Crediting from the Crunch

His wife, the vivacious Nichola Pease, was recently ranked the UK's 20th richest woman in the Sunday Times Rich List - leading to the couple being dubbed the Posh and Becks of the City.

A year before the first cracks appeared in the global financial system, he spotted the gathering storm that was the 'sub prime' credit crisis in the United States.
Since then, his company Odey Asset Management which he has ran since 1991 has been gambling on bank shares falling - and fall they have.

Mr Odey's helped his firm record an annual profit of £64.6million, out of which he has paid himself £28million.

This will help the household income greatly it seems considering that his wife recently lost one of her jobs as a non-executive director of non-other than Northern Rock.

Not that they were poor beforehand it is thought that the couple, operating out of a Georgian office in Mayfair, have built a fortune of more than £300million.
Her family are banking royalty and have been financial big hitters since the 19th century, when they had a hand in building the Stockton to Darlington railway.
It was her role as a non-executive director at Northern Rock that brought the headlines.

Mr Odey's firm was never associated with Northern Rock because of the obvious conflict of interest. But his profiteering from other failing banks is painfully ironic to the shareholders of Northern Rock.

His winning tactic was called 'short selling', which effectively meant betting against 900,000 shareholders. As the Northern Rock saga rumbled on, questions were asked about why his wife did not do more. She stated that the events were 'unprecedented' and could not be foreseen. Then, along with all the other non-executive directors, she resigned.

UPDATE: The Sunday Sun reported this story with comments from Robin Ashby, spokesman for the Northern Rock Small Shareholders’ Group, who said: “I have long been concerned about the performance of the non-executive directors of Northern Rock, prior to the crash, in their role of holding the executive to account on behalf of the shareholders.

“What did they do to earn the fat fees they received? Did they do much except warm chairs? They were supposed to be industry experts. Clearly, Ms Pease has money-making skills.

“It’s a pity they were not more evident in preventing the catastrophic losses suffered by shareholders and employees.”