Oonagh McDonald In the Media


On November 1, 2021, The Centre for the Study of Financial Innovation hosted Oonagh McDonald for a panel discussion with host Jane Fuller and Dave Birch about the evolution of cryptocurrency. The discussion explores privacy versus anonymity, criminal activity versus the surveillance state, and speed verus consumer protection. Watch the video.



​Jordan Goodman hosted Oonagh McDonald on the Money Answers show on October 25, 2021. In the hour-long interview, Oonagh and Jordan discuss her new book Cryptocurrencies: Money, Trust and Regulation. Listen to the Interview.


"Biden's IRS proposal could mark the end of privacy in banking" published in The Hill on October 15, 2021. In this essay, Dr. McDonald examines the risks posed by the Biden administration's proposed bank reporting requirements. Read the article.
Reuters BreakingViews editor Rob Cox, talks with Dr. Oonagh McDonald, CBE, about the current state of the world. Recorded in London, January 2016. Click the image to watch 2-minute video now.
Reuters BreakingViews editor Rob Cox converses with Dr. Oonagh McDonald, CBE, this time about the financial markets. Recorded in London, January 2016. Click the image to watch this short segment now.
Jordan Goodman hosted Oonagh McDonald on the Money Answers show on November 30, 2015. In the hour-long interview, Oonagh and Jordan discuss her new book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value.  In the interview, Dr. McDonald discusses the lead-up to Lehman Brothers’ financial collapse and the lessons we should have learned in its wake. Listen to the Interview.

Jordan Goodman hosted Oonagh McDonald on his Money Answers show on December 8, 2014. In the hour-long interview, Oonagh and Jordan discuss her book Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: Turning the American Dream into a Nightmare.  In addition, Oonagh discusses the roots of the financial meltdown and the lessons we should have learned. Listen to the interview.
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Dr. Larry Parks interviews Dr. Oonagh McDonald about her book Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: Turning the American Dream into a Nightmare. Click the image to watch the interview now.
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American Enterprise Institute speaks with Dr. Oonagh McDonald about her Fannie and Freddie given home ownership targets. Click the image to watch the video now.

