A Man for All Markets


Edward O. Thorp - 2016
    Thorp invented card counting, proving the seemingly impossible: that you could beat the dealer at the blackjack table. As a result he launched a gambling renaissance. His remarkable success--and mathematically unassailable method--caused such an uproar that casinos altered the rules of the game to thwart him and the legions he inspired. They barred him from their premises, even put his life in jeopardy. Nonetheless, gambling was forever changed.Thereafter, Thorp shifted his sights to "the biggest casino in the world" Wall Street. Devising and then deploying mathematical formulas to beat the market, Thorp ushered in the era of quantitative finance we live in today. Along the way, the so-called godfather of the quants played bridge with Warren Buffett, crossed swords with a young Rudy Giuliani, detected the Bernie Madoff scheme, and, to beat the game of roulette, invented, with Claude Shannon, the world's first wearable computer.Here, for the first time, Thorp tells the story of what he did, how he did it, his passions and motivations, and the curiosity that has always driven him to disregard conventional wisdom and devise game-changing solutions to seemingly insoluble problems. An intellectual thrill ride, replete with practical wisdom that can guide us all in uncertain financial waters, A Man for All Markets is an instant classic--a book that challenges its readers to think logically about a seemingly irrational world.Praise for A Man for All Markets"In A Man for All Markets, [Thorp] delightfully recounts his progress (if that is the word) from college teacher to gambler to hedge-fund manager. Along the way we learn important lessons about the functioning of markets and the logic of investment."--The Wall Street Journal"[Thorp] gives a biological summation (think Richard Feynman's Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!) of his quest to prove the aphorism 'the house always wins' is flawed. . . . Illuminating for the mathematically inclined, and cautionary for would-be gamblers and day traders"-- Library Journal

The Permanent Portfolio: Harry Browne's Long-Term Investment Strategy


Craig Rowland - 2012
    So rather than attempt to do away with it, why not embrace it? That is what this book is designed to do. "The Permanent Portfolio" takes you through Harry Browne's Permanent Portfolio approach--which can weather a wide range of economic conditions from inflation and deflation to recession--and reveals how it can help investors protect and grow their money.Written by Craig Rowland and Mike Lawson, this reliable resource demonstrates everything from a straightforward four-asset Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) version of the strategy all the way up to a sophisticated approach using Swiss bank storage of selected assets for geographic and political diversification. In all cases, the authors provide step-by-step guidance based upon personal experience.This timeless strategy is supported by more than three decades of empirical evidenceThe authors skillfully explain how to incorporate the ideas of the Permanent Portfolio into your financial endeavors in order to maintain, protect, and grow your moneyIncludes select updates of Harry Browne's Permanent Portfolio approach, which reflect our changing times"The Permanent Portfolio" is an essential guide for investors who are serious about building a better portfolio.

The Little Book of Behavioral Investing: How Not to Be Your Own Worst Enemy


James Montier - 2010
    Behavioral finance, which recognizes that there is a psychological element to all investor decision-making, can help you overcome this obstacle.In The Little Book of Behavioral Investing, expert James Montier takes you through some of the most important behavioral challenges faced by investors. Montier reveals the most common psychological barriers, clearly showing how emotion, overconfidence, and a multitude of other behavioral traits, can affect investment decision-making.Offers time-tested ways to identify and avoid the pitfalls of investor bias Author James Montier is one of the world's foremost behavioral analysts Discusses how to learn from our investment mistakes instead of repeating them Explores the behavioral principles that will allow you to maintain a successful investment portfolio Written in a straightforward and accessible style, The Little Book of Behavioral Investing will enable you to identify and eliminate behavioral traits that can hinder your investment endeavors and show you how to go about achieving superior returns in the process.Praise for The Little Book Of Behavioral InvestingThe Little Book of Behavioral Investing is an important book for anyone who is interested in understanding the ways that human nature and financial markets interact. --Dan Ariely, James B. Duke Professor of Behavioral Economics, Duke University, and author of Predictably IrrationalIn investing, success means�being on the right side of most trades. No book provides a better starting point toward that goal than this one. --Bruce Greenwald, Robert Heilbrunn Professor of Finance and Asset Management, Columbia Business School'Know thyself.' Overcoming human instinct is key to becoming a better investor.� You would be irrational if you did not read this book. --Edward Bonham-Carter, Chief Executive and Chief Investment Officer, Jupiter Asset ManagementThere is not an investor anywhere who wouldn't profit from reading this book. --Jeff Hochman, Director of Technical Strategy, Fidelity Investment Services LimitedJames Montier gives us a very accessible version of why we as investors are so predictably irrational, and a guide to help us channel our 'Inner Spock' to make better investment decisions. Bravo! --John Mauldin, President, Millennium Wave Investments

