A Demon of Our Own Design: Markets, Hedge Funds, and the Perils of Financial Innovation


Richard Bookstaber - 2007
    The very things done to make markets safer, have, in fact, created a world that is far more dangerous. From the 1987 crash to Citigroup closing the Salomon Arb unit, from staggering losses at UBS to the demise of Long-Term Capital Management, Bookstaber gives readers a front row seat to the management decisions made by some of the most powerful financial figures in the world that led to catastrophe, and describes the impact of his own activities on markets and market crashes. Much of the innovation of the last 30 years has wreaked havoc on the markets and cost trillions of dollars. A Demon of Our Own Design tells the story of man's attempt to manage market risk and what it has wrought. In the process of showing what we have done, Bookstaber shines a light on what the future holds for a world where capital and power have moved from Wall Street institutions to elite and highly leveraged hedge funds.

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.

The Rise of Carry: The Dangerous Consequences of Volatility Suppression and the New Financial Order of Decaying Growth and Recurring Crisis


Tim Lee - 2019
    But none has revealed just how significant a role it plays in the global economy--until now.A groundbreaking book sure to leave its mark in the canon of investing literature, The Rise of Carry explains how carry trading has virtually shaped the global economic picture--one of decaying economic growth, recurring crises, wealth disparity, and, in too many places, social and political upheaval. The authors explain how carry trades work--particularly in the currency and stock markets--and provide a compelling case for how carry trades have come to dominate the entire global business cycle. They provide thorough analyses of critical but often overlooked topics and issues, including:-The active role stock prices play in causing recessions--as opposed to the common belief that recessions cause price crashes-The real driving force behind financial asset prices-The ways that carry, volatility selling, leverage, liquidity, and profitability affect the business cycle-How positive returns to carry over time are related to market volatility--and how central bank policies have supercharged these returnsSimply put, carry trading is now the primary determinant of the global business cycle--a pattern of long, steady but unspectacular expansions punctuated by catastrophic crises.The Rise of Carry provides foundational knowledge and expert insights you need to protect yourself from what have come to be common market upheavals--as well as the next major crisis.

The Value of Everything: Making and Taking in the Global Economy


Mariana Mazzucato - 2018
    This must change to insure a capitalism that works for us all.In this scathing indictment of our current global financial system, The Value of Everything rigorously scrutinizes the way in which economic value has been determined and reveals how the difference between value creation and value extraction has become increasingly blurry. Mariana Mazzucato argues that this blurriness allowed certain actors in the economy to portray themselves as value creators, while in reality they were just moving existing value around or, even worse, destroying it.The book uses case studies - from Silicon Valley to the financial sector to big pharma - to show how the foggy notions of value create confusion between rents and profits, a difference that distorts the measurements of growth and GDP.The lesson here is urgent and sobering: to rescue our economy from the next, inevitable crisis and to foster long-term economic growth, we will need to rethink capitalism, rethink the role of public policy and the importance of the public sector, and redefine how we measure value in our society.

The Four Pillars of Investing


William J. Bernstein - 2002
    Explains how independent investors can construct a superior investment portfolio by learning the four essentials of investing.

The Five Rules for Successful Stock Investing: Morningstar's Guide to Building Wealth and Winning in the Market


Pat Dorsey - 2003
    His methodology is sound, his examples clear, and his approach timeless. --Christopher C. Davis Portfolio Manager and Chairman, Davis Advisors Over the years, people from around the world have turned to Morningstar for strong, independent, and reliable advice. The Five Rules for Successful Stock Investing provides the kind of savvy financial guidance only a company like Morningstar could offer. Based on the philosophy that investing should be fun, but not a game, this comprehensive guide will put even the most cautious investors back on the right track by helping them pick the right stocks, find great companies, and understand the driving forces behind different industries--without paying too much for their investments. Written by Morningstar's Director of Stock Analysis, Pat Dorsey, The Five Rules for Successful Stock Investing includes unparalleled stock research and investment strategies covering a wide range of stock-related topics. Investors will profit from such tips as: * How to dig into a financial statement and find hidden gold . . . and deception * How to find great companies that will create shareholder wealth * How to analyze every corner of the market, from banks to health care Informative and highly accessible, The Five Rules for Successful Stock Investing should be required reading for anyone looking for the right investment opportunities in today's ever-changing market.

