Best Stock Market Movies & Finance Movies of All Time
Here are the best stock market movies and finance movies of all time. Are you interested in a movie that will help you understand the national and global financial realms? There are plenty of such films, but most of them are so flat that you will fall asleep even before you get halfway with it. However, some films provide all-rounded aspects from education to entertainment.
We did some comprehensive research on the best stock market movies and finance movies, and we came up with the following list as our all-time best. Here are some free streaming services.
The Big Short-2015
The movie features a true story and follows three factions that predict the fall of America’s Credit and Housing bubble pre the 2008 financial crisis. It also features stories about some complicated financial instruments like the Synthetic C.D.O.s and the mortgage loans, which banks used to award virtually everyone that applied.
The movie borrows plots from the book The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, which cleverly incorporates the factual background describing how things went down pre and post the credit crunch. The Big Short is a great movie and inspiration for investment banks and institutions.
It encourages them to try understanding the products they imaginatively develop while trying to gain more profits.
The Wolf of Wall Street – 2013
The Wolf of Wall Street is a film based on adopting a book with the same name. Based on a real-life event, the movie revolves around Jordan Belfort, acted by Leonardo DiCaprio. He used ingenious selling methods by persuading unsuspecting investors to put their money into cheap securities that he had earlier back through his firm, Stratton Oakmont.
Through this, Jordan Belfort earned over $200 million, rising from the harsh streets to joining the elite community with personal jets and mansions. His antics do not last for a lifetime as he later engages in rampant corruption and fraud and two things that contribute to his sharp downfall.
The movie bears some moral investment lessons, especially for those who want to venture into the stock market.
Rogue Trader – 1999
One of the older films in the best stock market movies and finance movies of all time. The 1999 film, written and directed by James Dearden, Rogue Trader, revolves around Nick Leeson’s life, a former derivatives trader. The movie borrows the plot from Leeson’s 1996 book ‘Rogue Trader: How I Brought Down Barings Bank and Shook the Financial World.’
In the movie, Nick Leeson uses high-risk trading and deceptions to single-handedly bring down Barings Bank when serving as their star trader.
The film teaches banks and financial institutions how proper governance and risk management are crucial in keeping their trade organizations. It illustrates why traders need robust oversight and controls as part of their processes.
Margin Call – 2011
Margin Call is one of the best movies that show what unfolded before the 2008 financial crisis. The storyline depicts things as they transpired inside 24 hours in a large Wall Street investment bank and illustrates the early stages of the famous 2007-2008 financial crisis.
It focuses on the employees’ actions in the subsequent financial downfall, which led to the unnamed investment bank’s mass layoff.
The movie impressively reveals the financial industry mechanisms. The anticipatory moments bring some roller coaster experience that puts you at the edge of your seat from start to finish.
The movie’s moral story is that our financial system is fragile, and the industry can come to massive devastation if it experiences significant market threats.
Boiler Room – 2000
The 2000 American crime drama film exposes Wall Street’s evil side and the entire stock market trading. In the plot, Seth Davis (Ribisi), a 19-year-old college dropout, opens an unlicensed casino operating from his apartment.
One day one of his friends told him to reach out to J.T. Marlin brokerage, and Giovanni Ribisi sees this as his closest way to becoming a millionaire. After some time in his workstation, he learns that his employers are a chop stock brokerage firm that operates a “Pump and dump” (P&D) by creating artificial demand for the stock for fake, non-existent, or expired companies. They then sell the stock for ridiculous profits.
The film is an excellent fit for individuals who want a firsthand account of how far people and businesses are willing to go just to acquire massive wealth. The moral lesson here is the promise of enormous wealth can be intoxicating and can corrupt anyone.
Inside Job (Documentary) – 2010
On the best stock market movies and finance movies of all time, the award-winning documentary is one of the best if you want to get firsthand details of what transpired in the 2008 financial crisis. It also illustrates the impact of the situation in the global market and economic trends.
Inside Job features a thorough investigation of the crisis and its genesis dating back to the early 2000s. It does not reveal everything that leads to the crisis. However, the research done here is so conclusive and in-depth, leaving viewers shocked by the heights of greed and corruption in our financial systems. It wraps high-profile interviews together with perfect cinematography to form one hell of a true story.
The movie shows how gigantic monetary values vanished quickly due to a sharp decline in the stock exchange market prices. As a result, many people lost their jobs, saving, and homeownership.
