The US Treasury market - the world's largest government bond market - is worth about $32tn today, making it the largest pile of debt accumulated in history. But its roots lie in medieval Venice, a bloody military disaster and a leader who was forced to raise a loan to fund a war against the Byzantine Empire.

What followed was a catastrophe involving pestilence, defeat and the brutal murder of the Doge, or leader, himself on the streets of Venice. But out of this crisis emerges a financial tool that transformed global capitalism: a tradable loan that offered transparency, accountability and formed the foundations of the modern bond market.

In a special live recording from New York, Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth dive into the origins of the world’s first tradable bond. Plus, why bonds remain the ultimate check on government power today and what 12th-century Venice can teach us about current market turmoil.

Further reading: A Fabulous Debt: How Bonds Made the Modern World by Robin Wigglesworth

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Senior Producer: Michela Tindera

Executive Producer: Kate Ford

Video Producer: Michael Saliba

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT Global Head of Audio: Flo Phillips

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

How do you tell if an economy is actually working? Most economics classes point to controlled inflation, steady growth, or low unemployment - but what if the level of financial fraud is the real hidden indicator?

Robin Wigglesworth and Gillian Tett talk to Dan Davies, financial historian and author of Lying for Money, to hear about some of the wildest and most shocking frauds in history. From 'the great salad oil swindle,' which almost brought down American Express to a fake gold mine in Borneo that ended with a mysterious fall from a helicopter. Together they explore how trust drives modern economies - and how fraudsters continuously exploit it.

Further reading: Lying for Money: How Legendary Frauds Reveal the Workings of Our World by Dan Davies

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Senior Producer: Michela Tindera

Executive producers: Kate Ford and Manuela Saragosa

Video producer: Michael Saliba

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected]

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Long before Silicon Valley, the grandson of a 15th Century German peasant named Jakob Fugger built a mining and banking empire that dwarfed today’s tech titans, accumulating a fortune estimated at $4 trillion in today’s terms. Richer than the Medici, Rockefeller or Elon Musk, he was the ultimate financial mastermind who bought imperial elections, legalised interest-bearing loans, and inadvertently sparked the Protestant Reformation.

In this episode, hosts Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth are joined by historian and author Greg Steinmetz to unpack the saga of history's ultimate balance-sheet nerd. From pioneering wire-transfer systems and building the world’s first social housing project to bankrolling popes and Holy Roman emperors, they explore how Fugger weaponised capital, shaped modern finance, and redefined the relationship between money and power.

Further reading: The Richest Man Who Ever Lived: The Life and Times of Jacob Fugger by Greg Steinmetz

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Producer: Lulu Smyth

Executive producers: Kate Ford and Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Video editor: Michael Saliba

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Is money a tool of moral decay or a force for human liberation? Dante feared money would corrupt and damn us, placing bankers in the eighth circle of hell - just one above Lucifer. James Joyce saw it as a tool of freedom, and markets and trade as vital engines of connection and social mobility.

In this special bonus episode recorded live in front of an audience at the FT Weekend Festival in London, hosts Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth are joined by economist and author David McWilliams to explore humanity’s complex, seductive relationship with finance. From 14th-century Florentine banking and the birth of zero in accounting to Joyce’s Ulysses and modern central banking, they discuss how literature reveals why money animates human progress, and why trade remains humanity’s ultimate alternative to war.

Further reading:

Money: A Story of Humanity (2024), by David McWilliams

Love listening to The Story of Money? Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, and watch full episodes on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Guest: David McWilliams

Producer: Lulu Smyth

Senior Producer: Michela Tindera

Executive Producers: Manuela Saragosa & Kate Ford

Original Music and Sound Engineering: Breen Turner

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips 

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What did Jesus really think about money? When he overturned the tables of the money changers in the Temple in Jerusalem, accusing them of turning a sacred "house of prayer" into a "den of robbers", he also set off a series of events that would eventually lead to his death. But what exactly was he attacking? The traders themselves, or the wider economic and religious system they represented? 

