiretaps, and secret recordings of illegal meetings around the world, they suddenly found that everything was not all that it appeared. At the same time Whitacre was cooperating with the Feds while playing the role of loyal company man, he had his ownagenda he kept hidden from everyone around him—his wife, his lawyer, even the FBI agents who had come to trust him with the case they had put their careers on the line for. Whitacre became sucked into his own world of James Bond antics, imperiling the criminal case and creating a web of deceit that left the FBI and prosecutors uncertain where the lies stopped and the truth began.In this gripping account unfolds one of the most captivating and bizarre tales in the history of the FBI and corporate America. Meticulously researched and richly told by New York Times senior writer Kurt Eichenwald, The Informant re-creates the drama of the story, beginning with the secret recordings, stakeouts, and interviews with suspects and witnesses to the power struggles within ADM and its board—including the high-profile chairman Dwayne Andreas, F. Ross Johnson, and Brian Mulroney—to the big-gun Washington lawyers hired by ADM and on up through the ranks of the Justice Department to FBI Director Louis Freeh and Attorney General Janet Reno.A page-turning real-life thriller that features deadpan FBI agents, crooked executives, idealistic lawyers, and shady witnesses with an addiction to intrigue, The Informant tells an important and compelling story of power and betrayal in AmericaFrom the Trade Paperback edition.
656 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 28, 2000
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November 12, 2018
Once upon a time, I stumbled onto this book on the bargain shelf at Barnes & Noble. Since it cost practically nothing and looked mildly interesting, I bought it. It went in my TBR bookcase where it languished for years. Oh, occasionally I would pick it up, blow the dust away and read the blurbs and think that it looked mildly interesting, and then place it back on the shelf.
Not long ago, while looking for something to read I picked it up again, blew the dust off and thought, this looks mildly interesting, and decided that I would read it. After all, according to the cover of my paperback copy, it had been made into a major motion picture starring Matt Damon. By the time that I finished the prologue, I was hooked.
It isn’t often that a work of nonfiction can be described as a page-turner – but that is a good description of "The Informant." And there are a lot of pages to turn – 500 plus, in fact. Investigative reporter Kurt Eichenwald leaves no stone unturned and no fact unexamined or unreported in his thoroughly researched account of a price fixing conspiracy that occurred in the ‘90’s. Involved were Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), the hugely successful and politically powerful agribusiness corporation, as well as two Japanese and two South Korean corporations.
The prices being fixed included, among others, citric acid and high fructose corn syrup, additives that are found in a countless number of food products. And then there was lysine, an amino acid added to livestock feed, in order to fatten hogs and chickens. The result is that the prices of these additives were artificially propped up and that drove up the expenses of the food producers, which were subsequently passed on to – of course – the consumer.
ADM’s advertising slogan was and is “supermarket to the world.” But because its competitors wanted to keep prices high and its customers wanted to keep them low, the private and extremely cynical inside slogan among its top executives was “competitors are our friends and customers are our enemies.”
I know what I have described thus far doesn’t sound like much of a page-turner. But it is. What makes it so is that the FBI was able to persuade one of ADM’s top executives to wear a wire in order to tape him and other ADM executives and those of the four Asian corporations, engaging in price fixing. This cooperating witness was at the time (and may still be) the highest-ranking corporate whistleblower in U.S. history. His name is Mark Whitacre.
And what a witness he was! I’m not about to go into details about him or his actions because it is impossible to do so in a brief summary. Also, it would be like spoiling the plot in a whodunit – which is how this book reads.
Eichenwald wrote in an afterword:
“This is a book about the malleable nature of truth. As the story shows, reality can serve as the handmaiden of fiction….Throughout these pages, I’ve tried to play upon that line between fact and fantasy. While everything described in this book occurred, the story was intentionally structured to lend temporary credence to some of the many lies told in this investigation. Essentially, I was attempting to put readers in the same uncertain position as the investigators, all while dropping hints – admittedly subtle at times – about where reality began.”
He accomplished his goal. But beware; this is a complex, convoluted story. There are more characters than in a Russian novel. The reader needs a scorecard to keep up with the players. Fortunately, Eichenwald provides one in the front of the book. Also, complicating the story are the bureaucratic battles fought between FBI investigators and federal prosecutors (to be expected; it happens all the time) as well as turf battles between the U.S. Attorneys offices in Illinois and the Justice Department in Washington, D.C., not to mention internal struggles within the Justice Department. All of this can make it difficult to stay with the story.
My only complaint about the book is that Eichenwald could have streamlined his account somewhat without detracting from the readers understanding of the important facts of the case. But he had done his research – and how – and he was eager to report it – and did he ever.
The book was originally published in 2000. The movie was released in 2009. While the book gives much attention to the FBI agents’ investigation, and a great deal of space to the efforts of the prosecutors (whose in-fighting came close to derailing the case), the movie, unable to film the book in its entirety, concentrates on the whistleblower and his amazing antics. Greed and malfeasance that results in international price fixing conspiracies are nothing to laugh about, and yet, when one reads the book, one can’t help but laugh at times – even out loud sometime. In fact, the movie was promoted as a comedy –a comedy about price fixing!
The book has been compared to the fiction of Tom Clancy, Scott Turow, Michael Crichton, and, of course, John Grisham. But those writers’ imaginations pale in comparison to what Eichenwald recounts in his nonfiction book. One critic wrote, “…with its dizzying array of subplots, twists, and political maneuvers, this book is more like Grisham’s entire oeuvre compressed into 600 pages.”
Columnist Liz Smith nailed the book precisely when she wrote, “[It] reads like John Grisham on acid….”
The title of the first edition of the book is "The Informant: A True Story." The title of the paperback movie tie-in (published in 2000) that I own is "The Informant! A True Story." I am always wary of book, and especially movie, titles that announce that the story is a “true story.” More times than not, it isn’t. But this one is.
Exclamation marks in titles are red flags, too. They usually promise more than what they deliver. This one was added because the movie, which heavily concentrates on Mark Whitacre and his role in the proceedings, has to be seen to be believed. But it is true, too. And I have to admit that in this case the exclamation mark is warranted!!
As a friend said about the book, “Truth (even when it’s built around lies) is and always will be stranger than fiction."
Not long ago, while looking for something to read I picked it up again, blew the dust off and thought, this looks mildly interesting, and decided that I would read it. After all, according to the cover of my paperback copy, it had been made into a major motion picture starring Matt Damon. By the time that I finished the prologue, I was hooked.