Warren Buffett and the Art of Stock Arbitrage: Proven Strategies for Arbitrage and Other Special Investment Situations


Mary Buffett - 2010
    Even more amazing, this incredible rate of return was produced with very low rates of risk. Long considered one of the most powerful and profitable of Buffett’s investment operations, but the least understood, these special types of investments have been the edge that made Warren Buffett so phenomenally successful. Warren Buffett and the Art of Stock Arbitrage is the first book to examine Buffett’s special brand of arbitrage investing. Buffettologists Mary Buffett and David Clark explore the previously secret domain of Warren Buffett’s stock arbitrage investments. They explain how Buffett finds deals, evaluates them, picks the winners from the losers, and when he is willing to use leverage to help boost his performance in these investments to make amazing profits. Basic mathematical equations are included to help readers determine the projected rate of return, evaluate risk, and determine the probability of the deal being a success. Buffett and Clark provide detailed explanations and examples of Warren Buffett’s methods for arbitrage, and for investing in tender offers, liquidations, spin-offs, and reorganizations. They take readers step by step from the initial public announcement to tendering shares, explaining how Buffett evaluates risk and maximizes his profit at every step. Warren Buffett and the Art of Stock Arbitrage is a valuable companion to the other books in Buffett and Clark’s successful series—Buffettology, The Buffettology Workbook, The New Buffettology, The Tao of Warren Buffett, Warren Buffett and the Interpretation of Financial Statements, and Warren Buffett’s Management Secrets.

Your Money or Your Life


Vicki Robin - 1992
    Your Money or Your Life is even more relevant today than it was when the book first hit the stands, and a great publicity campaign will bring this already strong-selling book to a whole new audience.

Bitcoin: Hard Money You Can't F*ck With: Why bitcoin will be the next global reserve currency


Jason A. Williams - 2020
    No governments, no companies, no central banks, no money printing. It’s a revolution as big as the internet. And it’s never been hacked.Entrepreneur and investor Jason A. Williams is the first author to put bitcoin in context of the 2020 crisis - a year of financial disaster and unprecedented money creation (money printer go brrr!)Not only was bitcoin the best-performing asset on the planet in 2020, it quietly established itself as the next global reserve currency as central banks around the world desperately printed their money into oblivion.Hard Money You Can’t F*ck With explains bitcoin in simple, readable terms and maps out how this ‘magic internet money’ will grow into the best form of money we’ve ever had.What’s inside?Part 1: Why Bitcoin Matters Now- What is bitcoin?- Who created it?- Why bitcoin is ‘money you can’t f*ck with’- How bitcoin emerged out of the 2008 banking crisis.- Why money printing slowly destroys your wealth.Part 2: A brief history of money (and money printing)- Take a step back and learn ‘what exactly is money?’- Why ‘printing cash’ has always led to the death of currency.- Why bitcoin is the best form of money ever created.Part 3: How bitcoin becomes the next global reserve currency- A deep dive into the 2020 financial crisis and how bitcoin emerged strongest- The emergence of national digital currencies to compete.- Why some nation states are now holding and trading in bitcoin.

Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital: The Dynamics of Bubbles and Golden Ages


Carlota Pérez - 2002
    Carlota Perez draws upon Schumpeter's theories of the clustering of innovations to explain why each technological revolution gives rise to a paradigm shift and a "New Economy" and how these "opportunity explosions", focused on specific industries, also lead to the recurrence of financial bubbles and crises. These findings are illustrated with examples from the past two centuries: the industrial revolution, the age of steam and railways, the age of steel and electricity, the emergence of mass production and automobiles, and the current information revolution/knowledge society. By analyzing the changing relationship between finance capital and production capital during the emergence, diffusion and assimilation of new technologies throughout the global economic system, this book sheds light on some of the most pressing economic problems of today.

My Life as a Quant: Reflections on Physics and Finance


Emanuel Derman - 2004
    Page by page, Derman details his adventures in this field--analyzing the incompatible personas of traders and quants, and discussing the dissimilar nature of knowledge in physics and finance. Throughout this tale, he also reflects on the appropriate way to apply the refined methods of physics to the hurly-burly world of markets.

