By Dylan Parkes | November 18, 2025
Pivotal180’s Holiday Readings for 2025
As the weather turns chilly and Christmas music starts to drift into our collective consciousness, we want to settle down with a warm cup of tea and a good book. As the cold mounts, nothing will warm you like the hottest topics in finance, economics, technology, renewables, and more.
On our minds
As discussions around the global economy and the hegemony of global superpowers abound, there are a few books that feel timely:
- House of Huawei (Eva Dou)
- It looks at the rise of one of the most discussed and polarizing companies in the modern era.
- This book is also on the shortlist for FT and Schroders Business Book of the Year award (see below).
- Everybody Lies: Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are (Seth Stephens-Davidowitz)
- This book received critical acclaim when it was published in 2017 but feels relevant today given the rise of AI data analysis capabilities and the embedding of LLM and AI tools into Big Data.
- This book is a favorite among members of our team.
- Value(s): Building a Better World for All (Mark Carney)
- While published in 2021, this book has cachet currently following the election of Mark Carney to the role of Prime Minister of Canada this year.
- I personally found this book to be a unique and insightful analysis of the global financial crisis to which Mark Carney, then governor of the Bank of Canada, had a front seat. The book also includes warnings about signs to heed lest we repeat our mistakes.
FT and Schroders Business Book of the Year 2025 – Shortlist
This award from FT and Schroders has become quite an accolade. The award is being presented in early December, so we don’t yet know who won. However, they have released the shortlist publicly so you can read them all and make your own selection. This year features a predictable mix of topics including the health of the global economy, the impact of China, and the risks & rewards of new technologies.
- House of Huawei (Eva Dou)
- Chokepoints: How the Global Economy became a Weapon of War (Edward Fishman)
- How Progress Ends: Technology, Innovation, and the Fate of Nations (Carl Benedikt Fray)
- Abundance: How We Build a Better Future (Ezra Klein & Derek Thompson)
- Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future (Dan Wang)
- The Thinking Machine: Jensen Huang, NVIDIA, and the World’s Most Coveted Microchip (Stephen Witt)
Last year’s winner if you haven’t read it:
- Supremacy: AI, ChatGPT and the Race That Will Change the World (Parmy Olsen)
McKinsey 2025 annual book recommendations
In keeping with the current trend, AI leads the topic list for McKinsey with a range of books on this next phase of technological evolution. Those books include The Thinking Machine (listed above); a book on Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI (Keach Hagey); and books critical of AI such as The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech’s Hype and Create the Future We Want (Emily M. Bender & Alex Hanna).
In the business section of their list, they include:
- A CEO for All Seasons: Mastering the Cycles of Leadership (From McKinsey itself; senior partners Dewar, Keller, Malhotra, & Strovnik)
- Our Dollar, Your Problem: An Insider’s View of Seven Turbulent Decades of Global Finance, and the Road Ahead (Kenneth Rogoff)
- InEVitable; Inside the Messy, Unstoppable Transition to Electric Vehicles (Mike Colias)
ChatGPT (with all the talk of AI, let’s have it contribute a bit!)
As seen in previous versions of this blog, ChatGPT favors practical textbook material when asked for the best books on Project Finance published in 2025.
- Mastering Project Finance: Principles, Practice, and Applications (Olubusayo Aina; e-book)
- International Project Finance: Law and Practice (John Dewer; 4th Edition)
- Principles of Project Finance (E.R. Yescombe)*
*not published in 2025 but almost always listed when searching for top books on Project Finance.
For your holiday party conversations around the eggnog
Just in time for the company holiday party, the 2025 edition of the “World Energy Outlook” was released on November 12th by the IEA.
However, if this riveting material or any of the other books listed above fail to capture the imagination of your fellow party guests, might I suggest going with a more classic approach: epic Russian literature. Because nothing says “joyous festivities” quite like the master of analysis of the collective id and the superego, Fyodor Dostoevsky.
On November 4th, a new deluxe edition of Dostoevsky’s renowned classic The Brothers Karamazov was released including a new foreword by Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgaard.
I have already ordered two copies. And while this sounds tongue in cheek, I assure you it isn’t.
After you have purchased copies of the books above to fill stockings and to gift to your loved ones, consider giving the gift that keeps on giving: Project Finance and Financial Modeling courses!
Check out the links below to learn more about Pivotal180 and our financial modeling courses. Experience the Pivotal180 difference.
