Bankers and the Anatomy of Greed. Part 1

On August 11, 2011, Bob Diamond, chief executive of the British bank Barclays gave a lecture on the BBC's "Today" program. He declared that "culture" is the most important element in banking, and the test for this test is "the behavior of a man when no one is watching him. Now, after his resignation, we know that he himself failed that test, and we need to find out why manipulation of key interest rates, poor customer relations, etc., continues to thrive in the banking sector. Cognitive neuroscience will help answer some questions.
In the hands of the leading bankers there is enormous power, more than in the hands of many elected national leaders. With the exception of occasional shareholder meetings and often passive management, their activities are not limited to anything. And when one considers that power is one of the most powerful drugs affecting the brain, it certainly affects behavior, emotions and thinking.
Power alters the brain by increasing testosterone levels, which in turn stimulates the growth of the neurotransmitter dopamine, which is an important part of the brain's "reward system" because it induces feelings of pleasure. Sole power causes extreme forms of brain alteration, leading to personality degradation, such as that of the dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
The "masters of the universe" who emerged from the unregulated world financial system were given unprecedented power, which was bound to cause significant changes in their brains. Whereas power in moderate doses can make a person smarter, more strategic, courageous, and less depressed; in too large doses it can make him self-centered and unempathic, greedy for rewards-financial, sexual, interpersonal, material.