Where Are the Customers' Yachts?: Or a Good Hard Look at Wall Street


Fred Schwed Jr. - 1940
    . . . What Schwed has done is capture fully-in deceptively clean language-the lunacy at the heart of the investment business. -- From the Foreword by Michael Lewis, Bestselling author of Liar's Poker . . . one of the funniest books ever written about Wall Street. -- Jane Bryant Quinn, The Washington PostHow great to have a reissue of a hilarious classic that proves the more things change the more they stay the same. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent. -- Michael BloombergIt's amazing how well Schwed's book is holding up after fifty-five years. About the only thing that's changed on Wall Street is that computers have replaced pencils and graph paper. Otherwise, the basics are the same. The investor's need to believe somebody is matched by the financial advisor's need to make a nice living. If one of them has to be disappointed, it's bound to be the former. -- John Rothchild, Author, A Fool and His Money, Financial Columnist, Time magazineHumorous and entertaining, this book exposes the folly and hypocrisy of Wall Street. The title refers to a story about a visitor to New York who admired the yachts of the bankers and brokers. Naively, he asked where all the customers' yachts were? Of course, none of the customers could afford yachts, even though they dutifully followed the advice of their bankers and brokers. Full of wise contrarian advice and offering a true look at the world of investing, in which brokers get rich while their customers go broke, this book continues to open the eyes of investors to the reality of Wall Street.

The Little Book of Economics: How the Economy Works in the Real World


Greg Ip - 2010
    economy functions. In The Little Book of Economics, Greg, Ip, one of the country's most recognized and respected economics journalists, walks readers through how the economy really works. Written for the inquisitive layman who doesn't want to plow through academic jargon and Greek letters or pore over charts and tables, The Little Book of Economics offers indispensible insight into how the American economy works - or, doesn't. With engaging and accessible prose, the bookProvides a comprehensive understanding of each aspect of our economy from inflation and unemployment to international trade and finance Serves as an insider's guide to the people and institutions that control America's economy such as the Federal Reserve and the federal budget Explains the roots of America's current economic crisis and the risks the country faces in its aftermath, such as stratospheric government debt, while offering advice on overcoming these threats Walks readers through the basic concepts and terminology they need to understand economic news Punctures myths and political spin from both the left and the right with candid and often surprising insight A must read for anyone who wants a better grasp of the economy without taking a course in economics, The Little Book of Economics is a unique and engaging look at how the economy works in all its wonderful and treacherous ways.

Unconventional Success: A Fundamental Approach to Personal Investment


David F. Swensen - 2005
    Swensen offers incontrovertible evidence that the for-profit mutual fund industry consistently fails the average investor. From excessive management fees to the frequent "churning" of portfolios, the relentless pursuit of profits by mutual fund management companies harms individual clients. Perhaps most destructive of all are the hidden schemes that limit investor choice and reduce returns, including "pay-to-play" product-placement fees, stale-price trading scams, soft-dollar kickbacks, and 12b-1 distribution charges. Even if investors manage to emerge unscathed from an encounter with the profit-seeking mutual fund industry, individuals face the likelihood of self-inflicted pain. The common practice of selling losers and buying winners (and doing both too often) damages portfolio returns and increases tax liabilities, delivering a one-two punch to investor aspirations. In short: Nearly insurmountable hurdles confront ordinary investors. Swensen's solution? A contrarian investment alternative that promotes well-diversified, equity-oriented, "market-mimicking" portfolios that reward investors who exhibit the courage to stay the course. Swensen suggests implementing his nonconformist proposal with investor-friendly, not-for-profit investment companies such as Vanguard and TIAA-CREF. By avoiding actively managed funds and employing client-oriented mutual fund managers, investors create the preconditions for investment success. Bottom line? Unconventional Success provides the guidance and financial know-how for improving the personal investor's financial future.

The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers


Baruch Lev - 2016
    Based on a comprehensive, large-sample empirical analysis, this book reports financial documents' continuous deterioration in relevance to investors' decisions. An enlightening discussion details the reasons why accounting is losing relevance in today's market, backed by numerous examples with real-world impact. Beyond simply identifying the problem, this report offers a solution--the Value Creation Report--and demonstrates its utility in key industries. New indicators focus on strategy and execution to identify and evaluate a company's true value-creating resources for a more up-to-date approach to critical investment decision-making.While entire industries have come to rely on financial reports for vital information, these documents are flawed and insufficient when it comes to the way investors and lenders work in the current economic climate. This book demonstrates an alternative, giving you a new framework for more informed decision making.Discover a new, comprehensive system of economic indicators Focus on strategic, value-creating resources in company valuation Learn how traditional financial documents are quickly losing their utility Find a path forward with actionable, up-to-date information Major corporate decisions, such as restructuring and M&A, are predicated on financial indicators of profitability and asset/liabilities values. These documents move mountains, so what happens if they're based on faulty indicators that fail to show the true value of the company? The End of Accounting and the Path Forward for Investors and Managers shows you the reality and offers a new blueprint for more accurate valuation.

