No one can deny that the late Brett Kebble had good taste: Ferraris, a couple of private jets, a portfolio of luxury properties, expensive art pieces and all the usual trappings of the billionaire lifestyle to which he aspired. He also had political friends on the payroll, something that will no doubt cause acute embarrassment for some.

At one end of the stock exchange a man writes numbers on a whiteboard with a blue marker, at the other brokers tap sums into large calculators. Shares are bought and sold in crisp, verbal transactions; the deals are noted on ledgers filled with carbon paper.

Friday night in Kingston, and at a house party high up in the hills overlooking the city, the first refrains of the dancehall track Tuck in Yu Belly ring out. Within moments the dance floor is packed. It is a scene as Jamaican as a plate of calaloo and salt fish, with one exception: all the revellers are male, and there is a reason why this party is up in the hills.