Other Media Attention

May 17, 2017
Dr. McDonald’s paper “ Holding banks to account for the financial crisis?” which was previously published in Journal of Financial Crime has been selected by the journal’s editorial team as the Outstanding Paper in the 2017 Emerald Literati Network Awards for Excellence. Jim Bowden, Academic Relations Manager, Emerald Publishing, said in a recent congratulatory note that Dr. McDonald’s winning entry will be cited at various conferences, primarily in Europe, over the summer months. Dr. McDonald’s paper is now freely available to all for one year (until next year’s winning paper is chosen). Download now.
December 8, 2016
In her op-ed piece published by American Banker, U.S. Should Think Twice Before Jumping on Open Banking Bandwagon, Dr. McDonald says U.S. banks reluctance to adopt a technology concept that could be potentially harmful to customers is wise. She also encourages U.S. banks to monitor the progress in Europe carefully. Regardless of the country, the priority for banks should be on rebuilding trust, and allowing third-party access to foster open banking is likely not the best way forward. Read the full article here.
​November 16, 2016
The Glass-Steagall Act was enacted in 1933 in response to banking crises in the 1920s and early 1930s. It imposed the separation of commercial and investment banking. In 1999, after decades of incremental changes to the operation of the legislation, as well as significant shifts in the structure of the financial services industry, Glass-Steagall was partially repealed by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. While some may argue that repealing Glass-Steagall caused the global financial crisis that set in in 2008/09 and have since proposed that bringing back Glass-Steagall would prevent future crises, in this article, The Repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act: Myth and Reality, published by the Cato Institute, Dr. McDonald says these assertions are not supported by the facts. Read the full article here.
February 16, 2016
Dr. McDonald’s book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value was reviewed by TheFinancial Times’ John Plender who said, "The book is, in part, a primer on these structured products and on the way they are valued. It also offers detailed discussions of the different methodologies used to value property… But the conclusion is a broader, provocative exploration of the concept of market value, in which McDonald tilts at the efficient market hypothesis that underlay much of the thinking in finance ministries, central banks and regulatory bodies before the crisis.” Read the full review here.
January 6, 2016
Oonagh McDonald was the “Big Interview” on veteran journalist Chuck Jaffe’s Money Life to discuss her new book. In the interview Dr. McDonald and Chuck Jaffe discuss the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the lessons we should have learned from it. Listen to the full interview below.
December 2015
Dr. Oonagh McDonald was a guest on Financial Review with Sinclair Noe. In the 20-minute interview, Dr. McDonald discusses her new book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value, the conditions that led to Lehman’s ultimate collapse and what we can and should learn in the wake of its collapse. Listen to the full interview below.
December 2015  / Jan 2016
Writing in Financial World, Dr. McDonald explores how financial regulators in the UK and US are introducing tougher rules for bankers and stricter penalties for those responsible for corporate failures. Read the article.
December 2015  / Jan 2016
Oonagh McDonald’s new book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value was reviewed in Financial World. McDonald brings an unusual blend of skills to her analysis, as a former academic and politician who actually understands business and finance – including the more arcane areas. This means the book can be read as a primer, with helpful explanations of CDOs (collateralized debt obligations) and Repo 105, which Lehman perverted to portray borrowing as sales, hiding the extent of its leverage. Read the review.
December 10, 2015
Dr. Oonagh McDonald’s new book, Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value was featured in the “New and Noteworthy” column in the Times Higher Education. According to column, Dr. McDonald’s book provides "a sober, blow-by-blow account of one money-evaporating weekend in September 2008 and the whole tangled tale of the largest bankruptcy in American history.” Read the article.
November 28, 2015
Dr. Oonagh McDonald's new book, Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value was sourced in The Economist in a story about the ways that both Lehman Brothers and HBOs were not so smart in running their businesses. Read the article.
November 23, 2015
Jane Fuller, co-director of the Centre for Financial Innovation, talks to Dr. Oonagh McDonald CBE about her new book, Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value. Listen to this lively audio interview now (8:43 minutes).
November 19, 2015
Dr. Oonagh McDonald’s new book on the Lehman Brothers collapse has been released. Read all about the book here.
November 1, 2015
In a bylined piece, Oonagh McDonald discusses the aftermath of the U.S. Financial crisis, what has been done and more importantly, what should been done to avoid another crisis. Read the article.
October 29, 2015
Management Today’s Adam Gale conducted a Q&A with Oonagh McDonald to discuss why she wrote her newest book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value and what she believes caused the crisis in the first place. Read the article.
September 21, 2015
Oonagh McDonald appeared as a guest on the Steve Mayo Show with Steve Mayo and Cornelia Mrose.  In the 30-minute interview, Dr. McDonald discusses her forthcoming book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value.  In addition, Dr. McDonald discusses the underlying lack of supervision and sufficient capital by the banks and the effectiveness (or ineffectiveness) of the legislative changes that have followed in the wake of the Lehman Brothers crisis. Listen to the full interview below.
June / July, 2015
Oonagh McDonald analyses the US housing market and warns that there are worrying signs of problems over mortgage debt resurfacing. "The US housing market underwent an enormous boom in the run-up to the financial crisis that it helped trigger," McDonald writes."Because of political pressures, the same complex pattern of laws, goals and policies that led to the 2008 crisis are all in place. In what looks increasingly like a race to the bottom in lending standards, the FHFA has also moved to make it easier to get a mortgage." Read Bubbling Up Again.
June 1, 2015
Oonagh McDonald writes a candid piece for Barron's, challenging some of the assertions put forth by the author of the new book "This Changes Everything: Capitalism versus the Climate." She calls Naomi Klein's book a "hot-air-balloon book" and poses additional questions. Read It's All Our Fault.
November 3, 2014
Oonagh McDonald was a guest on the MoneyLife Show hosted by Marketwatch’s Chuck Jaffe. In the show’s Big Interview, Oonagh discusses her book Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: Turning the American Dream into a Nightmare and the ways the underlying issues that led to the financial meltdown have not yet been addressed. Listen to the interview below.
October 28, 2014
Oonagh McDonald was a guest on Business for Breakfast in Phoenix. In the interview, Oonagh discussed the ways that lending practices turned many American’s dream of home ownership into a nightmare. Listen to the interview below.
July 7, 2014
The Daily Mail’s Laura Shannon discusses the recommendations set forth by Dr. McDonald in the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors report. Read the article.
June 2014
“Surveyors have an important role to play if the housing market is to function more effectively, especially if securitisation is revived,” says Oonagh McDonald in her article, Valuation, valuation, valuation.
January 24, 2014
Dr. McDonald was quoted in a Hull Daily Mail article on property valuation.  McDonald said: "Paying for a valuation that is primarily for the lender's use at a time when the buyer is usually under financial pressure only adds to the burden on buyers at a particularly expensive time." Read the article.
January 2014
Dr. Oonagh McDonald’s research on Balancing Risk and Reward: Recommendations for a Sustainable Valuation Profession in the UK was published by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). Read the independent report.
November 15, 2013
Reuter’s Susan Thomas, Veronica Brown and Josephine Mason mention Dr. McDonald in their story.  The article quotes a report by Dr. McDonald wherein she says the London Metal Exchange board received “30 official letters of complaint about the way in which LME-approved warehouse companies operate.” Read the article.
September 26, 2013
Institutional Investor’s Robert Stowe England favorably reviewed Dr. McDonald’s book Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: Turning the American Dream into a Nightmare. Read the article.
October 1, 2012
Barron’s, reporter Gene Epstein says Oonagh McDonald is "a rare combination, at least for the U.S., of politician and academician, having held professorships and written previous books on business and finance." Epstein says her book is a "thoroughly researched, practically definitive tome”. Read Blueprint for a Housing Crash.
August 22, 2012
In his article, Yes, the Subprime Crisis Was Government's Fault, Kevin Villani says the U.S. housing policy was the essential catalyst and regulatory malfeasance the enabler. He cites Oonagh McDonald’s book. Villani was chief economist at Freddie Mac from 1982 to 1985, is a principal of University Financial Associates and an executive scholar at the Burnham-Moores Center for Real Estate of the University of San Diego.
November 22, 2012
In the article, Holding Back the Flood, author Oonagh McDonald says Europe faces a rising flood of dependent elderly. She says the Dutch pension programs are extremely rare and admirable.
September 12, 2008
Dr. McDonald was a guest on Share Radio to discuss her new book Lehman Brothers: A Crisis of Value and how Lehman’s trillion dollar value seemingly melted into thin air. Listen to the discussion.