Fortune's Formula: The Untold Story of the Scientific Betting System That Beat the Casinos and Wall Street


William Poundstone - 2006
    One was mathematician Claude Shannon, neurotic father of our digital age, whose genius is ranked with Einstein's. The other was John L. Kelly Jr., a Texas-born, gun-toting physicist. Together they applied the science of information theory—the basis of computers and the Internet—to the problem of making as much money as possible, as fast as possible.Shannon and MIT mathematician Edward O. Thorp took the "Kelly formula" to Las Vegas. It worked. They realized that there was even more money to be made in the stock market. Thorp used the Kelly system with his phenomenonally successful hedge fund, Princeton-Newport Partners. Shannon became a successful investor, too, topping even Warren Buffett's rate of return. Fortune's Formula traces how the Kelly formula sparked controversy even as it made fortunes at racetracks, casinos, and trading desks. It reveals the dark side of this alluring scheme, which is founded on exploiting an insider's edge.Shannon believed it was possible for a smart investor to beat the market—and Fortune's Formula will convince you that he was right.

Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics


Richard H. Thaler - 2016
    Thaler has spent his career studying the radical notion that the central agents in the economy are humans—predictable, error-prone individuals. Misbehaving is his arresting, frequently hilarious account of the struggle to bring an academic discipline back down to earth—and change the way we think about economics, ourselves, and our world.Traditional economics assumes rational actors. Early in his research, Thaler realized these Spock-like automatons were nothing like real people. Whether buying a clock radio, selling basketball tickets, or applying for a mortgage, we all succumb to biases and make decisions that deviate from the standards of rationality assumed by economists. In other words, we misbehave. More importantly, our misbehavior has serious consequences. Dismissed at first by economists as an amusing sideshow, the study of human miscalculations and their effects on markets now drives efforts to make better decisions in our lives, our businesses, and our governments.Coupling recent discoveries in human psychology with a practical understanding of incentives and market behavior, Thaler enlightens readers about how to make smarter decisions in an increasingly mystifying world. He reveals how behavioral economic analysis opens up new ways to look at everything from household finance to assigning faculty offices in a new building, to TV game shows, the NFL draft, and businesses like Uber.Laced with antic stories of Thaler’s spirited battles with the bastions of traditional economic thinking, Misbehaving is a singular look into profound human foibles. When economics meets psychology, the implications for individuals, managers, and policy makers are both profound and entertaining.

Macroeconomics


Andrew B. Abel - 1992
    This text uses a unified approach based on a single economics model that provides readers with a clear understanding of macroeconomics and its classical and Keynesian assumptions. Introduction: Introduction to Macroeconomics; The Measurement and Structure of the National Economy. Long-Run Economic Performance: Productivity, Output, and Employment; Consumption, Saving, and Investment; Saving and Investment in the Open Economy; Long-Run Economic Growth; The Asset Market, Money, and Prices. Business Cycles and Macroeconomic Policy: Business Cycles; The IS-LM/AD-AS Model: A General Framework for Macroeconomic Analysis; Classical Business Cycle Analysis: Market-Clearing Macroeconomics; Keynesianism: The Macroeconomics of Wage and Price Rigidity. Macroeconomic Policy: Its Environment and Institutions: Unemployment and Inflation; Exchange Rates, Business Cycles, and Macroeconomic Policy in the Open Economy; Monetary Policy and the Federal Reserve System; Government Spending and Its Financing. For all readers interested in intermediate macroeconomics.

Market Wizards


Jack D. Schwager - 1989
    What separates the world's top traders from the vast majority of unsuccessful investors? Jack Schwager sets out to answer tis question in his interviews with superstar money-makers including Bruce Kovner, Richard Dennis, Paul Tudor Jones, Michel Steinhardt, Ed Seykota, Marty Schwartz, Tom Baldwin, and more in "Market Wizards: Interviews with Top Traders," now in paperback and ebook.This classic interview-style investment text from a financial expert is a must-read for traders and professional financiers alike, as well as anyone interested in gaining insight into how the world of finance really works.Filled with anecdotes about market experiences, including the story of a trader who after wiping out several times, turned $30,000 into $80 million and an electrical engineer from MIT whose computerized trading has earned returns of 250,000 percent over sixteen yearsIdentifies the factors that define a successful traderNow availabe as in digital formats.One of the most insightful, bestselling trading books of all time.

Essentials of Econometrics


Damodar N. Gujarati - 1998
    This text provides a simple and straightforward introduction to econometrics for the beginner. The book is designed to help students understand econometric techniques through extensive examples, careful explanations, and a wide variety of problem material. In each of the editions, I have tried to incorporate major developments in the field in an intuitive and informative way without resort to matrix algebra, calculus, or statistics beyond the introductory level. The fourth edition continues that tradition.

The Money Machine


Philip Coggan - 1986
    What happens in the City has never affected us moreIn this excellent guide, now fully revised and updated, leading financial journalist Philip Coggan cuts through the headlines, the scandals and the jargon to explain the nuts and bolts of the financial system.What causes the pound to rise or interest rates to fall? Which are the institutions that really matter? Why is it we need the Money Machine - and what happens when it crashes? Coggan provides clear and concise answers and shows why we should all be more familiar with a system we so intimately depend upon.