It isn’t often that a work of nonfiction can be described as a page-turner – but that is a good description of "The Informant." And there are a lot of pages to turn – 500 plus, in fact. Investigative reporter Kurt Eichenwald leaves no stone unturned and no fact unexamined or unreported in his thoroughly researched account of a price fixing conspiracy that occurred in the ‘90’s. Involved were Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), the hugely successful and politically powerful agribusiness corporation, as well as two Japanese and two South Korean corporations.
The prices being fixed included, among others, citric acid and high fructose corn syrup, additives that are found in a countless number of food products. And then there was lysine, an amino acid added to livestock feed, in order to fatten hogs and chickens. The result is that the prices of these additives were artificially propped up and that drove up the expenses of the food producers, which were subsequently passed on to – of course – the consumer.
ADM’s advertising slogan was and is “supermarket to the world.” But because its competitors wanted to keep prices high and its customers wanted to keep them low, the private and extremely cynical inside slogan among its top executives was “competitors are our friends and customers are our enemies.”
I know what I have described thus far doesn’t sound like much of a page-turner. But it is. What makes it so is that the FBI was able to persuade one of ADM’s top executives to wear a wire in order to tape him and other ADM executives and those of the four Asian corporations, engaging in price fixing. This cooperating witness was at the time (and may still be) the highest-ranking corporate whistleblower in U.S. history. His name is Mark Whitacre.
And what a witness he was! I’m not about to go into details about him or his actions because it is impossible to do so in a brief summary. Also, it would be like spoiling the plot in a whodunit – which is how this book reads.
Eichenwald wrote in an afterword:
“This is a book about the malleable nature of truth. As the story shows, reality can serve as the handmaiden of fiction….Throughout these pages, I’ve tried to play upon that line between fact and fantasy. While everything described in this book occurred, the story was intentionally structured to lend temporary credence to some of the many lies told in this investigation. Essentially, I was attempting to put readers in the same uncertain position as the investigators, all while dropping hints – admittedly subtle at times – about where reality began.”
He accomplished his goal. But beware; this is a complex, convoluted story. There are more characters than in a Russian novel. The reader needs a scorecard to keep up with the players. Fortunately, Eichenwald provides one in the front of the book. Also, complicating the story are the bureaucratic battles fought between FBI investigators and federal prosecutors (to be expected; it happens all the time) as well as turf battles between the U.S. Attorneys offices in Illinois and the Justice Department in Washington, D.C., not to mention internal struggles within the Justice Department. All of this can make it difficult to stay with the story.
My only complaint about the book is that Eichenwald could have streamlined his account somewhat without detracting from the readers understanding of the important facts of the case. But he had done his research – and how – and he was eager to report it – and did he ever.
The book was originally published in 2000. The movie was released in 2009. While the book gives much attention to the FBI agents’ investigation, and a great deal of space to the efforts of the prosecutors (whose in-fighting came close to derailing the case), the movie, unable to film the book in its entirety, concentrates on the whistleblower and his amazing antics. Greed and malfeasance that results in international price fixing conspiracies are nothing to laugh about, and yet, when one reads the book, one can’t help but laugh at times – even out loud sometime. In fact, the movie was promoted as a comedy –a comedy about price fixing!
The book has been compared to the fiction of Tom Clancy, Scott Turow, Michael Crichton, and, of course, John Grisham. But those writers’ imaginations pale in comparison to what Eichenwald recounts in his nonfiction book. One critic wrote, “…with its dizzying array of subplots, twists, and political maneuvers, this book is more like Grisham’s entire oeuvre compressed into 600 pages.”
Columnist Liz Smith nailed the book precisely when she wrote, “[It] reads like John Grisham on acid….”
The title of the first edition of the book is "The Informant: A True Story." The title of the paperback movie tie-in (published in 2000) that I own is "The Informant! A True Story." I am always wary of book, and especially movie, titles that announce that the story is a “true story.” More times than not, it isn’t. But this one is.
Exclamation marks in titles are red flags, too. They usually promise more than what they deliver. This one was added because the movie, which heavily concentrates on Mark Whitacre and his role in the proceedings, has to be seen to be believed. But it is true, too. And I have to admit that in this case the exclamation mark is warranted!!
As a friend said about the book, “Truth (even when it’s built around lies) is and always will be stranger than fiction."
September 6, 2008
I attended a continuing legal education event a week ago, at which the author of this book and one of the FBI agents from the book spoke about the case. I left the event determined to read the book straight away - and in any event, before the movie comes out next year.
I had known of this book for some time, and was generally aware it concerned the ADM antitrust price-fixing trial. But I had thought, wrongly as it turned out, that the book was about the trial. In fact, the trial is relegated to the epilogue.
The book starts with the FBI's investigation of allegations of potential corporate espionage at ADM in Decatur, Illinois. Early in the investigation, one of ADM's executives, Mark Whitacre, admits that the company has been involved in fixing prices with its competitors, and becomes a mole for the FBI.
But that is just the start. As the government builds its case, devastating new facts arise that could compromise the whole case. The government's informant, it seems, is hiding other secrets.
I couldn't put this book down, not even knowing (from the presentation) how it would end. I read all 500+ pages in a matter of days, staying up late. I would definitely recommend it.
I had known of this book for some time, and was generally aware it concerned the ADM antitrust price-fixing trial. But I had thought, wrongly as it turned out, that the book was about the trial. In fact, the trial is relegated to the epilogue.
The book starts with the FBI's investigation of allegations of potential corporate espionage at ADM in Decatur, Illinois. Early in the investigation, one of ADM's executives, Mark Whitacre, admits that the company has been involved in fixing prices with its competitors, and becomes a mole for the FBI.
But that is just the start. As the government builds its case, devastating new facts arise that could compromise the whole case. The government's informant, it seems, is hiding other secrets.
I couldn't put this book down, not even knowing (from the presentation) how it would end. I read all 500+ pages in a matter of days, staying up late. I would definitely recommend it.
August 24, 2019
I can understand why a movie was made of 'The Informant' by Kurt Eichenwald! This FBI/Department of Justice case is very bizarre! Eichenwald, a New York Times reporter at the time, followed the true story for years. Initially, it was all about a typical white-collar price-fixing crime involving top-level respectable and powerful company executives. However, the whistleblower Mark Whitacre was no "deep-throat" informant! He was chaos personified, to put it mildly. Because of his antics, the FBI agents who worked with him never knew if he was simply suffering from fear and loss of nerve, or if there was something else going on with him.