Biblical scholar Tom Thatcher joins Gillian and Robin to explore the financial world of Jesus of Nazareth - from taxation, debt and inequality to the extraordinary economic power of that Temple in Jerusalem. Plus, if Jesus were alive today, where would he sit on the political and economic spectrum? Could his ideas about money and inequality offer a challenge to the way we think about capitalism today? Could he even be described as socialist?

Further reading: 

John, Jesus, and the Renewal of Israel by Richard A. Horsley and Tom Thatcher

Antiquities of the Jews by Flavius Josephus

The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant by John Dominic Crossan

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Senior Producer: Laurence Knight

Executive producers: Kate Ford and Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editors: Richard Topping and Michael Saliba

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 1873, Ohio senator John Sherman quietly helped pass a law that stopped Americans from turning silver into official US money. The consequences were huge: years of economic pain and political turmoil that earned it the nickname “the Crime of 1873”. Pulitzer Prize-winning author Liaquat Ahamed explains how the event squeezed American farmers and fuelled the Free Silver movement, led by the populist firebrand William Jennings Bryan. Host Gillian Tett explores with Ahamed how monetary policy can reshape politics. 

Further reading:

1873: The Rothschilds, the First Great Depression, and the Making of the Modern World (2026), by Liaquat Ahamed

Credits: Getty Images, Wikimedia, Alamy

Note: The “Cross of Gold” clip is from a 1921 studio recording, read by William Jennings Bryan. 

Love listening to The Story of Money? Join Robin and Gillian on Saturday September 5 at Kenwood House Gardens in London, or online as the FT Weekend paper comes to life. Register now at ft.com/festival and enjoy 10% off with code FTPODCAST.

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Senior Producers: Michela Tindera and Laurence Knight 

Executive producer: Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editor: Richard Topping

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

He was the bruiser of Wall Street. In the early noughties, New York attorney-general Eliot Spitzer took it upon himself to expose the lies of stock analysts during the dotcom bubble. His crusade blindsided the bankers and made him one of America's most popular politicians. People even spoke of him as a possible US president before a scandal ended his political career almost overnight. In this episode of The Story of Money, host Gillian Tett speaks to Brooke Masters, FT US managing editor and author of Spoiling for a Fight: The Rise of Eliot Spitzer, to explore how Spitzer reshaped financial regulation during the dotcom era, why his aggressive tactics won both admirers and enemies and why his legacy still matters today.

Further reading:

Spoiling for a Fight: The Rise of Eliot Spitzer, (2006), Brooke Masters

Credits: Getty Images

Love listening to The Story of Money? Join Robin and Gillian on Saturday September 5 at Kenwood House Gardens in London, or online as the FT Weekend paper comes to life. Register now at ft.com/festival and enjoy 10% off with code FTPODCAST.

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Producers: Laurence Knight and Lulu Smyth

Executive producer: Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editor: Richard Topping

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Did you know that the Prophet Mohammed was a caravan trader? He helped arrange convoys of thousands of camels carrying valuable goods across the Arabian desert. And he put his commercial nous to good use. Not only did he found one of the world’s great religions, but also a model of free-market capitalism that Friedrich Hayek would have approved of. That is the claim of this week’s guest, the libertarian economist and author Benedikt Koehler. He tells hosts Robin Wigglesworth and Gillian Tett how Islamic commercial practices were, in his view, eventually copied by medieval Europeans to great effect.

Further reading:

Early Islam and the Birth of Capitalism (2014), by Benedikt Koehler

The Long Divergence: How Islamic Law Held Back the Middle East (2010), by Timur Kuran

Muhammad: Man and Prophet (1995), by Adil Salahi

Credits: Getty Images

Love listening to The Story of Money? Join Robin and Gillian on Saturday September 5 at Kenwood House Gardens in London, or online as the FT Weekend paper comes to life. Register now at ft.com/festival and enjoy 10% off with code FTPodcast. 

