Con Men: A History of Financial Fraud and the Lessons You Can Learn

by Leo Gough

A history of financial fraud that includes topics such as the motives and methods of fraudsters, when and why frauds happen, how old scams can be repackaged, and the types of financial product that become vehicles for fraud.

Genres: Nonfiction

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Wilde Sky · Rating 4 out of 5]

A description of various conmen / frauds and advice on how to being a victim of fraud.

The first section was really interesting, but the book drifted towards the end and became a bit repetitive.

Overall rating 3.5

Reading time around two hours.

[Felix Iliff · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is primarily aimed at investors as a combination of cautionary tale and practical advice manual. I have no real interest in investment, but I am a Forensic Accountant and former auditor, so I read it from a position somewhere between personal interest and homework.

Despite not really being in its target audience, I really enjoyed this book. The examples used are generally well known cases and are written with a degree of humour, which makes the book a pleasure to read even if you have only a casual interest in the subject matter. They are also explained in very clear terms which should mean that they are easy to understand, even for a relative layperson (although it is difficult for me to judge that).

Overall, I found this book to be an enjoyable, as well as informative, read and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in fraud or investment.

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

Just because acts are put in chronological order does not make this collection of scams a "history".

[xi ning, wang · Rating 5 out of 5]

列舉近代金融史上最慘烈的幾個舞弊案，從每個個案中帶出身為散戶投資人能做些什麼事來讓風險降到最低。
太多人缺乏金融常識，卻又喜歡裝懂，到最後就是落得血本無歸，哭喊著要政府負責。
自己的錢就該自己去保護好。

[Forrest · Rating 4 out of 5]

如果已經看過不少商業詐騙相關書籍的話這本可以跳過，雖然話是這樣說；但裡面仍有一些觀點值得一讀；像裡面說到"窮爸爸、富爸爸"這本書的作者吹虛、對會計師查帳報告的觀點及對存股的不置可否(沒特別講存股，但有說到沒有那種把錢丟進去投資然後都不去管它的)

[Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

c2013: FWFTB: Enron, greed, investment, Madoff, scandals. What a great fast read. A light touch of humour together with basic explanations of how it was done and why. Some interesting facts that I had not realised at the time the scandals started to break. It is aimed at the amateur investor or wannabe investors and has enough to make anyone reconsider trying to play the stock market on their own. Definitely recommended to the normal crew. At the end of 2000, running out of these accruals, Worldcom bosses began to mark line costs as capital investments, rather than what they really were, suppliers' services had to be paid for; this manoeuvre was quite outside normal accounting practice and had the added effect of making Worldcom appear to be profitable, when it was in fact beginning to suffer losses."