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Beat the Crowd: How You Can Out-Invest the Herd by Thinking Differently
Train your brain to be a real contrarian and outsmart the crowd
Beat the Crowd is the real contrarian’s guide to investing, with comprehensive explanations of how a true contrarian investor thinks and acts – and why it works more often than not. Bestselling author Ken Fisher breaks down the myths and cuts through the noise to present a clear, unvarnished view of timeless market realities, and the ways in which a contrarian approach to investing will outsmart the herd. In true Ken Fisher style, the book explains why the crowd often goes astray—and how you can stay on track.
Contrarians understand how headlines really affect the market and which noise and fads they should tune out. Beat the Crowd is a primer to the contrarian strategy, teaching readers simple tricks to think differently and get it right more often than not.
Discover the limits of forecasting and how far ahead you should look Learn why political controversy matter less the louder it gets Resurrect long-forgotten, timeless tricks and truths in markets Find out how the contrarian approach makes you right more often than wrong A successful investment strategy requires information, preparation, a little bit of brainpower, and a larger bit of luck. Pursuit of the mythical perfect strategy frequently lands folks in a cacophony of talking heads and twenty-four hour noise, but Beat the Crowd cuts through the mental clutter and collects the pristine pieces of actual value into a tactical approach based on going against the grain.
Beat the Crowd is the real contrarian’s guide to investing, with comprehensive explanations of how a true contrarian investor thinks and acts – and why it works more often than not. Bestselling author Ken Fisher breaks down the myths and cuts through the noise to present a clear, unvarnished view of timeless market realities, and the ways in which a contrarian approach to investing will outsmart the herd. In true Ken Fisher style, the book explains why the crowd often goes astray—and how you can stay on track.
Contrarians understand how headlines really affect the market and which noise and fads they should tune out. Beat the Crowd is a primer to the contrarian strategy, teaching readers simple tricks to think differently and get it right more often than not.
Discover the limits of forecasting and how far ahead you should look Learn why political controversy matter less the louder it gets Resurrect long-forgotten, timeless tricks and truths in markets Find out how the contrarian approach makes you right more often than wrong A successful investment strategy requires information, preparation, a little bit of brainpower, and a larger bit of luck. Pursuit of the mythical perfect strategy frequently lands folks in a cacophony of talking heads and twenty-four hour noise, but Beat the Crowd cuts through the mental clutter and collects the pristine pieces of actual value into a tactical approach based on going against the grain.
273 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 13, 2015
63 people are currently reading
378 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
March 18, 2018
WHEN PEOPLE STARE AT ONE THING, THEY OVERLOOK SOMETHING ELSE.
If you want to produce the best results in 20 or 30 years you have to be flexible. A flexible viewpoint is a matter of avoiding a peculiar trait of human nature, which is to buy the things that you wish you had bought in the past, or to continue to buy things that did well for you in the past.
Opposite-doers have a herd-like mentality too, and the market likes fooling them as much as it likes fooling the crowd they are trying to game. The independent thinkers are the real contrarians.
If investors become too aware of something it loses surprise power. But once people forget it packs a punch again.
QE led to banks not lending money as it depressed LT interest rates. When yield curves are flatter lending is less profitable for banks.
Through both world wars markets fell 40%.
Look past the inventive technology makers and find the inventive users and you will find some elepahants.
Optimisim for the future is rational as humans adapt.
Investors feel the pain of loss about 2.5x as much as they appreciate an equivalent gain (myopic loss aversion).
Selling means admitting the decision to buy was wrong - tough for an overconfident person to do.
If you want to produce the best results in 20 or 30 years you have to be flexible. A flexible viewpoint is a matter of avoiding a peculiar trait of human nature, which is to buy the things that you wish you had bought in the past, or to continue to buy things that did well for you in the past.
Opposite-doers have a herd-like mentality too, and the market likes fooling them as much as it likes fooling the crowd they are trying to game. The independent thinkers are the real contrarians.
If investors become too aware of something it loses surprise power. But once people forget it packs a punch again.
QE led to banks not lending money as it depressed LT interest rates. When yield curves are flatter lending is less profitable for banks.
Through both world wars markets fell 40%.
Look past the inventive technology makers and find the inventive users and you will find some elepahants.
Optimisim for the future is rational as humans adapt.
Investors feel the pain of loss about 2.5x as much as they appreciate an equivalent gain (myopic loss aversion).
Selling means admitting the decision to buy was wrong - tough for an overconfident person to do.
December 20, 2018
“The Great Humiliator” - The Stock Market
TGH loves what few can conceive.
The more people moved to cities, the more horses were needed to carry goods & people across town. 10s of thousands of horses to power buggies, wagons, & buses but came millions of pounds of manure-per day.
Great Horse Manure crisis of 1894-an actual thing-one London Times writer predicted the whole of London would be buried under 9 feet of manure in 50 years. City planners scrambled globally, holding crisis summits & planning conferences-not unlike today's climate change frenzy. None could dream up a solution. Mankind was doomed!
