About Dr. Bayer

Christopher Bayer, Ph.D., brings you inside the minds of The Street as few can. Since the early 1980s, Dr. Bayer has practiced as a licensed New York psychologist and psychoanalyst, specializing in the treatment of financial services executives, and their families, in the securities and banking industries. Dr. Bayer’s early training took place at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. Clark was the first graduate school in the United States, and the only place Sigmund Freud lectured in this country (Freud and Carl Jung Lectures, 1909). Dr. Bayer earned a Certificate of Specialization in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis from New York University’s Postdoctoral Psychology Program in 1982. He was an Adjunct Lecturer at the New York College of Osteopathic Medicine for eight years, taught Dream Analysis at the Long Island Institute of Mental Health for four years, and he has lectured at the School of Social Work at Adelphi University, Molloy College, and the Henry George School of Social Science. For ten years, Dr. Bayer was the Psychological Consultant at the Highland Preparatory School. He has been a Clinical Supervisor in Yeshiva University’s Psychology Doctoral Program, and he has trained interns and residents in Hillside Hospital’s Psychology Internship Program. He has worked in a variety of settings: psychiatric hospitals (state and private), correctional facilities, drug and alcohol rehabilitation units, correctional institutions, community mental health centers, and various court systems (family, supreme, and federal).

Dr. Bayer has published extensively. Areas of interest have included: perception and psychophysics, the behavioral treatment of trichotillomania, cognitive impairment as a function of anti-hypertensive medications, psychological adjustment in Canadian resource frontier communities, psychological aspects of testimony, community psychology internship training, program development for chronic psychiatric hospital patients, prison programming, and the development and application of toxic product syndrome theory to business sustainability scenarios and financial products. “Downtime” is spent sailing and racing on Long Island Sound, and directing a family art and antiques business which has been ongoing since the 1960s: www.entiques.com. He also enjoys working with The Rabbit Hole Ensemble, a grass roots community theater group based in Brooklyn, New York, and the New York Health, Education & Awareness Drive (H.E.A.D.), also based in Brooklyn, New York. Lastly, food & travel are passions of Dr. Bayer. He enjoys terrific eateries and has written numerous reviews on his international dining and travel experiences, including: Peter Luger Steak House: The Carnivore’s Penultimate Eatery, La Petite Ferme: Unparalleled….Across a Myriad of Dimensions, Arlington Club: Awesome Image, No Depth, Australian National Maritime Museum, The Bali Driver: Unparalleled Touring, Monwana Game Lodge: Beyond Expectation….

From the boardroom to the boiler room, Dr. Bayer’s practice spans every stratum in the financial services spectrum, with a case load that touches virtually all of the major banks, securities firms, law practices, and boutique private capital firms on Wall Street. Dr. Bayer has treated nearly a thousand financial executives, brokers, analysts, financial consultants, litigators, venture capitalists, financial product developers, Wall Street lawyers, traders, CEOs, CFOs, CIOs, and entrepreneurs over a nearly 30 year period.

Through their eyes, Dr. Bayer has witnessed the dramatic evolution, and cyclical implosion, of our modern financial sector. Over the course of decades, Dr. Bayer has leveraged this rare, highly privileged insider perspective to develop unique methods of treatment, and expertise in wall street psychology. His methods, detailed in this blog, address the causes and effects of the devastating psychological and physiological damage inflicted by these occupations. The dangerous obsessions, the self-destructive lifestyles, the cycles of abuse, the pathological infidelities, and so much more. Dr. Bayer has seen what few see—the physical and personal consequences of our culture’s fascination with the pursuit of money and success at all costs.

This blog represents the culmination of Dr. Bayer’s years of dedication to alleviating the pain of his patients, and helping build their mental health. His efforts have helped FPs overcome self-destructive behavior, and create a life model which significantly increases the probability of their financial success and happiness.

Today, when not treating patients, Dr. Bayer devotes his time to writing, teaching, research, supervision, and the development of a financial management training program for high school students and young adults transitioning to college (www.money-mind101.com). He has presented this program at elite New York City private schools including: Dalton, Birch Wathen Lenox, Brooklyn Friends, and Chapin. He is also taking this course into the Harlem community (Antioch Baptist Church) and Brooklyn (Calvary Cathedral of Praise Church). Dr. Bayer counsels early career professionals to avoid the psychological pitfalls that lie ahead. Currently, he is part of a development team creating a social network platform for investor empowerment (www.theshareholderactivist.com) dedicated to providing a voice to the voiceless investor, and ensuring the viability and sustainability of publicly owned companies.

For his patients, the one constant force in their frenetic lives is the dangerous, driving obsession with money. But, is the love of money the root of all evil (the Biblical viewpoint)? Or, rather, is the lack of money the root of all evil (according to George Bernard Shaw)? This is the historic enigma Dr. Bayer continues to wrestle with in his clinical practice which has inspired him to write a major book about the inner life of financial professionals, and the history and psychology of money. This blog presents and underscores the fundamentals of the manuscript which is entitled: The Wall Street Psychologist’s Gyroscope: Survival Tactics for Financial Professionals in a Money-Mad World. Publication is scheduled for Spring, 2014.

This blog is Dr. Bayer’s call-to-action!