The Secret Club That Runs The World

“Thanks to this gripping new book … we know more about how they do it. And it’s even more shocking than you think.” —The Independent When most people think of the drama of global finance, they think of stocks and bonds, venture capital, high-tech IPOs, and complex mortgage-backed securities. But commodities? Crude oil and soybeans? Copper and wheat? What could be more boring? That’s exactly what the elite commodity traders want you to think. They don’t seek the media spotlight. They don’t want to be as famous as Warren Buffett or Bill Gross. Their astonishing wealth was created in near-total obscurity, either in closely held private companies or deep within large banks and corporations, where commodity profits and losses weren’t broken out. Now Kate Kelly, the bestselling author of Street Fighters, takes us inside this secretive inner circle that controls so many things we all depend on. She gets closer than any previous reporter to understanding these whip-smart, aggressive, and often egomaniacal men who bet millions every day on a blend of facts, analysis, and pure gut instinct.

A deep dive into the origins, history, members, and workings of the Illuminati from a well-known and respected expert. Chilling initiations. Big banks and money manipulations. Possible links to the Rockefellers, Rothschilds, Adamses, and Bushes. Reviewing the evidence, documents, and connections, The Illuminati: The Secret Society That Hijacked the World by award-winning journalist and author Jim Marrs shines a light on the history, workings, continuing influence, and pernicious and hidden power of this secret order. Surveying experts—from those who dismiss the Illuminati as a short-lived group of little consequence to skeptics who dare question the government's accounts and pronouncements—Marrs cuts through the wild speculation and the attempts to silence critical thinkers to tell the true story of this secret cabal. Gnosticism, mystery schools, the Roshaniya, Knights Templar, assassins, Rosicrucians, Skull and Bones, Knights of Malta, whistle blowers, the revolutions in France, Russia, and America, and the structure, symbols, and theology of the Illuminati are all covered. Marrs takes a broad look at the group and their workings, investigating their origin as “The Ancient and Illuminated Seers of Bavaria,” the depiction on the United States one-dollar bill of an all-seeing eye and pyramid on the reverse of the Great Seal of the United States, and the Protocols—or procedures—for usurping national governments and gaining world domination, as well as the Illuminati symbolism found in today's international corporate logos. Wealth, power, and intrigue come together in this in-depth exposé on the Illuminati, their history, connections to influential people, and their place in modern America. The Illuminati lifts the cloaks of secrecy protecting the powerful.

The oil industry provides the lifeblood of modern civilization, and bestselling books have been written about the industry and even individual companies in it, like ExxonMobil. But the modern oil industry is an amazingly shady meeting ground of fixers, gangsters, dictators, competing governments, and multinational corporations, and until now, no book has set out to tell the story of this largely hidden world. The global fleet of some 11,000 tankers—that's tripled during the past decade—moves approximately 2 billion metric tons of oil annually. And every stage of the route, from discovery to consumption, is tainted by corruption and violence, even if little of that is visible to the public. Based on trips to New York, Washington, Houston, London, Paris, Geneva, Phnom Penh, Dakar, Lagos, Baku, and Moscow, among other far-flung locals, The Secret World of Oil includes up-close portraits of a shadowy Baku-based trader; a high-flying London fixer; and an oil dictator's playboy son who has to choose one of his eleven luxury vehicles when he heads out to party in Los Angeles. Supported by funding from the prestigious Open Society, this is both an entertaining global travelogue and a major work of investigative reporting.

Did you know? • Freemasonry's first American lodge included a young Benjamin Franklin among its members. • The Knights Templar began as impoverished warrior monks then evolved into bankers. • Groom Lake, Dreamland, Homey Airport, Paradise Ranch, The Farm, Watertown Strip, Red Square, “The Box,” are all names for Area 51. An indispensable guide, Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies connects the dots and sets the record straight on a host of greedy gurus and murderous messiahs, crepuscular cabals and suspicious coincidences. Some topics are familiar—the Kennedy assassinations, the Bilderberg Group, the Illuminati, the People's Temple and Heaven's Gate—and some surprising, like Oulipo, a select group of intellectuals who created wild formulas for creating literary masterpieces, and the Chauffeurs, an eighteenth-century society of French home invaders, who set fire to their victims' feet.