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Producer: Laurence Knight 

Executive producer: Manuela Saragosa

With additional help from: Saffeya Ahmed

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editors: Josh Divney and Kristen Kenyon at Podcast Discovery

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The 1873 Gründerkrach, the spectacular stock market crash that followed Germany’s unification, is one of history’s great financial maelstroms. But its most enduring legacy isn’t about money. Host Robin Wigglesworth speaks to Pulitzer Prize-winning author Liaquat Ahamed about how the resulting economic malaise fuelled social division and transformed old prejudices into antisemitic conspiracy. It gave birth to ideas that would resurface with catastrophic consequences decades later in the 20th century.

Further reading:

1873: The Rothschilds, the First Great Depression, and the Making of the Modern World (2026), by Liaquat Ahamed 

Gold and Iron: Bismarck, Bleichröder, and the Building of the German Empire (1977), by Fritz Stern

Credits: Getty Images, Alamy

Love listening to The Story of Money? Join Robin and Gillian on Saturday September 5 at Kenwood House Gardens in London, or online as the FT Weekend paper comes to life. Register now at ft.com/festival and enjoy 10% off with code FTPodcast. 

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Senior producers: Michela Tindera and Laurence Knight 

Executive producer: Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast development: Laura Clarke

FT global head of audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editors: Josh Divney and Kristen Kenyon at Podcast Discovery

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected]

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ancient Rome is often depicted as a glamorous empire of power, sophistication and wealth. Yet for most people, the reality of daily life was precarious. Host Robin Wigglesworth talks to Kim Bowes, author of Surviving Rome: The Economic Lives of the Ninety Percent, about how ordinary Romans combined real grit with surprising financial sophistication in order to weather a system that was stacked against them. They uncover a hidden financial world in which women often ran the household finances, families delivered their own children into debt bondage and shepherds might sell wool futures on rented sheep. A far cry from the Rome of popular imagination, this is the ancient Roman empire as most Romans experienced it.

Further reading: Surviving Rome: The Economic Lives of the Ninety Percent by Kim Bowes 

Credits: Getty Images

Love listening to The Story of Money? Join Robin and Gillian on Saturday 5 September at Kenwood House Gardens in London, or online as the FT Weekend paper comes to life. Register now at ft.com/festival and enjoy 10% off with code FTPodcast. 

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Producer: Lulu Smyth

Senior Producer: Michela Tindera 

Executive Producer: Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Giuompasis

Podcast Development: Laura Clarke

FT Global Head of Audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editor: Josh Divney and Kristen Kenyon at Podcast Discovery

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The construction of the Erie Canal is one of the most ambitious infrastructure projects in American history. But its most influential legacy is not the waterway itself, it is how it was paid for. Hosts Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth speak with financial historian Richard Sylla about how a gutsy New York City mayor won over politicians, citizens and investors to build something that not only transformed trade in a young nation, but also made New York City a financial centre and laid the blueprint for America’s municipal bond market. 

Further reading:

Wedding of the Waters: The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation (2006), by Peter L. Bernstein 

Credits: Getty Images. A performance of ‘Meeting of the Waters of the Hudson and Erie’ published by cplotter on YouTube 

To enjoy future episodes, be sure to subscribe to The Story of Money wherever you get your podcasts, also on the show's dedicated YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@FTTheStoryOfMoney 

Hosts: Gillian Tett and Robin Wigglesworth

Producer: Lulu Smyth

Senior Producer: Michela Tindera

Executive Producer: Manuela Saragosa

Original music and sound design: Breen Turner

Broadcast engineers: Bianca Wakeman and Petros Gioumpasis

Podcast Development: Laura Clarke

FT Global Head of Audio: Flo Phillips 

Video editors: Josh Divney and Kristen Kenyon at Podcast Discovery

Learn more at www.ft.com/tsom or get in touch at [email protected].

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.