There was something else going on with him...
Here is a link to the movie trailer. It seems like the movie is mostly accurate, especially in spirit to the character of Mark Whitacre:
https://youtu.be/AGx7iw6y86s
Mark Whitacre, thirty-four years old, an elite employee of the powerful agriculture company Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) and president of its Bioproducts Division, was an amazingly self-destructive executive. Eventually, no one knew when he was lying or telling the truth, including his poor betrayed wife, Ginger. He seemed incapable of revealing facts without either adding unnecessary embellishments or strange impossible falsehoods.
Whitacre was THE "cooperating witness" for the FBI. He wore taping devices and microphones into ADM meetings, and recorded meetings and conversations. With his undercover assistance, the FBI was able to set up cameras in some of the hotel rooms as well - indefectible evidence. But was Whitacre a good guy or bad? He was strangely reluctant for many days, but then suddenly he was wild with enthusiasm and suggestions. His stories about the prize-fixing scheme constantly changed, as did his explanations for mysteriously going off the grid. At one point, he said he was being blackmailed by a Japanese company into sabotaging ADM's bacteria vats, another time he said he'd been beaten and kidnapped. It all sounded suspiciously like a book by John Grisham, The Firm.
Who WAS this guy? The FBI discovered he lied about his birth family, telling some people he was adopted. He lied about some of his education, claiming degrees he didn't have. His non-ADM business associates and friends had been told conflicting explanations for business deals and Swiss/Bahamas bank accounts he talked them into fronting for him. His wife believed him he was doing a good thing, exposing ADM corruption, but she thought the FBI agents and Department of Justice lawyers were throwing Whitacre under the bus because of the complaints he voiced at home, most of which turned out to be lies.
Was Mark Whitacre sane? Wtf?
From Wikipedia:
"The Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM) is an American global food processing and commodities trading corporation, headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The company operates more than 270 plants and 420 crop procurement facilities worldwide, where cereal grains and oilseeds are processed into products used in food, beverage, nutraceutical, industrial, and animal feed markets worldwide."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archer_...
Today, 2019, ADM appears to be doing well under new management, no longer making illegal conspiracies with other agriculture-commodity companies around the world (Japan, China, South Korea, etc.).
However, the main price-fixing plot for which ADM was eventually brought to justice involved at first a product called Lysine.
"Lysine production for animal feed is a major global industry, reaching in 2009 almost 700,000 tonnes for a market value of over €1.22 billion. Lysine is an important additive to animal feed because it is a limiting amino acid when optimizing the growth of certain animals such as pigs and chickens for the production of meat. Lysine supplementation allows for the use of lower-cost plant protein (maize, for instance, rather than soy) while maintaining high growth rates, and limiting the pollution from nitrogen excretion...Lysine is industrially produced by microbial fermentation, from a base mainly of sugar. Genetic engineering research is actively pursuing bacterial strains to improve the efficiency of production and allow lysine to be made from other substrates."
from Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysine
The lysine price-fixing conspiracy was an organized effort during the mid-1990s to raise the price of the animal feed additive lysine. It involved five companies that had commercialized high-tech fermentation technologies, including American company Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Japanese companies Ajinomoto and Kyowa Hakko Kogyo, and Korean companies Sewon America Inc. and Cheil Jedang Ltd. A criminal investigation resulted in fines and three-year prison sentences for three executives of ADM who colluded with the other companies to fix prices. The foreign companies settled with the United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division in September through December 1996. Each firm and four executives from the Asian firms pleaded guilty as part of a plea bargain to aid in further investigation against ADM. The cartel had been able to raise lysine prices 70% within their first nine months of cooperation. The investigation yielded $105 million in criminal fines, a record antitrust penalty at the time, including a $70 million fine against ADM. ADM was fined an additional $30 million for its participation in a separate conspiracy in the citric acid market and paid a total fine of $100 million. Three former high-ranking ADM executives were convicted in September 1998 after a ten-week jury trial. Buyers of lysine in the United States and Canada sued and recovered $80 to $100 million in damages from the five cartel members, and ADM paid $38 million to settle mismanagement suits by its shareholders.
The lysine cartel was the first successful prosecution of an international cartel by the U.S. Department of Justice in more than 40 years. Since then, the DoJ has discovered and prosecuted scores of international cartels.
From Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysine_...
Kurt Eichenwald, the author and investigating reporter of this story, included an extensive Notes and Sources section. There also are multiple media hits on Google if the gentle reader cares to search for further reading.
This was a popular news story! Trust me, it IS so incredibly amazing. Mark Whitacre is one of those people who could have easily been a reality TV star - definitely the equal of any Trump-involved production - if he had been a media influencer in these Ott years.
There was something else going on with him...
Here is a link to the movie trailer. It seems like the movie is mostly accurate, especially in spirit to the character of Mark Whitacre:
https://youtu.be/AGx7iw6y86s
Mark Whitacre, thirty-four years old, an elite employee of the powerful agriculture company Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) and president of its Bioproducts Division, was an amazingly self-destructive executive. Eventually, no one knew when he was lying or telling the truth, including his poor betrayed wife, Ginger. He seemed incapable of revealing facts without either adding unnecessary embellishments or strange impossible falsehoods.
Whitacre was THE "cooperating witness" for the FBI. He wore taping devices and microphones into ADM meetings, and recorded meetings and conversations. With his undercover assistance, the FBI was able to set up cameras in some of the hotel rooms as well - indefectible evidence. But was Whitacre a good guy or bad? He was strangely reluctant for many days, but then suddenly he was wild with enthusiasm and suggestions. His stories about the prize-fixing scheme constantly changed, as did his explanations for mysteriously going off the grid. At one point, he said he was being blackmailed by a Japanese company into sabotaging ADM's bacteria vats, another time he said he'd been beaten and kidnapped. It all sounded suspiciously like a book by John Grisham, The Firm.
Who WAS this guy? The FBI discovered he lied about his birth family, telling some people he was adopted. He lied about some of his education, claiming degrees he didn't have. His non-ADM business associates and friends had been told conflicting explanations for business deals and Swiss/Bahamas bank accounts he talked them into fronting for him. His wife believed him he was doing a good thing, exposing ADM corruption, but she thought the FBI agents and Department of Justice lawyers were throwing Whitacre under the bus because of the complaints he voiced at home, most of which turned out to be lies.