The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution


Gregory Zuckerman - 2019
    No other investor--Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Ray Dalio, Steve Cohen, or George Soros--can touch his record. Since 1988, Renaissance's signature Medallion fund has generated average annual returns of 66 percent. The firm has earned profits of more than $100 billion; Simons is worth twenty-three billion dollars.Drawing on unprecedented access to Simons and dozens of current and former employees, Zuckerman, a veteran Wall Street Journal investigative reporter, tells the gripping story of how a world-class mathematician and former code breaker mastered the market. Simons pioneered a data-driven, algorithmic approach that's sweeping the world.As Renaissance became a market force, its executives began influencing the world beyond finance. Simons became a major figure in scientific research, education, and liberal politics. Senior executive Robert Mercer is more responsible than anyone else for the Trump presidency, placing Steve Bannon in the campaign and funding Trump's victorious 2016 effort. Mercer also impacted the campaign behind Brexit.The Man Who Solved the Market is a portrait of a modern-day Midas who remade markets in his own image, but failed to anticipate how his success would impact his firm and his country. It's also a story of what Simons's revolution means for the rest of us.

Anatomy of the Bear: Lessons from Wall Street's Four Great Bottoms


Russell Napier - 2007
    Financial market history is a guide to understanding the future. Looking at the four occasions when US equities were particularly cheap - 1921, 1932, 1949 and 1982 - Russell Napier sets out to answer these questions by analysing every article in the "Wall Street Journal" from either side of the market bottom. In the 70,000 articles he examines, one begins to understand the features which indicate that a great buying opportunity is emerging. By looking at how markets really did work in these bear-market bottoms, rather than theorising how they should work, Napier offers investors a financial field guide to making the best financial provisions for the future. This new edition includes a brand new preface from the author.

Bernard Baruch


James Grant - 1983
    Baruch's political policies are discussed briefly, and James Grant includes a detailed account of Baruch's trading and investment gains and losses. Baruch obtained his millions by risking his fortune again and again. In the history of our stock market and government, there are few who have obtained his mythical status as a successful investor of all times.

The Aggressive Conservative Investor


Martin J. Whitman - 1979
    Regulation, disclosure, and other things may change, but the general approach and mindset to successful investing are timeless. Read this book and you will learn the rudiments of 'safe and cheap' investing. An essential read for every amateur and professional investor. --Stan Garstka, Deputy Dean & Professor in the Practice of Faculty & Management, Yale School of Management Security analysis toward both better odds and higher long-term payoff: A readable, authoritative guide. --Professor Bill Baumol, New York UniversityIn reading this book, one is struck by the simplicity of the ideas and the dependence of the investor on his own understandings of reality as opposed to the myths on the street. The updated version of this 1979 classic incorporates all the modern financial engineering that has occurred as a product of the late 20th century, and the new methodologies refine your abilities to measure risk but don't change the fundamentals of value. The updated version of The Aggressive Conservative Investor is very much a value-added proposition. --Sam Zell, Chairman, Equity Group Investment LLCI concur with those people who regard Marty Whitman as the 'Dean of Value Investing.' This book is a must-read for everyone interested in understanding the art of investing. --Melvin T. Stith, Dean, Whitman School of Management, Syracuse UniversityThis no-holds-barred presentation of one of the most successful investment strategies of all time -- value investing in distressed securities/companie -- shows you how to analyze and evaluate stocks just like controlling owners. Based on the assumption that stock price rarely reflects real value, authors Whitman and Shubik use numerous case studies to present risk-minimizing methods that also provide high rewards. Still relevant today, this classic work includes a new introduction discussing the dramatic changes that have taken place in the value investing world since its first publication in 1979.