I.O.U.: Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay


John Lanchester - 2009
    I.O.U. is the story of how we came to experience such a complete and devastating financial implosion, and how the decisions and actions of a select group of individuals had profound consequences for America, Europe, and the global economy overall. John Lanchester begins with "The ATM Moment," that seemingly magical proliferation of cheap credit that led to an explosion of lending, and then deftly outlines the global and local landscapes of banking and finance. Viewing the crisis through the lens of politics, culture, and contemporary history -- from the invention and widespread misuse of financial instruments to the culpability of subprime mortgages -- Lanchester draws perceptive conclusions on the limitations of financial and governmental regulation, capitalism's deepest flaw, and, most important, on the plain and simple facts of human nature where cash is concerned.Weaving together firsthand research and superbly written reportage, Lanchester delivers a shrewd perspective and a digestible, comprehensive analysis that connects the dots for the expert and casual reader alike. I.O.U. is an eye-opener of a book -- it may well provoke anger, amazement, or rueful disbelief -- and, as the author clearly reveals, we've only just begun to get ourselves back on track.

The Millionaire Mind


Thomas J. Stanley - 2001
    Stanley, Ph.D., answers these questions and provides us with further insight into the thoughts and lives of this wealthy segment of the population in The Millionaire Mind. A follow-up to Stanley's New York Times bestseller, The Millionaire Next Door, The Millionaire Mind may surprise readers with its findings about the kinds of people that millionaires really are. Interestingly, many millionaires were not straight-A students in high school, nor did they attend prestigious colleges. Instead, they were often told when they were younger that they were not bright and that they would not be successful. These challenges taught them how to surmount obstacles and motivated them to try harder and to take risks to get ahead financially. The major risks that these millionaires have taken and continue to take are financial ones. They must overcome the fear of taking risks, and they must maintain this courage throughout their adult careers. Stanley discovered that many millionaires share similarities in techniques to allay their anxieties and stay on track financially. Some of these include: Believing in myself Counting my blessings every day Countering negativethoughtswith positive ones Sharing concerns with spouse Visualizing success Outworking, outthinking, out-toughing the competition Hiring talented advisors Constantly upgrading my knowledge about my occupation Spending considerable time planning my success Exercising regularly Having strong religious faith Stanley also reveals that millionaires are very often successful in marriage as well as in work (the typical millionaire has been married to the same spouse for over twenty-five years) and that they usually lead relatively frugal, economically productive lifestyles. Perhaps most interesting to readers will be the section that Stanley devotes to how millionaires chose the career in which they would be most likely to succeed. So don't miss out on picking apart and analyzing the thoughts and habits of millionaires with Thomas Stanley and The Millionaire Mind, a book sure to be as brilliantly revealing and fascinating as his previous bestseller on millionaires. Thomas J. Stanley, Ph.D., is a researcher, author, and lecturer. He has studied the wealthy for more than 25 years. The Millionaire Next Door, published in 1996, has sold more than one million copies in hardcover and nearly one million in paperback. The book has been on The New York Times Best Sellers list for more than 150 combined weeks. His previous books include Marketing to the Affluent, which Best of Business Quarterly named one of 10 outstanding business books, Selling to the Affluent, and Networking with the Affluent. Dr. Stanley lives in Atlanta. He was a professor of marketing at Georgia State University, where he was named Omicron Delta Kappa Outstanding Professor. He holds his doctorate from the University of Georgia in Athens.

Safe Haven Investing: How to Take Cover from Financial Storms


Mark Spitznagel - 2018
    Mark will work through other areas that are typically considered safe, like farmland and real estate, before showing the reader how to align his/her portfolio to withstand a potential crash. Topics covered include: What is a safe haven investment and how do they fit in a portfolio? Silver and gold Real Estate, Art, & Farmland Dividends & Hedge Funds Derivatives & Tail Hedging What you, as an investor, should ultimately do

Principles Of Corporate Finance


Richard A. Brealey - 1980
    Throughout the book the authors show how managers use financial theory to solve practical problems and as a way of learning how to respond to change by showing not just how but why companies and management act as they do. The text is comprehensive, authoritative, and modern and yet the material is presented at a common sense level. The discussions and illustrations are unique due to the depth of detail blended with a distinct sense of humor for which the book is well known and highly regarded. This text is a valued reference for thousands of practicing financial managers.