Was Mark Whitacre sane? Wtf?
From Wikipedia:
"The Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM) is an American global food processing and commodities trading corporation, headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The company operates more than 270 plants and 420 crop procurement facilities worldwide, where cereal grains and oilseeds are processed into products used in food, beverage, nutraceutical, industrial, and animal feed markets worldwide."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archer_...
Today, 2019, ADM appears to be doing well under new management, no longer making illegal conspiracies with other agriculture-commodity companies around the world (Japan, China, South Korea, etc.).
However, the main price-fixing plot for which ADM was eventually brought to justice involved at first a product called Lysine.
"Lysine production for animal feed is a major global industry, reaching in 2009 almost 700,000 tonnes for a market value of over €1.22 billion. Lysine is an important additive to animal feed because it is a limiting amino acid when optimizing the growth of certain animals such as pigs and chickens for the production of meat. Lysine supplementation allows for the use of lower-cost plant protein (maize, for instance, rather than soy) while maintaining high growth rates, and limiting the pollution from nitrogen excretion...Lysine is industrially produced by microbial fermentation, from a base mainly of sugar. Genetic engineering research is actively pursuing bacterial strains to improve the efficiency of production and allow lysine to be made from other substrates."
from Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysine
The lysine price-fixing conspiracy was an organized effort during the mid-1990s to raise the price of the animal feed additive lysine. It involved five companies that had commercialized high-tech fermentation technologies, including American company Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Japanese companies Ajinomoto and Kyowa Hakko Kogyo, and Korean companies Sewon America Inc. and Cheil Jedang Ltd. A criminal investigation resulted in fines and three-year prison sentences for three executives of ADM who colluded with the other companies to fix prices. The foreign companies settled with the United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division in September through December 1996. Each firm and four executives from the Asian firms pleaded guilty as part of a plea bargain to aid in further investigation against ADM. The cartel had been able to raise lysine prices 70% within their first nine months of cooperation. The investigation yielded $105 million in criminal fines, a record antitrust penalty at the time, including a $70 million fine against ADM. ADM was fined an additional $30 million for its participation in a separate conspiracy in the citric acid market and paid a total fine of $100 million. Three former high-ranking ADM executives were convicted in September 1998 after a ten-week jury trial. Buyers of lysine in the United States and Canada sued and recovered $80 to $100 million in damages from the five cartel members, and ADM paid $38 million to settle mismanagement suits by its shareholders.
The lysine cartel was the first successful prosecution of an international cartel by the U.S. Department of Justice in more than 40 years. Since then, the DoJ has discovered and prosecuted scores of international cartels.
From Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysine_...
Kurt Eichenwald, the author and investigating reporter of this story, included an extensive Notes and Sources section. There also are multiple media hits on Google if the gentle reader cares to search for further reading.
This was a popular news story! Trust me, it IS so incredibly amazing. Mark Whitacre is one of those people who could have easily been a reality TV star - definitely the equal of any Trump-involved production - if he had been a media influencer in these Ott years.
February 16, 2010
Few people do these massive reconstructions of corporate malfeasance better than Kurt Eichenwald. The ADM price-fixing case (which Eichenwald covered for the New York Times) almost recedes to the background as he details the bizarre shenanigans of cooperating witness and lying sociopath Mark Whitacre, president of the Bioproducts Division. (Archer Daniels Midland - "Supermarket to the World..." is a giant agribusiness company that made America obese with high fructose corn syrup and made our diets increasingly more unnatural with new foodlike inventions.) Suicide attempts, diagnoses of mental illness, Nigerian scam letters abound. Yes - several executives making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year fell for Nigerian scam letters. (Like they say, salesmen are always a sucker for a sale, and apparently con men are suckers for cons.) Eichenwald includes some covertly taped conversations between ADM executives that aren't related to the price-fixing but pertain to the appearance of various female ADM employees: their attractiveness, weight, speculation on what they like to do in bed, and which of them have "big lips like a black."
"She's just a quiet gal," Whitacre said.
"Sort of a little meek-lookin' gal," Andreas added.
"Yeah," Whitacre said. "But she looks like she's an-"
"Looks like a whore," Andreas interrupted. "Looks like a fuckin' whore."
SPOILER
All three of the men involved in this HR conversation ended up in prison.
"She's just a quiet gal," Whitacre said.
"Sort of a little meek-lookin' gal," Andreas added.
"Yeah," Whitacre said. "But she looks like she's an-"
"Looks like a whore," Andreas interrupted. "Looks like a fuckin' whore."
SPOILER
All three of the men involved in this HR conversation ended up in prison.
July 18, 2018
It's hard not to hear the Michael Douglas character, Gordon Gecko, in "Wall Street" echoing 'greed is good' when reading this story. Having seen the film I decided to read the book which goes far beyond it in all respects. Mark Whitacre, PhD and head of lysine department at ADM is more like Bernie Madoff than anything else though its not suspected due to his 'good guy' nature. The twists and turns as the story unfolds show just how greedy Fortune 500 companies are and to what end they'll go to manipulate markets and people. But crime does NOT pay and Whitacre learns this well. Highly recommended.
May 21, 2017
Bottom line first: Very readable, barely believable. Perhaps too long and certainly a few too many made up conversations. This is high stakes reality TV with unexpected change - ups to keep you turning pages.
As I remember, or choose to remember the timeline: It was made public that one of the planets largest agricultural food and related industries was under criminal investigation on either the same day or the same week as the White Water investigation went public.
The White Water investigation would tie up American fascination, government operations and make the name Lewinsky into the name of an action. The expression: "It depends on what your definition of "is" is; remains an ultimate way to start or finish a conversation on a cynical note. In terms of substance this scandal produced much smoke, some little heat and nothing important.
The Archer Daniels Midlands -ADM- investigation would send several top corporate officials to jail and produce what was then a record criminal penalty. Author Daniel Midlands was leading a plot to control the price of food across the planet. This case is remembered in this book and a briefly popular movie. The Informant!
Most cases of corporate malfeasance and criminal activity hang on technicalities, complex laws and all manner of boring details. They tend to be the stuff of limited interest. The final criminal proceedings against ADM may have been just as technical and dull. The investigation was not.
The Informant is an attempt to capture what reads more like a comedy - psychodrama then anything invoking real people. The story unfolds like a Mad Magazine plot with a group of FBI straight men having to act as jugglers, therapists and mine field guides. One of their biggest problems is: their informant.