The 12% Solution


David Alan Carter - 2017
    A strategy that’s not pie-in-the-sky and not just a bunch of theory, but rather a systematic plan that is backed up with real numbers showing it clearly beating the S&P 500 over time. A trading strategy that’s understandable, repeatable, that works and works simply.Anyone can do this. In simple-to-understand language, you’ll discover---- The six ETFs that power the strategy, and why.-- The simple technique for identifying which of those ETFs to buy, and which to sell. And most importantly, when.-- How $5,000 can end up $1,000,000 in your retirement portfolio.-- How to protect your portfolio during market downturns with a simple cash trigger.-- In short, how to earn an average of 12% annually in the stock market with minimal trading, less volatility, and less risk.Beat "The Street" in just 20 minutes.If you have 20 minutes a month and a computer, you can turn any investment amount into a steadily growing compounding machine that will make you the envy of Mad Money’s Jim Cramer and 99% of all mutual fund managers.Make just 2-4 trades one day a month. The strategy tells you what ETFs to buy and what to sell. That’s it. Then turn off the computer and go live your life.

Dollars and Sense: How We Misthink Money and How to Spend Smarter


Dan Ariely - 2017
    Emotions play a powerful role in shaping our financial behavior, often making us our own worst enemies as we try to save, access value, and spend responsibly. In Dollars and Sense, bestselling author and behavioral economist Dan Ariely teams up with financial comedian and writer Jeff Kreisler to challenge many of our most basic assumptions about the precarious relationship between our brains and our money. In doing so, they undermine many of personal finance’s most sacred beliefs and explain how we can override some of our own instincts to make better financial choices.Exploring a wide range of everyday topics—from the lure of pain-free spending with credit cards to the  pitfalls of household budgeting to the seductive power of holiday sales—Ariely and Kreisler demonstrate how our misplaced confidence in our spending habits frequently leads us astray, costing us more than we realize, whether it’s the real value of the time we spend driving forty-five minutes to save $10 or our inability to properly assess what the things we buy are actually worth. Together Ariely and Kreisler reveal the emotional forces working against us and how we can counteract them. Mixing case studies and anecdotes with concrete advice and lessons, they cut through the unconscious fears and desires driving our worst financial instincts and teach us how to improve our money habits.The result not only reveals the rationale behind our most head-scratching financial choices but also offers clear guidance for navigating the treacherous financial landscape of the brain. Fascinating, engaging, funny, and essential, Dollars and Sense provides the practical tools we need to understand and improve our financial choices, save and spend smarter, and ultimately live better.

A Complete Guide To Volume Price Analysis


Anna Coulling - 2013
    For them, it was the ticker tape, for us it is the trading screen. The results are the same and can be for you too.You can be lucky tooI make no bones about the fact I believe I was lucky in starting my own trading journey using volume. To me it just made sense. The logic was inescapable. And for me, the most powerful reason is very simple. Volume is a rare commodity in trading - a leading indicator. The second and only other leading indicator is price. Everything else is lagged. It's a simple problemAs traders, investors or speculators, all we are trying to do is to forecast where the market is heading next. Is there any better way than to use the only two leading indicators we have at our disposal, namely volume and price?And such a powerful solutionIn isolation, each tells us very little. After all, volume is just that, no more no less. A price is a price. However, combine these two forces together, and the result is a powerful analytical approach to forecasting market direction with confidence.What you will discoverThis book will teach you all you need to know from first principles. So whether you're a day trader or longer-term investor in any market, instrument or timeframe, this book is the perfect platform to set you on the road to success and join those iconic traders of the past. All you need to succeed is a chart with volume and price...simple.

