The End of Banking

The digital revolution has left banking broken beyond repair. But there is an alternative. We can do better than banking.

In this thought-provoking book, Jonathan McMillan dissects banking to reveal its inner workings. He cuts through the complexity of modern finance and explains how banking almost crashed our financial system. Banking is broken, and McMillan reveals why we can no longer fix it. The digital revolution turns out to be the game changer that calls for the end of banking. But McMillan refrains from merely pointing out flaws. Building on economic research and a rigorous analytical approach, he goes on to provide an innovative blueprint for a modern financial system. The End of Banking transforms our understanding of the financial system. It identifies the root cause of today's problems with banking and presents a solution that stands out against existing reform proposals,

Jonathan McMillan is a pseudonym. Behind it stands an unlikely pair. One works for a large global bank. He is a financial expert who loves nothing more than digging through balance sheets, system flowcharts, and transaction data. In his role, he has gained firsthand insights into the workings of the financial centers of London and New York. To protect the identity of this author, The End of Banking is published under a pseudonym. The other author is Jürg Müller, who has chosen an academic path. He holds an M.Phil. in economics from the University of Cambridge and a Ph.D. in economics from ETH Zurich. In his research, he investigated the impact of banking regulation on macroeconomic stability and welfare – parts of his thesis have been published in the Journal of Economic Theory. He is now an economics editor at Neue Zürcher Zeitung, the Swiss newspaper of record. The two authors have met while attending university, but lost touch with each other in the years after due to their different career choices. In 2011, their paths crossed again in a London pub. Disappointed by how their peers in banking and academia dealt with the financial crisis, they decided to set forth on a writing journey together. In The End of Banking, they share their complementary insights into the workings of banking. The other author has chosen an academic path. Always eager to learn, he earned two bachelor’s degrees, one in economics and one in international relations. He holds an M.Phil. in economics from the University of Cambridge and a Ph.D. in economics from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Zurich. In his research, he investigated the impact of banking and banking regulation on macroeconomic stability and welfare. He is now an economics editor at Neue Zürcher Zeitung, the Swiss newspaper of record.