The China Hustle- 2018
The China Hustle is a true story that could be directly affecting any investor, endangering their financial security or shaping your future. It continues the list of our movies that features the rot post-2008 economic crisis and reveals the dirty games as of 2018 in stock exchange in the U.S.
The movie illustrates how the sophisticated financial maneuvers continue even after the stock market crash. It tells us bankers used new strategies and help from Chinese companies to cheat vulnerable investors. The banks pocketed huge profits but threatened the global economic stability.
It shows how U.S. firms and Chinese companies use backdoors to get into U.S. exchanges and avoid the set checks and balances regarding the I.P.O. The problem is that the floated companies are non-existent, but the traders persuade investors to buy their stock.
The opening line alone in the movie will grab your attention. It says, “Capitalism rewards those who work hard, but it also rewards those to take advantage of others.”
Chasing Madoff – 2011
The 2011 documentary written and directed by Jeff Prosserman draws its storyline from a book, “No one would listen” by Harry Markopolos.
The movie narrates how Harry Markopolos and his associates took ten years trying to convince the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (S.E.C.) and other bodies to recognize and act on their proof of Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The scheme was responsible for scamming over $65billion in fake returns from unsuspecting investors.
Despite the efforts and several meetings, S.E.C. only reacted by giving the evidence a mere cursory investigation.
Too Big to Fail- 2011
Another one the best stock market movies and finance movies of all time is a documentary based on the book, Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System – and Themselves” by Andrew Ross Sorkin’s. It explores the 2007-2008 financial crisis that made Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy.
Too Big to Fail illustrates what led to the crisis and helps the audience understand how it got to that level. As you watch the film, you will come to realize that politics, as influential as it is, have no effects on the economy’s innocence.
The story criticizes Wall Street and the authority that should be controlling it. Unfortunately, while there are many lessons learned from the crisis, there are no significant measures to manage the number of the ‘Too Big To Fail institutions.’
Banking on Bitcoin
Bitcoin became the most disruptive invention ever since the birth of the internet. It sired some antagonism with fringe utopists battling mainstream capitalism. The film depicts players who are trying to illustrate how Bitcoin technology is our financial future.
The movie is ideal for people who doubt the technology’s impact or learn more about Bitcoin. You will get to know from the featured comprehensive interviews with selected BlockChain and Bitcoin enthusiasts with the best knowledge in the field.
You will also get to know the Bitcoin trend and how most investors have been losing and gaining money on their respective stakes.
Floored
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nz7hMvBJeg
Floored is a fantastic financial documentary directed by James Allen Smith. It vividly describes the hustle and bustle of the future of the stock market in Chicago.
The movie illustrates how employees could accept trade-in P.I.T. during the 1980s, but only a handful can do that today. One of the significant contributors to this is the digitization and computerization of the world.
Technology minimized floor trading power, but the aspect is still large, with money flowing over the counters and the floor.
In the Drama, Allen Smith talks about the future of some of the prominent stockbrokers in Chicago.
Capitalism: A Love Story -2009
In this play, the director Michael Moore introduces humor as he describes how the financial crisis developed and how the government bailed out the crisis’s perpetrators.
The movie outlines the unethical dealings of globally active investment banks and companies which take high risks as they target huge profits. The most disgusting part of this scheme is that the public secure the risks with their money.
The director points out the individuals that benefit from the scheme and their potential connection with the political class. Capitalism: A Love Story has an IMDB rating of 7.4, making it one of the top-rates financial documentaries ever.
You will love the entertaining and thought-provoking theme the documentary creates.
Barbarians at the Gate – 1993
The movie draws its story from the Barbarians at the Gate, a 1989 non-fictional book by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar. It is a true story based Wall Street movie that talks about R.J.R. Nabisco’s leveraged buyout.
The main story is about a bitter rivalry over R.J.R. Nabisco, a tobacco and food conglomerate. The C.E.O., the self-made multimillionaire, named F. Ross Johnson, gets wind of the firm’s smokeless cigarette’s potential market failure and an imminent drop in the stock value. He then decides to make a killing by buying it from the shareholders.
However, he faces competition from his own team, Wall Street investment professionals he hired to help him buy out. That rivalry gives birth to one of the biggest enemy corporate takeovers in America’s history.
