This movie just goes to show you how stupidly greedy the top officials are at the investment banks:If one person can bring down a well established bank from within then they all are vulnerable to the same thing. Nothing but vultures of getting rich off the hard work of others.

As for why so many bridges of his wife, just think about how and where they met then it’s all clear. They were clerks in charge of dealing with tons of bad debts of Baring bank in the confidential basement. Showed in the beginning of the film, it set the tone for the step by step crack down and the aftermath of all these. In fact, this old bank was long been problematic before Nick Leeson was in his position. He helped accelerating the big failing by paying his own price. He's just a fresh young man in his 25, packaged with a green-handed team after all.

Speculating is extremely risky without the underlying assets and hedging strategies. In this sense, no wonder Nick Leeson deemed the exchange as a big casino in the film when he bet on Nikkei 225. I believe he wont say that in his fifties. The risk will always be there but the risk to return sometimes are not that satisfying as one supposed it to be.

Triumph, a feeling that people would like to experience all the time, is not sustainable. One seek for triumph all the time is like seeking a pattern to be succeeded over and over again, which is likely to cause sever path dependency. With arrogance and over confidence coming along with every selection Nick Leeson was to make during the process, he is on the way of self devastation. When Leeson made back the $10M loss by sitting on the position, it was like closing his eyes and walking through a minefield without blowing up. He mistaken the 88888 account, his temporary safe net （before he can earn the money back ）for the safe net for good.