Snow Business ; Knocking Back the Laurent-Perrier and Shaking Their Their Annual Jamboree. In an Array of Heavy Disguises, Booty to 'Sex Machine', the World's Best-Fed Money Men Hit Davos Last Month for Es Snuck Into the Most Serious Soirees to Keep a Beady Eye On the Moguls at Play

Summary

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Call it the credit crunch, the financial meltdown, or simply the end of the world as we know it, but somebody is to blame. And to be sure there were a few sheepish expressions among the 2,500 rich and powerful who gathered in Davos, Switzerland, for the World Economic Forum.

It's the annual schmoozefest - sorry, thinktank - for those who control the global financial system. They gather to party, network, mutually congratulate and make more deals. They've met in Davos each year for the past 40 and, boy, has it been a blast. 'Fat cats in the snow,' is how Bono once described their frolicking up the mountain.

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Extract

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Snow Business ; Knocking Back the Laurent-Perrier and Shaking Their Their Annual Jamboree. In an Array of Heavy Disguises, Booty to 'Sex Machine', the World's Best-Fed Money Men Hit Davos Last Month for Es Snuck Into the Most Serious Soirees to Keep a Beady Eye On the Moguls at Play

Indeed the U2 singer and A-list celebs such as Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and Sharon Stone, who came to lobby the bankers, industrialists and world leaders on behalf of their favourite causes, only added to the lustre. Their dinners were the must-go events of the gathering: $20 million was spent on entertainment alone.

But in the past 12 months the system that had given the WEF its raison d'etre has bust, like a Faberge egg left in the care of Mr Magoo. Gathered around the wreckage, it seem...

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