Twitter

Where to Stream:

Billions

Billions, Showtime’s new drama centered around a cat and mouse game between a hedge fund master of the universe and the Feds, did not disappoint when it premiered Sunday night. A Showtime record of 3 million people either watched or streamed the premiere episode of the show which stars Damian Lewis as Bobby Axelrod, hedge fund manager of the eponymous named Axe Capital, and Paul Giamatti as Chuck Rhoades, the US attorney from the southern district of New York out to get him. The show arrives with some serious pedigree in the form of co-creator and executive producer Andrew Ross Sorkin, perhaps the best connected reporter on all things wall street and author of the modern finance classic Too Big to Fail.

The main characters are composite characters inspired by real life figures: Bobby Axelrod is a fictionalized version of real life hedge fund titan Steve Cohen, and Chuck Rhoades is an amalgamation of Elliot Spitzer and current US Attorney for the Southern District, Preet Bharara. The overarching tale of intrigue surrounding insider trading also closely mirrors the insider trading case involving Matthew Martoma, who was convicted of insider trading while working for Steve Cohen’s hedge fund SAC Capital.

Given that Billions draws upon real life but the cinematic depiction of the financial services industry tends to be hit or miss (Hit = Margin Call, Miss = Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps), one of the first questions viewers might have is how realistic are the wild events the show depicts?

Below, we have tallied our list of things in the show’s first episode we found to be either too real to fail or as fake as a toxic asset’s triple A rating, scored on our completely subjective point system:

THE BILLIONS REALITY INDEX*

Realer than a fund manager saying “Whats the point of having fuck you money if I can’t say fuck you?”

A prosecutor cracking down on Wall Street is into S&M and being humiliated.
PLUS 1, because why not pander to the financial services professionals who will be tuning in each week?

The hedge fund bros of Axe Capital wear the official buy side uniform – Dress shirts, loafers, and half zip fleeces.
PLUS 2 (would have been PLUS 3 if they had the Axe Capital logo embroidered. Come on, Sorkin, you should know better!)

Bobby Axelrod has covered the inside of Axe Capital’s offices with an obnoxious amount of modern art. All that was missing was a shark in a formaldehyde tank.
PLUS 2

A hedge fund manager that went to Hofstra with a chip on their shoulder? Park Avenue funds are chock full of managers who went to state colleges or no name schools.
PLUS 3

The US Attorney for SDNY cares about and constantly brags about their win loss record, most likely to tee up for a campaign for attorney general or governor. Sounds very familiar.
PLUS 2

Bobby Axelrod chews out an analyst for buttering him up. The kid does it again during the scholarship scene because, secretly, he knows fund managers love people kissing their asses.
PLUS 2

Chuck Rhoades, a US Attorney for the southern district of New York wants to make a name by going after rich people, yet comes from a rich family himself.
PLUS 1 (because that’s the Elliot Spitzer story)
Everyone knows who is buying a massive beach front house. And everyone hates them for it.
PLUS 2

While there has been a lot of skepticism online from people who watched the first episode of Billions before it premiered this weekend, a hedge fund having an in-house psychologist isn’t exactly far fetched. After all, SAC did it.
PLUS 1
During a scene at an upscale barber shop, an ex law professor and current defense attorney for Axe Capital says to their former student and current SDNY lackey “one day you’ll come asking me for a job”. The revolving door is real. And in real life, the lackey would jump at the offer.
PLUS 1

When a former employee approaches Bobby Axelrod to set him up, Bobby notes the narc’s sweaty hands, and sketchy eye contact as if they were poker tells.
PLUS 2 (because all traders are gambling obsessives who want to win the World Series of Poker)

POINTS FOR REAL: +19

Faker than a hedge fund trader being down 4% this year and thinking that’s really bad

What the hell was that software the SEC used to magically detect insider trading?
MINUS 2 (because seriously if a program could find trading irregularities then match it with individual funds and the trader responsible at the click of a button, there would be no SEC)

 During a meeting with the in-house psychologist, a young trader wonders aloud if he should try Prozac. Nope. The only meds he would be asking the doctor for are Adderall or Vyvanse. Seriously why is everyone at the fund not jacked up on a shit ton of Adderall?
MINUS 1
This to me was completely baffling- the only person who uses the phrase “killin it” all episode is the US attorney. Killin it is not uttered by a single finance bro! Come on.
MINUS 2

During a scene used to show the dedication and steadfastness of Chuck Rhoades, a convicted inside trader brings the US Attorney’s father to a meeting to lobby for a more lenient sentence?!?! NEVER EVER. NEVER.
MINUS 4
Later on in the episode, Chuck gets a call from the Wall Street Journal seeking comment from him after Skip, the aforementioned inside trader, decides serving time isn’t for him and commits suicide.
MINUS 2 (because real finance executives found guilty attend a jail prep boot camp before heading to their minimum security resort)
The scene with lawyers quoting Warren Buffett was just awkward and weird. Lawyers quoting Warren Buffett? What?
MINUS 1

A hedge fund conference and no sign of Anthony Scaramucci?
MINUS 3

POINTS FOR FAKE: -15

OVERALL SCORE ON THE BILLIONS RECAP REALITY INDEX:

(Click to enlarge)

Despite the occasional awkward line of dialogue or unreal event, Billions seems to be off to a promising start in portraying the world of finance in a somewhat accurate fashion. With the first episode ending in positive territory, we’re taking a profit of +4 and giving the series a buy rating with cautious optimism going forward. Stick with us when we recap Episode 2 next week and see if Billions can keep its bullish run going.

[You can stream Billions on Showtime Anytime, or on Hulu and Amazon Prime Video with a Showtime subscription]

*We’d be remiss if we didn’t tip our caps to Jessica Pressler and Chris Rovzar; their seminal Gossip Girl Reality Index recaps for New York Magazine’s Intelligencer provided significant inspiration for this recap style.

Comfortably Smug is a government relations professional with a focus on the financial services industry. He can be found on Twitter with his musings on all things finance and politics at @ComfortablySmug