Trade Like a Stock Market Wizard: How to Achieve Super Performance in Stocks in Any Market


Mark Minervini - 2013
    -- JACK SCHWAGER, bestselling author of Stock Market WizardsMark's book has to be on every investor's bookshelf. It is about the most comprehensive work I have ever read on investing in growth stocks. -- DAVID RYAN, three-time U.S. Investing Champion[Minervini is] one of the most highly respected independent traders of our generation. His experience and past history of savvy market calls is legendary. -- CHARLES KIRK, The Kirk ReportOne of Wall Street's most remarkable success stories. -- BEN POWER, Your Trading EdgeTHE INVESTOR'S GUIDE TO SUPERPERFORMANCE! Dramatically increase your stock market returns with the legendary SEPA system!For the first time ever, U.S. Investing Champion Mark Minervini reveals the proven, time-tested trading system he used to achieve triple-digit returns for five consecutive years, averaging 220% per year for a 33,500% compounded total return.In Trade Like a Stock Market Wizard, Minervini unveils his trademarked stock market method SEPA, which provides outsized returns in virtually every market by combining careful risk management, self-analysis, and perseverance. He explains in detail how to select precise entry points and preserve capital--for consistent triple- digit returns.Whether you're just getting started in the stock market or you're a seasoned pro, Minervini will show how you how to achieve SUPERPERFORMANCE! You'll gain valuable knowledge as he shares lessons, trading truths, and specific tactics--all derived from his 30-year career as one of America's most successful stock traders.Trade Like a Stock Market Wizard teaches you:How to find the best stocks before they make big price gainsHow to avoid costly mistakes made by most investorsHow to manage losses and protect profitsHow to avoid high-risk situationsPrecisely when to buy and when to sellHow to buy an IPOWhy traditional valuation doesn't work for fast-growing SuperperformersExamples of Minervini's personal trades with his commentsWith more than 160 chart examples and numerous case studies proving the remarkable effectiveness of Minervini's methodology, Trade Like a Stock Market Wizard puts in your hands one of the most effective and--until now--secretive stock investing systems in the world.MARK MINERVINI has a trademarked stock market method that produces outsized returns in virtually every market. It's called Specific Entry Point Analysis--SEPA--and it has been proven effective for selecting precise entry points, preserving capital and profi ts with even more precise exit points--and consistently producing triple-digit returns.Now, in Trade Like a Stock Market Wizard, Minervini shares--for the fi rst time ever--his coveted methodology with investors like you!

The Devil's Financial Dictionary


Jason Zweig - 2015
    And it distills the complexities, absurdities, and pomposities of Wall Street into plain truths and aphorisms anyone can understand.An indispensable survival guide to the hostile wilderness of today's financial markets, The Devil's Financial Dictionary delivers practical insights with a scorpion's sting. It cuts through the fads and fakery of Wall Street and clears a safe path for investors between euphoria and despair.Staying out of financial purgatory has never been this fun.

