The Financier · Chapter
The Plan and the New Houses explained
Cowperwood devises a manipulative financial scheme with City Treasurer Stener to control the sale of city loan certificates, using wash sales and market manipulation to profit while ensuring the city eventually gets par value.
What happens
Cowperwood devises a manipulative financial scheme with City Treasurer Stener to control the sale of city loan certificates, using wash sales and market manipulation to profit while ensuring the city eventually gets par value. Meanwhile, his new bank and houses, designed by Ellsworth, are completed, reflecting his growing wealth and artistic taste. He plans to use the homes for social entertaining to advance his connections.
Themes in this chapter
Ambition and Success
Cowperwood's ambitious financial scheme and his investment in luxurious homes and social climbing illustrate his relentless drive for success.
Deception and Self-Justification
The manipulative plan to use city funds and wash sales is presented as a clever, acceptable business practice, highlighting the theme of moral self-justification.
Class and Social Mobility
Cowperwood's new houses and plans for entertaining are aimed at elevating his social standing and securing advantageous marriages for his siblings.
Characters to notice
- Frank Algernon Cowperwood
Devises a manipulative financial plan with Stener; oversees completion of his new bank and houses; plans social entertaining to advance his position.
- George W. Stener
City treasurer who agrees to Cowperwood's scheme to use city loan certificates for market manipulation and speculation.
- Henry Worthington Cowperwood
Father of Frank; his house is also being built adjacent to Frank's, with shared features.
- Anna Adelaide Cowperwood
Frank's sister; mentioned as part of plans for joint use of the houses and potential social advancement.
- Lillian Cowperwood
Frank's wife; reacts wanly to his plans for entertaining in the new home.
- Wilton Ellsworth
Architect and decorator who designs the Cowperwood bank and houses, explaining artistic styles to Frank.
Key passages
“The plan Cowperwood developed after a few days’ meditation will be plain enough to anyone who knows anything of commercial and financial manipulation, but a dark secret to those who do not.”
Cowperwood's scheme is transparent to financial insiders but obscure to the general public.
Sets up the chapter's focus on financial manipulation.
“Manipulative tricks have always been worked in connection with stocks of which one man or one set of men has had complete control. It was no different from what subsequently was done with Erie, Standard Oil, Copper, Sugar, Wheat, and whatnot.”
Such market manipulation is a common practice when a single group controls a stock, similar to later cases with major commodities.
Contextualizes Cowperwood's actions within broader financial history.
“The interior was finished in highly-polished hardwood, stained in imitation of the gray lichens which infest trees.”
The woodwork was polished to resemble the gray lichen found on trees.
Describes the distinctive aesthetic of Cowperwood's new bank.