The collapse of E. F. Hutton, once one of America's most successful financial institutions, is a penetrating tale of greed and power gone amok. In blind pursuit of enormous profits, Hutton spiraled out of control, finally pleading guilty to over 2,000 counts of fraud. But Hutton's problems lay deeper than even the revealing details of its outlandish schemes: It was ripped apart by huge egos, intense personal battles, and a search for a scapegoat — resulting in the bitter final fight for control and a scramble for the spoils as it went under.

Burning Down the House is the gripping inside story of this orgy of greed, told by New York Times reporter James Sterngold who covered the story from beginning to end. At the center of the storm is the raging duel between the hard-drinking, self-indulgent Hutton chairman Robert Fomon, and his hand-picked president Robert (Ritt) Rittereiser, who innocently believed he had finally made it to the top with his appointment. Fomon's antics had entered Wall Street legend: his public humiliation of employees; his heavy drinking, which contributed to his declining health; and a management philosophy that allowed the corrupt schemes at Hutton to flourish. The consummate corporate warrior, Fomon had no plans to hand Ritt real power. But as Hutton plunged toward financial disaster, Ritt naively tried to save the house and his job. Even after being thrown out of the firm, the manipulative Fomon continued to control both Hutton's and Ritt's fates. From the rubble, Fomon walked away with a fortune while Ritt was left out in the cold. Sterngold vividly captures the rise and fall of the brokerage house, the backroom negotiating and shady power plays of some of Wall Street's and America's biggest names:

• Peter Cohen, Shearson's chairman, whose Midas touch deserted him when he decided he had to have the dying Hutton;
  
• John Shad, veteran of the Wall Street wars, who was outmaneuvered by Fomon for Hutton's presidency and then endured Fomon's public humiliations until leaving to become chairman of the Securities & Exchange Commission;
  
• Peter Ueberroth, hero of the 1984 Olympics and ex-commissioner of baseball, who joined the Hutton board in troubled times and watched as it sank into chaos, but bluffed Shearson into overpaying by $500 million and earned himself a $1 million fee in the process;
  
• Griffin Bell, former attorney general, whose investigation of Hutton led to his term the "Hutton Salute," a metaphor for the rampant evasion of responsibility. Sterngold's provocative account of the fall of E. F. Hutton is a gripping portrait of Wall Street at the end of the 1980s.