All the Devils are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis


Bethany McLean - 2010
    Should the blame fall on Wall Street, Main Street, or Pennsylvania Avenue? On greedy traders, misguided regulators, sleazy subprime companies, cowardly legislators, or clueless home buyers?According to Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera, two of America's most acclaimed business journalists, the real answer is all of the above-and more. Many devils helped bring hell to the economy. And the full story, in all of its complexity and detail, is like the legend of the blind men and the elephant. Almost everyone has missed the big picture. Almost no one has put all the pieces together.All the Devils Are Here goes back several decades to weave the hidden history of the financial crisis in a way no previous book has done. It explores the motivations of everyone from famous CEOs, cabinet secretaries, and politicians to anonymous lenders, borrowers, analysts, and Wall Street traders. It delves into the powerful American mythology of homeownership. And it proves that the crisis ultimately wasn't about finance at all; it was about human nature.Among the devils you'll meet in vivid detail:• Angelo Mozilo, the CEO of Countrywide, who dreamed of spreading homeownership to the masses, only to succumb to the peer pressure-and the outsized profits-of the sleaziest subprime lending.• Roland Arnall, a respected philanthropist and diplomat, who made his fortune building Ameriquest, a subprime lending empire that relied on blatantly deceptive lending practices.• Hank Greenberg, who built AIG into a Rube Goldberg contraption with an undeserved triple-A rating, and who ran it so tightly that he was the only one who knew where all the bodies were buried.• Stan O'Neal of Merrill Lynch, aloof and suspicious, who suffered from "Goldman envy" and drove a proud old firm into the ground by promoting cronies and pushing out his smartest lieutenants.• Lloyd Blankfein, who helped turn Goldman Sachs from a culture that famously put clients first to one that made clients secondary to its own bottom line.• Franklin Raines of Fannie Mae, who (like his predecessors) bullied regulators into submission and let his firm drift away from its original, noble mission.• Brian Clarkson of Moody's, who aggressively pushed to increase his rating agency's market share and stock price, at the cost of its integrity.• Alan Greenspan, the legendary maestro of the Federal Reserve, who ignored the evidence of a growing housing bubble and turned a blind eye to the lending practices that ultimately brought down Wall Street-and inflicted enormous pain on the country.Just as McLean's The Smartest Guys in the Room was hailed as the best Enron book on a crowded shelf, so will All the Devils Are Here be remembered for finally making sense of the meltdown and its consequences.

The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World


Niall Ferguson - 2007
    Bread, cash, dosh, dough, loot, lucre, moolah, readies, the wherewithal: Call it what you like, it matters. To Christians, love of it is the root of all evil. To generals, it’s the sinews of war. To revolutionaries, it’s the chains of labor. But in The Ascent of Money, Niall Ferguson shows that finance is in fact the foundation of human progress. What’s more, he reveals financial history as the essential backstory behind all history. With the clarity and verve for which he is known, Ferguson elucidates key financial institutions and concepts by showing where they came from. What is money? What do banks do? What’s the difference between a stock and a bond? Why buy insurance or real estate? And what exactly does a hedge fund do? This is history for the present. Ferguson travels to post-Katrina New Orleans to ask why the free market can’t provide adequate protection against catastrophe. He delves into the origins of the subprime mortgage crisis.

Crisis Economics: A Crash Course in the Future of Finance


Nouriel Roubini - 2010
    Renowned economist Nouriel Roubini electrified his profession and the larger financial community by predicting the current crisis well in advance of anyone else. Unlike most in his profession who treat economic disasters as freakish once-in-a-lifetime events without clear cause, Roubini, after decades of careful research around the world, realized that they were both probable and predictable. Armed with an unconventional blend of historical analysis and global economics, Roubini has forced politicians, policy makers, investors, and market watchers to face a long-neglected truth: financial systems are inherently fragile and prone to collapse. Drawing on the parallels from many countries and centuries, Nouriel Roubini and Stephen Mihm, a professor of economic history and a "New York Times Magazine" writer, show that financial cataclysms are as old and as ubiquitous as capitalism itself. The last two decades alone have witnessed comparable crises in countries as diverse as Mexico, Thailand, Brazil, Pakistan, and Argentina. All of these crises-not to mention the more sweeping cataclysms such as the Great Depression-have much in common with the current downturn. Bringing lessons of earlier episodes to bear on our present predicament, Roubini and Mihm show how we can recognize and grapple with the inherent instability of the global financial system, understand its pressure points, learn from previous episodes of "irrational exuberance," pinpoint the course of global contagion, and plan for our immediate future. Perhaps most important, the authors-considering theories, statistics, and mathematical models with the skepticism that recent history warrants explain how the world's economy can get out of the mess we're in, and stay out. In Roubini's shadow, economists and investors are increasingly realizing that they can no longer afford to consider crises the black swans of financial history. A vital and timeless book, "Crisis Economics" proves calamities to be not only predictable but also preventable and, with the right medicine, curable."