The collapse of financial services firm Greensill Capital offers a timely but costly warning about a number of contemporary trends. Clearly, we should be wary of the hype around financial innovation. But we also need to shine a brighter spotlight on the shady world of corporate lobbying, the regulation of risk, and other issues at the intersection of capitalism and government.

Greensill reportedly tried to use former Prime Minister David Cameron to entice the Saudi government to press investors to contribute more funds to SoftBank so that SoftBank could increase its backing of Greensill. Then, following the start of the pandemic, Cameron reportedly lobbied for Greensill to secure access to an emergency loan scheme, and pressed the NHS to adopt an app owned by Greensill to pay staff daily.