Bob Diamond: The misadventures of a banker in Africa
He insists he and Atlas Mara are just getting started: “This isn’t five-minute rice”
Bob Diamond is shifting restlessly on the sofa, his Brioni jacket draped behind him. He’s in his corner office, high up in the Seagram Building, a modernist icon on Park Avenue in Manhattan. He faces one of Takashi Murakami’s smiley face flower motifs, which perfectly captures the former Barclays boss’s signature optimism. He’s needed plenty of that in recent years as he’s tried to build a banking empire across sub-Saharan Africa. That daunting experience can be summed up by another eye-catching work of art, which is hanging in the reception area: a Pamela Rosenkranz metallic emergency blanket. During an interview that lasts more than an hour, Diamond acknowledges the challenges the company he founded, Atlas Mara, has faced amid Africa’s weakening economies. And he bemoans its share price, which has tumbled 68% since it went public in December 2013. No matter. His defence is a work of performance art. Frequently leaping to his feet—grabbing a golf club or a wad of bills from his wa...
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