Masters Of The World Hidden behind many of today's major news stories, the Bilderberg Group is an elite clique of the most powerful names in politics, media, business, and finance, who want to impose a one-world government on the rest of us. Led by such iconic members as Henry Kissinger, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Richard Perle, Melinda Gates (wife of Bill Gates), David Rockefeller, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Tony Blair, and Margaret Thatcher, their secret conferences (where press has long been banned) are rumored to have engineered many of today's monumental global events, including: • The September 2008 collapse of worldwide banking. • Bill Clinton's presidency and the passage of NAFTA. • The loss of America's jobs to foreign nations. • The toppling of Margaret Thatcher for trying to keep the U.K. out of the E.U. Featuring interviews with meeting attendees, The Bilderberg Conspiracy is essential--and often terrifying--reading for anyone interested in world events. "H. Paul Jeffers reveals stunning insights about the Bilderberg Group. Wars, coups, assassinations; control of banking, finance, the media, and education--any means necessary to fulfill their agenda." --Michael Benson, author of Inside Secret Societies H. Paul Jeffers has published more than 50 works of fiction and nonfiction, including Freemasons: Inside the World's Oldest Secret Society, biographies of presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Grover Cleveland, New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia, Diamond Jim Brady, and others. He lives in Manhattan.

Elite secret clubs have always influenced society. First they build power, then they bend others to help them, knowingly or in ignorance, to consolidate and expand their power base. Then they destroy society. Some of them already control the world. When the word "cult" is used, the response is usually the same: dangerous, subversive, anti-family, anti-social. And while this is certainly true, the most daunting discovery in this book is tha the most powerful secret societies are actually running the world, seeking to destroy "morality" and the family unit while publicly appearing to be their biggest champions. Their ultimate weapons are power and time. They have the power; only time will bring their obscure scheme to its inevitable conclusion. This book examines 21 of these elusive and deeply disturbing organizations and reveals in alarming detail how, for five centuries, they have successfully manipulated the global economy, waged wars, and controlled the balance of power to bring about a New World Order.

“Commodity players are a shrewd and indomitable lot. And the contracts they trade are still so loosely regulated that the correct combination of money and skill creates irresistible opportunity. That’s why I’m only half joking when I call them the secret club that runs the world.” When most people think of the drama of global finance, they think of stocks and bonds, venture capital, high-tech IPOs, and complex mortgagebacked securities. But commodities? Crude oil and soybeans? Copper and wheat? What could be more boring? That’s exactly what the elite commodity traders want you to think. They don’t seek the media spotlight. They don’t want to be as famous as Warren Buffett or Bill Gross. Their astonishing wealth was created in near-total obscurity, because they dwelled either in closely held private companies or deep within large banks and corporations, where commodity profits and losses weren’t broken out. But if the individual participants in the great commodities boom of the 2000s went unnoticed, their impact did not. Over several years the size of the market exploded, and so did prices for raw materials—raising serious questions about whether the big traders were intentionally jacking up the cost of gasoline, food, and other essentials bought by ordinary people around the world. What was really driving all those price spikes? Now Kate Kelly, the bestselling author of Street Fighters, takes us inside this secretive inner circle that controls so many things we all depend on. She gets closer than any previous reporter to understanding these whip-smart, aggressive, and often egomaniacal men (yes, they are nearly all men). They work hard, play hard, flaunt their wealth, and bet millions every day on a blend of facts, analysis, and pure gut instinct. Kelly’s narrative focuses on one of the most extraordinary periods in financial history. Though the practice of gaming out price changes in commodities goes back to ancient Mesopotamia, it had never before reached the extremes of the early to mid-2000s. Kelly exposes the role of the hedge funds, banks, brokers, and regulators in this volatile market, through fascinating stories of “secret club” members such as . . . Pierre Andurand, a self-made multimillionaire who generated the winningest annual performance ever for an oil trader in 2008 and hired Elton John to perform at his wedding. Ivan Glasenberg, whose secretive Swiss commodities giant, Glencore, founded by the infamous American fugitive Marc Rich, orchestrated a massive merger with the help of former UK prime minister Tony Blair. Jon Ruggles, a brash know-it-all—recruited by Delta Air Lines to revitalize the airline’s fuel hedging business, he continued to make trades in his personal account, a questionable practice given his position. Drawing on her exclusive access to the secret club, and following the trail from New York to Houston, London, Dubai, and beyond, Kelly reveals the immense power in the hands of a few, and the so-far contentious efforts by the Obama administration to rein in the cowboys.

In this Franklin Classic Storybook, our hero discovers the hard way that leaving people out is never nice.