The Richest Man in Babylon


George S. Clason - 1926
    This is the book that reveals the secret to personal wealth. The Success Secrets of the Ancients—An Assured Road to Happiness and Prosperity Countless readers have been helped by the famous “Babylonian parables,” hailed as the greatest of all inspirational works on the subject of thrift, financial planning, and personal wealth. In language as simple as that found in the Bible, these fascinating and informative stories set you on a sure path to prosperity and its accompanying joys. Acclaimed as a modern-day classic, this celebrated bestseller offers an understanding of—and a solution to—your personal financial problems that will guide you through a lifetime. This is the book that holds the secrets to keeping your money—and making more. The Richest Man in BabylonRead it and recommend it to loved ones—and get on the road to riches.MORE THAN TWO MILLION BOOKS SOLD

Americana: A 400-Year History of American Capitalism


Bhu Srinivasan - 2017
    Americana takes us on a four-hundred-year journey of this spirit of innovation and ambition through a series of Next Big Things -- the inventions, techniques, and industries that drove American history forward: from the telegraph, the railroad, guns, radio, and banking to flight, suburbia, and sneakers, culminating with the Internet and mobile technology at the turn of the twenty-first century. The result is a thrilling alternative history of modern America that reframes events, trends, and people we thought we knew through the prism of the value that, for better or for worse, this nation holds dearest: capitalism.In a winning, accessible style, Bhu Srinivasan boldly takes on four centuries of American enterprise, revealing the unexpected connections that link them. We learn how Andrew Carnegie's early job as a telegraph messenger boy paved the way for his leadership of the steel empire that would make him one of the nation's richest men; how the gunmaker Remington reinvented itself in the postwar years to sell typewriters; how the inner workings of the Mafia mirrored the trend of consolidation and regulation in more traditional business; and how a 1950s infrastructure bill triggered a series of events that produced one of America's most enduring brands: KFC. Reliving the heady early days of Silicon Valley, we are reminded that the start-up is an idea as old as America itself.Entertaining, eye-opening, and sweeping in its reach, Americana is an exhilarating new work of narrative history.

Flash Crash: A Trading Savant, a Global Manhunt, and the Most Mysterious Market Crash in History


Liam Vaughan - 2020
    In the span of five minutes, a trillion dollars of valuation was lost. The Flash Crash, as it became known, represented the fastest drop in market history. When share values rebounded less than half an hour later, experts around the globe were left perplexed. What had they just witnessed?Navinder Singh Sarao hardly seemed like a man who would shake the world's financial markets to their core. Raised in a working-class neighborhood in West London, Nav was a preternaturally gifted trader who played the markets like a computer game. By the age of thirty, he had left behind London's "trading arcades," working instead out of his childhood home. For years the money poured in. But when lightning-fast electronic traders infiltrated markets and started eating into his profits, Nav built a system of his own to fight back. It worked--until 2015, when the FBI arrived at his door. Depending on whom you ask, Sarao was a scourge, a symbol of a financial system run horribly amok, or a folk hero who took on the tyranny of Wall Street and the high-frequency traders.A real-life financial thriller, Flash Crash uncovers the remarkable, behind-the-scenes narrative of a mystifying market crash, a globe-spanning investigation into international fraud, and the man at the center of them both.

A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The Inside Story of the Collapse of Lehman Brothers


Lawrence G. McDonald - 2009
     What happened at Lehman Brothers and why was it allowed to fail, with aftershocks that rocked the global economy? In this news-making, often astonishing book, a former Lehman Brothers Vice President gives us the straight answers—right from the belly of the beast.In A Colossal Failure of Common Sense, Larry McDonald, a Wall Street insider, reveals, the culture and unspoken rules of the game like no book has ever done. The book is couched in the very human story of Larry McDonald’s Horatio Alger-like rise from a Massachusetts “gateway to nowhere” housing project to the New York headquarters of Lehman Brothers, home of one of the world’s toughest trading floors. We get a close-up view of the participants in the Lehman collapse, especially those who saw it coming with a helpless, angry certainty. We meet the Brahmins at the top, whose reckless, pedal-to-the-floor addiction to growth finally demolished the nation’s oldest investment bank. The Wall Street we encounter here is a ruthless place, where brilliance, arrogance, ambition, greed, capacity for relentless toil, and other human traits combine in a potent mix that sometimes fuels prosperity but occasionally destroys it. The full significance of the dissolution of Lehman Brothers remains to be measured. But this much is certain: it was a devastating blow to America’s—and the world’s—financial system. And it need not have happened. This is the story of why it did.

Billion Dollar Whale: The Man Who Fooled Wall Street, Hollywood, and the World


Tom Wright - 2018
    The dust had yet to settle on the global financial crisis in 2009 when an unlikely Wharton grad was setting in motion a fraud of unprecedented gall and magnitude--one that would come to symbolize the next great threat to the global financial system. Billion Dollar Whale will become a classic, harrowing parable about the financial world in the twenty-first century.