From the evidence of this book and vague recollections of at least one 60 Minutes segment, Mr. Mark Whitcare, the informant in question might be seen in a clown costume, an exceptionally long sleeved white coat, prison garb or superhero tights. His motives and psychology and consequently his behaviors justify a large wardrobe. Mr. Whitcare is the title character of this story, but to spare you too many details...What a piece of work!
One cannot doubt that the FBI agents are the steady rocks of this book. Special Agent Brian Sheppard was one of the first to have deal with this case. A local boy with local ties and no reason to cause harm to a community closely tied to the success and reputation of ADM. He would initially come into the case at the invitation of ADM only to see it became a case against ADM. This kind of turn around is a regular occurrence and the reason why so many reviewers find themselves using the word "fiction" their summaries of this book.
For the true historian or student of corporate crime, it might be worth while to get a more academic version of the story. Other books might better represent the points of view of the various major players. Those books will not make good movies.
As I remember, or choose to remember the timeline: It was made public that one of the planets largest agricultural food and related industries was under criminal investigation on either the same day or the same week as the White Water investigation went public.
The White Water investigation would tie up American fascination, government operations and make the name Lewinsky into the name of an action. The expression: "It depends on what your definition of "is" is; remains an ultimate way to start or finish a conversation on a cynical note. In terms of substance this scandal produced much smoke, some little heat and nothing important.
The Archer Daniels Midlands -ADM- investigation would send several top corporate officials to jail and produce what was then a record criminal penalty. Author Daniel Midlands was leading a plot to control the price of food across the planet. This case is remembered in this book and a briefly popular movie. The Informant!
Most cases of corporate malfeasance and criminal activity hang on technicalities, complex laws and all manner of boring details. They tend to be the stuff of limited interest. The final criminal proceedings against ADM may have been just as technical and dull. The investigation was not.
The Informant is an attempt to capture what reads more like a comedy - psychodrama then anything invoking real people. The story unfolds like a Mad Magazine plot with a group of FBI straight men having to act as jugglers, therapists and mine field guides. One of their biggest problems is: their informant.
From the evidence of this book and vague recollections of at least one 60 Minutes segment, Mr. Mark Whitcare, the informant in question might be seen in a clown costume, an exceptionally long sleeved white coat, prison garb or superhero tights. His motives and psychology and consequently his behaviors justify a large wardrobe. Mr. Whitcare is the title character of this story, but to spare you too many details...What a piece of work!
One cannot doubt that the FBI agents are the steady rocks of this book. Special Agent Brian Sheppard was one of the first to have deal with this case. A local boy with local ties and no reason to cause harm to a community closely tied to the success and reputation of ADM. He would initially come into the case at the invitation of ADM only to see it became a case against ADM. This kind of turn around is a regular occurrence and the reason why so many reviewers find themselves using the word "fiction" their summaries of this book.
For the true historian or student of corporate crime, it might be worth while to get a more academic version of the story. Other books might better represent the points of view of the various major players. Those books will not make good movies.
August 6, 2015
This non-fiction story is more interesting than any fictional crime detective story. I feel compelled to be a bit more enthusiastic than usual about this book to overcome the reaction of potential readers who are not interested in a story about price fixing at Archer Daniels Midland (ADM). That may sound boring. Trust me, it’s not!
By the end of the book, you will learn that as of the year 2000 over a billion dollars in fines had been paid worldwide by various food and pharmaceutical companies as a result of the fall-out from this case. Thousands of normally law-abiding people had to be involved over many years for such wide spread price fixing to exist. It took one flawed cooperating witness to expose the crimes to law enforcement. When I use the word “flawed,” this one was a doozy! As multiple layers of lies are peeled back in this story the reader can’t help but wonder just how many more layers can there be?
The story is told from the point of view of the FBI as they investigate the case. A small but interesting part of the story is the internal friction between the FBI and the Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors. In this case the FBI appears to be the good guys and the DOJ are a bunch of bumbling idiots. At one point the DOJ appears to be guilty of trying to obstruct justice in response to political pressure. It’s too bad the author wasn’t able to learn the behind-the-scenes reasons for their actions. It was probably a good example of the effect of the generous political contributions made by ADM.
A runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize, The Informant is a mesmerizing piece of investigative reporting. The foreword to the book says that everything in the book is true including the lies. After finishing the book, I understand the reason for that statement.
The following is from the PageADay Book Lover's Calendar for August 8, 2006:
Kurt Eichenwald, an investigative reporter for The New York Times, interviewed more than 100 people to piece together this incredible true-crime story of a vast international price-fixing scandal. Archer Daniels Midland, a company that supplies oils and flours for grocery products, made corrupt deals with businesses all over the world in a tangled web of white-collar crime. The twists and turns in this shocking-but-true tale make this as compelling as any thriller—and you'll never view items on the grocery store shelves in the same way again.
THE INFORMANT: A TRUE STORY, by Kurt Eichenwald (2000; Broadway, 2001)
By the end of the book, you will learn that as of the year 2000 over a billion dollars in fines had been paid worldwide by various food and pharmaceutical companies as a result of the fall-out from this case. Thousands of normally law-abiding people had to be involved over many years for such wide spread price fixing to exist. It took one flawed cooperating witness to expose the crimes to law enforcement. When I use the word “flawed,” this one was a doozy! As multiple layers of lies are peeled back in this story the reader can’t help but wonder just how many more layers can there be?
The story is told from the point of view of the FBI as they investigate the case. A small but interesting part of the story is the internal friction between the FBI and the Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors. In this case the FBI appears to be the good guys and the DOJ are a bunch of bumbling idiots. At one point the DOJ appears to be guilty of trying to obstruct justice in response to political pressure. It’s too bad the author wasn’t able to learn the behind-the-scenes reasons for their actions. It was probably a good example of the effect of the generous political contributions made by ADM.
A runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize, The Informant is a mesmerizing piece of investigative reporting. The foreword to the book says that everything in the book is true including the lies. After finishing the book, I understand the reason for that statement.
The following is from the PageADay Book Lover's Calendar for August 8, 2006:
Kurt Eichenwald, an investigative reporter for The New York Times, interviewed more than 100 people to piece together this incredible true-crime story of a vast international price-fixing scandal. Archer Daniels Midland, a company that supplies oils and flours for grocery products, made corrupt deals with businesses all over the world in a tangled web of white-collar crime. The twists and turns in this shocking-but-true tale make this as compelling as any thriller—and you'll never view items on the grocery store shelves in the same way again.
