Sex and scandal: it's just life as usual in Paul Kilduff's new financial thriller, The Dealer. Kilduff's second novel is set in the City, amid a multi-billion-pound takeover of a bank that unearths a handful of characters related through a web of corruption.
The inner-workings of the City are familiar territory for Kilduff, who spent six years in London working for companies such as HSBC and Prudential before returning to his hometown of Dublin to work for Merrill Lynch, where he is a vice president in derivatives operations.
Kilduff differs from whistle-blowing financial writers like Michael Lewis who quit Salomon Brothers to write Liars' Poker and Frank Partnoy who wrote Fiasco about his time at Morgan Stanley stiffing derivatives buyers. Kilduff plans to keep his career in banking because of its security. However, he admits that he has signed a confidentiality agreement with Merrill Lynch.