Barbarians at the Gate movie have a 7.3 rating on IMDB, making it another popular film in the same genre.
Wall Street — Money Never Sleeps – 2011
The movie also goes by the names Wall Street 2 or Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps. It is an American drama film that revolves around the 2008 financial crisis.
According to the story, the supposedly reformed Gordon Gekko (Douglas) gets out of prison serving a sentence due to his involvement in insider trading and securities fraud. Gekko wants to do it by promoting his new book titled ‘Is Greed Good?’.
He is unable to reform despite the changes, and later in the film, he plans his way back to the top to elevate his ego and superiority. To succeed in this, he risks destroying his relationship with his family.
The movie’s highlight comes from Geeko’s speech, which summarizes today’s economic and financial conditions.
Glengarry Glen Ross – 1992
The movie adopts its storyline from David Mamet’s award-winning play with the same name. The star-studded film features Jack Lemmon, Alec Baldwin, Al Pacino, and Kevin Spacey. The film itself borrows its name from two real estate developments, Glengarry Highlands and Glen Ross Farms, which are part of the play.
The movie takes us into the life of four real estate salespeople who develop utterly corrupt morals while working for an evil firm.
Hell breaks loose in the real estate company when management calls for sales competitions. From this point onwards, you begin to witness some of the greed and some of the underhanded tactics salespeople apply to maximize their wins.
Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve – 2013
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkIPiA2QHmI
This is a conclusive independent documentary that talks about the American Federal Reserve. It digs into 100 years of the reserves and discusses the body’s performance and contributions to the United States economy, plus the hand it had in the 2008 financial crisis.
Money for Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve explains the structures in detail and tries to promote investors’ confidence. After watching the movie, you learn and understand how the F.E.D. has been at the forefront of stabilizing the United States’ financial system.
The movie also illustrates everything through comprehensive interviews, with some giving the critical perspective of the F.E.D. The most critical ones are the interviews with Paul Volcker and Janet Yellen (both former chairpersons of the F.E.D.). They bring out the crucial perspective in line with the economic crisis.
The Ascent of Money
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAbVltqySrA&list=PLdUhtBaYhORE4Pbvx5RjTyqussT7ktiBQ
Niall Ferguson, the writer of this movie, takes us through the world’s financial history. He walks us through the long history of money, banking, and credit. He talks about how money came to be and its impact and continues on the world; how it grew from being a tool of trading goods and services to society’s most dominating factor across the globe.
If you are into history and like to understand how the modern financial setup came to be then, you must watch this documentary.
Arbitrage – 2012
Arbitrage is one of the best Finance movies of all time. It focuses on Hedge Fund Manager, who tries to cover his evil deeds. The focus is not on this guy’s fund management criteria but on how he tries to escape the snare after committing a crime the” Hollywood way’.
After a while, Robert manages a fund with his daughter and decides to sell the investment at a profit. However, he altered the funds and borrowed $412 million from an associate to cover for the loss and escape arrest. The only problem is that he put everyone in the dark, including his employees and investment partner (his daughter).
Enron – The Smartest Guys in the Room – 2005
Enron is another masterpiece when it comes to financing documentaries. It draws its storyline from a book named Enron, written by Fortune reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, which talked about the most prominent business scandal in United States’ history.
Enron – The Smartest Guys in the Room depicts a U.S. energy company that experienced one of the biggest ever economic failures. Enron was a playground for successive managers who used it to gain personal wealth until it became bankrupt in 2001.
More than 20,000 people lost their jobs due to account fraud, money shifts, and wild entrepreneurial adventures. It was so unfortunate that the rot even reached the staff pension scheme, which lost over $2 billion.
The film features some prominent interviews, including one with McLean and Elkind and another one with Gray Davis, the former Governor of California.
Bottom Line
To many, watching movies and films is a mere part of getting entertained. However, for financial enthusiasts and financial gurus, it involves more than that. You want something that educates you and helps you understand your field. We hope that you will enhance your library with the best stock market movies and finance movies ever after going through the above discussion.
Want to know where you can view these videos FOR FREE!!
OR
Try this link as well, Enjoy!
Would you like to make some serious cash like the stock market, but from the comfort of your home? Check out these articles below
5 Extraordinarily Simple Businesses For Stay At Home Moms to Master
5 Self Motivational Tips To Conquer Your Goals In 2021′