THE INFORMANT: A TRUE STORY, by Kurt Eichenwald (2000; Broadway, 2001)
March 14, 2012
The author is fairly good at telling an interesting story,
but by the time I got to page 450, I was burned out and went to the last chapter to see how things turned out.
He put in too many descriptions of buildings, etc that really didn't have anything to do with the story.
Also every fart, sneeze, cough and backache by everyone in the book.
Whoever edited the book failed, the story needed to be tighten up.
Only a little about the trial, and because the book was written in 2000, nothing about appeals or actual time served.
So I went to wikipedia,
they have some good pages on the lysine conspiracy and Whitacre.
No page for Michael Andreas tho, he must have killed that.
Wiki was a surprise, Whitacre served quite a long sentence,
while Andreas and Wilson only did 2 years.
AMD got off lightly, and the Dept. of Justice didn't do much about all the other
price fixing AMD did.
AMD's political power paid off.
The fine was only a few months profit, then business as usual.
DOJ was more interested in the $10 million Whitacre stole
than the $$$ Billions that AMD stole.
As an informant, Whitacre really got screwed, after reading this I wouldn't have
anything to do with Dept of Justice or the FBI.
DOJ especially looks incompetent, and very, very political.
The DOJ looks like it was bought and paid for by AMD and the Andreas family.
I think there's another story here if someone dug for it.
Turns out the author got in some hot water over ethics a couple of years ago himself;
Ironic?
see wiki for more.
The book doesn't have an index, when it should have one.
Saw the movie last night,
It has many of the punchlines in the book,
but for people who haven't read the book,
it might be hard to understand.
The movie is about a one star.
Ironic I should read the book this year,
so much about sleaze and corruption in Greece.
Then a not too much different story about some Greek-Americans.
Finally, the auditor for AMD was Ernst & Young,
the same auditor for Lehman Brothers.
"Ernst & Young substantially assisted Lehman Brothers,
now bankrupt, to engage in a massive accounting fraud"
E&Y isn't any better than Arthur Anderson,
the auditor for Enron,
Like Anderson they should be put out of business.
but by the time I got to page 450, I was burned out and went to the last chapter to see how things turned out.
He put in too many descriptions of buildings, etc that really didn't have anything to do with the story.
Also every fart, sneeze, cough and backache by everyone in the book.
Whoever edited the book failed, the story needed to be tighten up.
Only a little about the trial, and because the book was written in 2000, nothing about appeals or actual time served.
So I went to wikipedia,
they have some good pages on the lysine conspiracy and Whitacre.
No page for Michael Andreas tho, he must have killed that.
Wiki was a surprise, Whitacre served quite a long sentence,
while Andreas and Wilson only did 2 years.
AMD got off lightly, and the Dept. of Justice didn't do much about all the other
price fixing AMD did.
AMD's political power paid off.
The fine was only a few months profit, then business as usual.
DOJ was more interested in the $10 million Whitacre stole
than the $$$ Billions that AMD stole.
As an informant, Whitacre really got screwed, after reading this I wouldn't have
anything to do with Dept of Justice or the FBI.
DOJ especially looks incompetent, and very, very political.
The DOJ looks like it was bought and paid for by AMD and the Andreas family.
I think there's another story here if someone dug for it.
Turns out the author got in some hot water over ethics a couple of years ago himself;
Ironic?
see wiki for more.
The book doesn't have an index, when it should have one.
Saw the movie last night,
It has many of the punchlines in the book,
but for people who haven't read the book,
it might be hard to understand.
The movie is about a one star.
Ironic I should read the book this year,
so much about sleaze and corruption in Greece.
Then a not too much different story about some Greek-Americans.
Finally, the auditor for AMD was Ernst & Young,
the same auditor for Lehman Brothers.
"Ernst & Young substantially assisted Lehman Brothers,
now bankrupt, to engage in a massive accounting fraud"
E&Y isn't any better than Arthur Anderson,
the auditor for Enron,
Like Anderson they should be put out of business.
May 4, 2015
Loved the movie and the book is fantastic, as well. I loved the way the author used dialogue through transcripts of taped conversations, first hand accounts, and testimony. It reads so smoothly - unlike many "True Stories" - and you feel the deceptions emotionally rather than just tut tutting the bad actors. You as the reader go on the roller coaster with the investigating agents and the prosecutors as they try to build a case around someone that can't be trusted to tell the truth for longer than ten minutes.
My three criticisms of the book are 1) the long section about building of the legal case against Whitacre and ADM dragged for me, 2) Mark Whitacre's mental illness is treated a little bit condescendingly and 3) I wish there had been more discussion about the implications for corporate whistleblowers after Whitacre's case because I don't know why anyone would ever attempt to whistleblow after the way he was treated. I don't want to spoil anything here, but damn.
Overall, this is a long but interesting read and Mark Whitacre is one of the most engrossing people I've ever read in nonfiction. He has all the qualities of a tragic hero AND bumbling villain. Pretty amazing.
My three criticisms of the book are 1) the long section about building of the legal case against Whitacre and ADM dragged for me, 2) Mark Whitacre's mental illness is treated a little bit condescendingly and 3) I wish there had been more discussion about the implications for corporate whistleblowers after Whitacre's case because I don't know why anyone would ever attempt to whistleblow after the way he was treated. I don't want to spoil anything here, but damn.
Overall, this is a long but interesting read and Mark Whitacre is one of the most engrossing people I've ever read in nonfiction. He has all the qualities of a tragic hero AND bumbling villain. Pretty amazing.
July 29, 2016
Fascinating true story. On the one hand, I would have liked it more if it were about 1/4 the length. On the other, some of the most interesting details were what made me like it the most. Like... I loved his relationship with the gardener (although totally non essential to the main story).
January 21, 2018
This one's tricky. It's a fascinating story with a complex man named Mark Whitacre at the center of the storm. (I've already added the movie adaptation to my Netflix queue. I'm curious to see what Matt Damon does with this guy.) It covers a broad range of topics including fraud, corporate espionage, relationships between the FBI and cooperating witnesses, relationships between the FBI and other federal agencies, loyalty, political corruption, mental illness...and the list goes on. The fact that it covers so much ground is both its strength and its weakness. The book was an ambitious behemoth. Sometimes it felt overwhelming, and it didn't help that Eichenwald was so freakin' thorough.
