The World Economic Forum drew corporate, political, and economic leaders to its annual Davos, Switzerland, meeting in January 2020. Then-US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told the meeting that a virus had just locked down a Chinese city, but no one was concerned. Just two months later, a global pandemic loomed, proving a greater threat to the US economy than even the 2008 recession had been. As journalist Liz Hoffman reports, leaders had to act fast. Billions of dollars changed hands. Some companies made money, while others barely endured. The US economy survived, but its corporate and financial world permanently changed. Hoffman provides intimate portraits of leaders navigating a confusing and historic crisis as it unfolded.
As COVID-19 turned into a global pandemic, America’s financial elite were oblivious.
In late January 2020, members of the financial elite and some of their top government facilitators gathered at the World Economic Forum in Davos, a luxurious resort in the Swiss Alps. American attendees included the then-US secretary of the treasury, Steven Mnuchin, Chevron’s CEO Mike Wirth, IBM’s Ginni Rometty, Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg, and many others, including Wall Street investment bankers. The Davos attendees discussed climate change, global politics, and more. Mnuchin mentioned in passing that a Chinese city of more than 10 million people had locked down due to an unknown infectious disease.
As attendees at Davos were aware, viral diseases occasionally emerged from developing countries, especially China. These isolated illnesses had never before created a global problem – certainly not worldwide economic havoc. And at the time, the financial elite at the forum had plenty to celebrate. The US economy had enjoyed an unprecedented 10 consecutive years of growth, and 2019 corporate profits were close to $2 trillion, a record high. However, what the executives at Davos...
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