To some degree, he needed to provide detail to keep the book interesting (and accurate). He takes it a little far though. At one point, the author describes exactly what food the executives were eating at one of their meetings. He also really liked describing what people were wearing, including the color of their tie. There's a fine line between providing enough detail to set the scene and boring the crap out of a reader who really just wants to know how the story ends. I was having a hard enough time keeping the enormous cast of characters straight without these sorts of extraneous details. (Why do authors think this problem is solved by having a list of characters at the beginning of the book? Do they really think it will be enjoyable for the reader to keep flipping back and forth to check that?) Eichenwald is constantly switching perspectives and I struggled to keep up. I read this book relatively quickly, but that was mostly because I was worried that if I put it down for a few days I'd be hopelessly lost when I picked it back up.
5 stars as a detailed historical record of an important sequence of events. 4 stars as journalism melded with engaging storytelling. But only 3 stars as an enjoyable read for me.
To some degree, he needed to provide detail to keep the book interesting (and accurate). He takes it a little far though. At one point, the author describes exactly what food the executives were eating at one of their meetings. He also really liked describing what people were wearing, including the color of their tie. There's a fine line between providing enough detail to set the scene and boring the crap out of a reader who really just wants to know how the story ends. I was having a hard enough time keeping the enormous cast of characters straight without these sorts of extraneous details. (Why do authors think this problem is solved by having a list of characters at the beginning of the book? Do they really think it will be enjoyable for the reader to keep flipping back and forth to check that?) Eichenwald is constantly switching perspectives and I struggled to keep up. I read this book relatively quickly, but that was mostly because I was worried that if I put it down for a few days I'd be hopelessly lost when I picked it back up.
5 stars as a detailed historical record of an important sequence of events. 4 stars as journalism melded with engaging storytelling. But only 3 stars as an enjoyable read for me.
February 26, 2019
It was alright. I applaud Eichenwald for being capable of such a complicated and detailed story, but Mark Whitacre is easily one of the most annoying people that has ever lived, and price fixing is hardly a plot that gets one's heart racing. The executives at ADM and bland and boring, and almost seem to try to spice up their own lives by punctuating their conversations with misogyny and sexual objectification of the women in their office. In short - everyone in this book is boring AF - but it does do a good job of showing how blatantly some corporations break the law, and how hard it is to bring them to justice. The FBI agents on the case had to do everything short of producing a hologram of the executives announcing to the world, in detail, their crimes.
Looking back, I'm honestly not sure how I made it through this book. It seemed to stretch on forever. I guess I was drawn along by Whitacre's strange antics, constantly wondering what he was going to do next. I can't say I would recommend the book - not nearly as much as Eichenwald's book on Enron - Conspiracy of Fools. THAT was a great book. But if you're like me and have some strange interest in corporate crime, you might like The Informant. TBH, I think the only reason I like books on corporate crime is that I like books on the mafia, but they're all so poorly written. *insert laughing emoticon*
Looking back, I'm honestly not sure how I made it through this book. It seemed to stretch on forever. I guess I was drawn along by Whitacre's strange antics, constantly wondering what he was going to do next. I can't say I would recommend the book - not nearly as much as Eichenwald's book on Enron - Conspiracy of Fools. THAT was a great book. But if you're like me and have some strange interest in corporate crime, you might like The Informant. TBH, I think the only reason I like books on corporate crime is that I like books on the mafia, but they're all so poorly written. *insert laughing emoticon*
August 12, 2018
Meh. (Spoiler alert!) Sucks you in with the Introduction, but then you go through 600 pages (or in my case 30 hours) and don't ever get any real answers or closure. e.g. Why did Whittaker make up that his parents were killed and then pretend to be adopted? How/why did he make spliced tapes? What was the point of dragging out the part of sending money to Ginger's sister? No counter commentary that both suicide attempts were obviously staged? Also you constantly need to refer to a Rolodex to keep track of the myriad of coming and going characters. WAY too many loose and dead ends - even the epilogue created more questions than answers. I didn't see the movie, but in this case I'm inclined to say see that first and save yourself LOTS of time.
September 16, 2012
This isn't the type of book I usually read. I'm not that interested in true crime or in corporate America. So it says something in itself that I still gave this book four stars -- and my main criticisms of it may have to do more with the fact that the genre isn't really my cup-of-tea than real shortcomings of the book.
The hardest things to take about this book are its length and its huge cast of characters. There are times when it just felt long, and it's hard to keep all the ADM employees, lawyers, FBI agents, and other characters straight. (There is a "characters list" at the end of the book that divides them according to their affiliations, but since I listened to the audiobook, I couldn't reference the list and just got to hear it read out at the end of the book, which was less helpful. I was like, "Oh, *that's* who that guy was! Wish I'd realized that when I was reading the book!").
Still, what keeps this book compelling despite its shortcomings is its intensive character study of Mark Whitacre and the FBI agents closest to him. These are fascinating people, and Mark's actions are so bold/crazy/out of left field that it made my jaw drop. It's easy to just refer to him as crazy, but I feel bad actually doing so, since clearly he did have some mental illness issues going on.
I thought that what might make this book all worth it in the end was ADM's top execs getting properly punished for the corporate fraud and greed that was their daily existence. It was sickening how they felt totally untouchable in terms of what they were allowed to do and what they thought they could get away with. And while they didn't exactly "get away with" it, it was a let down to know that they only served a couple years for cheating customers around the world, whereas Mark Whitacre served almost ten years for the money he stole from one company.
Kurt Eichenwald is a good writer and a fantastic journalist, and he even inserts himself at the end of the book, explaining how he came to cross paths with Mark Whitacre and begin this project, which was a nice way to bring things full circle.
I rewatched the movie (which is what piqued my interest in the book initially) after "reading it," and the movie actually does a pretty good job of staying true to the spirit of the story while cutting about 24 hours of material down to two.
The hardest things to take about this book are its length and its huge cast of characters. There are times when it just felt long, and it's hard to keep all the ADM employees, lawyers, FBI agents, and other characters straight. (There is a "characters list" at the end of the book that divides them according to their affiliations, but since I listened to the audiobook, I couldn't reference the list and just got to hear it read out at the end of the book, which was less helpful. I was like, "Oh, *that's* who that guy was! Wish I'd realized that when I was reading the book!").
Still, what keeps this book compelling despite its shortcomings is its intensive character study of Mark Whitacre and the FBI agents closest to him. These are fascinating people, and Mark's actions are so bold/crazy/out of left field that it made my jaw drop. It's easy to just refer to him as crazy, but I feel bad actually doing so, since clearly he did have some mental illness issues going on.
I thought that what might make this book all worth it in the end was ADM's top execs getting properly punished for the corporate fraud and greed that was their daily existence. It was sickening how they felt totally untouchable in terms of what they were allowed to do and what they thought they could get away with. And while they didn't exactly "get away with" it, it was a let down to know that they only served a couple years for cheating customers around the world, whereas Mark Whitacre served almost ten years for the money he stole from one company.
Kurt Eichenwald is a good writer and a fantastic journalist, and he even inserts himself at the end of the book, explaining how he came to cross paths with Mark Whitacre and begin this project, which was a nice way to bring things full circle.
I rewatched the movie (which is what piqued my interest in the book initially) after "reading it," and the movie actually does a pretty good job of staying true to the spirit of the story while cutting about 24 hours of material down to two.
July 13, 2009
A can't-put-it-down book about... antitrust? YES.
The ADM price-fixing case in the late 1990s was unprecedented in terms of scope and evidence. The cooperating witness, Mark Whitacre, spent about three taping meeting and phone calls showing ADM agreeing to fix prices with 4 other companies in the global market for lysine. The ADM fine and evidence led to other prosecutions of price-fixing and law enforcement approaches price-fixing investigations and prosecutions in a completely new way.
But the same abilities that made Whitacre such a great informant - his ability to lie and sway others, his compulsive work ethic, his need for control - also created vast problems. In other words, how do you bring down a company engaged in overt crime when your only witness is a bi-polar embezzler? The book builds the case as seen through the eyes of the investigators.
If you're curious but not ready to read the book, listen to the This American Life story from 2002 (available on iTunes) based on the book. It has interviews with the author, one of the investigators, some of the lawyers and Whitacre himself. Or watch the trailer for the new movie based on the book (by the same title), directed by Steven Soderbergh.
The ADM price-fixing case in the late 1990s was unprecedented in terms of scope and evidence. The cooperating witness, Mark Whitacre, spent about three taping meeting and phone calls showing ADM agreeing to fix prices with 4 other companies in the global market for lysine. The ADM fine and evidence led to other prosecutions of price-fixing and law enforcement approaches price-fixing investigations and prosecutions in a completely new way.
But the same abilities that made Whitacre such a great informant - his ability to lie and sway others, his compulsive work ethic, his need for control - also created vast problems. In other words, how do you bring down a company engaged in overt crime when your only witness is a bi-polar embezzler? The book builds the case as seen through the eyes of the investigators.
If you're curious but not ready to read the book, listen to the This American Life story from 2002 (available on iTunes) based on the book. It has interviews with the author, one of the investigators, some of the lawyers and Whitacre himself. Or watch the trailer for the new movie based on the book (by the same title), directed by Steven Soderbergh.
January 10, 2010
This is the most annoying book I've read since Three Cups of Tea. This would have been a much more interesting book had Eichenwald simply allowed the facts to unfold without peppering his prose with conjectural adjectives. It would also have been a much shorter book. This reader wonders why Eichenwald went to such painstaking lengths to trace the paper trail involved in the downfall of a cooperating witness while totally ignoring the incredible waste of resources perpetrated upon the American taxpayers by Federal bureaucrats who do not trust each other enough to consolidate their efforts and travel.
August 30, 2017
This book started out great, defining the characters, the scheme and the crimes. But as time went by, the chapters became repetitive. It was boring because the process was so slow... I started to skim pages and chapters because they were doing the same approach each time. just couldn't get into it after that.
October 6, 2018
This is exactly the kind of book that I'm always on the lookout for but find all too rarely: nonfiction that flows cohesively, building up from a little trickle of a stream to a raging river and onward, till the dams burst! I'll be reading more of Eichenwald's work, no question about it.
November 5, 2008
very dry and boring. I was very disappointed since I so badly wanted to read it. It sounded very interesting, but unfortunately it wasn't.
March 6, 2010
Tried to get through it, I'd heard it was dull until about page 200. I'm well past 200 and I just don't care.
So I rented the movie, not much better. Damn! I really wanted to like this story.
So I rented the movie, not much better. Damn! I really wanted to like this story.
February 1, 2013
Conspiracy of fools was better. I read that book and thought this would be a good one as well. Not really.
May 9, 2016
Sounded like such a great read, sadly boring and too full of minutiae.
August 20, 2018
Picked this up at a used bookstore on vacation. Interesting local story, but really got bogged down by details in the last 4 or 5 chapters.
May 26, 2022
So much filler that I gave up.
May 30, 2022
Couldn’t put it down :)
April 20, 2022
Is a good read. Very useful for anyone in the anti trust/competition law space. I would sum up this book as the complete embodiment of that meme with 3 panels of a guy shoving a stick into the bicycle he is on.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 24, 2022
Completely insane, and hilariously so. The story's twists are amazing, and with Eichenwald's chronological telling I saw none of it coming. I think the book is probably too long for its subject, but a reader with patience will be pleasantly baffled.
> This was a tape that the FBI knew nothing about. This was one of his recordings of his meetings with the agents. He was just like Tom Cruise, taping the agents when they didn’t know. Feeling cocky, Whitacre opened the closet and placed the microcassette on a shelf. He found it amusing that he was using a recording device from the FBI to tape its own agents
> Of course, he left his briefcase behind and it continued taping. Under the law, that portion of the tape couldn’t be turned over to prosecutors—no consenting party was present.
> This was a tape that the FBI knew nothing about. This was one of his recordings of his meetings with the agents. He was just like Tom Cruise, taping the agents when they didn’t know. Feeling cocky, Whitacre opened the closet and placed the microcassette on a shelf. He found it amusing that he was using a recording device from the FBI to tape its own agents
> Of course, he left his briefcase behind and it continued taping. Under the law, that portion of the tape couldn’t be turned over to prosecutors—no consenting party was present.
September 9, 2018
Who would have thought that price-fixing, especially price-fixing of something as unsexy as lysine, could make such a roller coaster of a read? "This is [actually] a book about the malleable nature of truth" says the author in the afterward. In this case, the truth is much weirder than fiction. The book reads like a madcap satire rather than as the work of journalism that it is.
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