But then the automobile happened. Technology solved the problem! Cars replaced horses. Crisis averted.
The companies that create, adopt & collide new technologies will grow & profit-never-ending advancement is a never-ending source of earnings growth.
When media tells you the world is going to hell in a long-term hand-basket, as ugly as the world gets sometimes, that limitless potential is always there, always lurking around the corner, always ready to spark a rebound before long & drive the world to ever-greater heights.
TGH loves what few can conceive.
The more people moved to cities, the more horses were needed to carry goods & people across town. 10s of thousands of horses to power buggies, wagons, & buses but came millions of pounds of manure-per day.
Great Horse Manure crisis of 1894-an actual thing-one London Times writer predicted the whole of London would be buried under 9 feet of manure in 50 years. City planners scrambled globally, holding crisis summits & planning conferences-not unlike today's climate change frenzy. None could dream up a solution. Mankind was doomed!
But then the automobile happened. Technology solved the problem! Cars replaced horses. Crisis averted.
The companies that create, adopt & collide new technologies will grow & profit-never-ending advancement is a never-ending source of earnings growth.
When media tells you the world is going to hell in a long-term hand-basket, as ugly as the world gets sometimes, that limitless potential is always there, always lurking around the corner, always ready to spark a rebound before long & drive the world to ever-greater heights.
October 8, 2015
The first half of the book is quite worth reading. One of the interesting point made was that most of the books and news are either about past events or long term issues that will only have an impact far into the future. But past events are instantaneously reflected in stock price and market rarely looks beyond 30 months. What an investor should pay attention to is the quiet elephant in the room that people get so used to but could have an material impact to the market. The author also recommended Leading Economic Index published by Conference Board to get a good sense of the economic trend globally and regionally.
August 1, 2018
This is a pretty good and easy guide on how to invest like a true contrarian and, in the long run, achieve above-market investment returns. Being a true contrarian isn't easy, and often requires not just the courage to stick all the way through but more importantly what Howard Marks calls the "second-order thinking," i.e. thinking one or more levels deeper than what sort of investor reaction and stock movements a new piece of information normally triggers.
Particularly useful is the author's sharp analysis of the media's senseless obsession with every piece of economic data and focus on gloom-doom negativity to sell fear and grab people's attention. Thus, the best way to use the media to our advantage is not to get worked up over those terrifying news and ominous forecasts, but to use it as a barometer of the broad investor sentiment. What gets widely discussed and debated is already priced in, so true contrarians can use that as a reference and look for what the author calls elephants in the room that most investors have forgotten or blissfully ignored.
Particularly useful is the author's sharp analysis of the media's senseless obsession with every piece of economic data and focus on gloom-doom negativity to sell fear and grab people's attention. Thus, the best way to use the media to our advantage is not to get worked up over those terrifying news and ominous forecasts, but to use it as a barometer of the broad investor sentiment. What gets widely discussed and debated is already priced in, so true contrarians can use that as a reference and look for what the author calls elephants in the room that most investors have forgotten or blissfully ignored.
October 9, 2020
- Experts/Media/The Crowd are typically wrong. The contrarians who bet against others solely because they want to bet on the opposite are typically wrong too. One should aim to be the third category, not the crowd, not the contrarian, but independent thinker.
- Everything that's widely expected in the market should be ignored. They likely won't happen.
- The Crowd will always ignore the important things, find that thing and it'd be your competitive advantage (e.g. Realize the impact of COVID before it spread and before other people even knew it)
- Euphoria happens when 1) everyone on the street begins to talk about stock and 2) bad news no longer harm the stock market
- Simplicity is powerful
- Think only in 30 months terms - the duration market cares, and the only durations human can somewhat know the probability of
- When an expert say something, compare that to a foreign nation (QE spurs inflation? Japan says otherwise; US dollar loosing dominance means higher interest rates? Japan, once again, says otherwise)
- Everything that's widely expected in the market should be ignored. They likely won't happen.
- The Crowd will always ignore the important things, find that thing and it'd be your competitive advantage (e.g. Realize the impact of COVID before it spread and before other people even knew it)
- Euphoria happens when 1) everyone on the street begins to talk about stock and 2) bad news no longer harm the stock market
- Simplicity is powerful
- Think only in 30 months terms - the duration market cares, and the only durations human can somewhat know the probability of
- When an expert say something, compare that to a foreign nation (QE spurs inflation? Japan says otherwise; US dollar loosing dominance means higher interest rates? Japan, once again, says otherwise)
May 10, 2017
First, I was given this book by Fisher Investments, because I was looking into using their company for financial advice. It is a freebie. So I read it. This is the latest of many books on various financial subjects by Ken Fisher. I finished it, but it took a while. I really do not like his style of writing. I understand Mr. Fisher writes a monthly article for a major magazine, and, if this book is similar to the articles, the articles are likely just as hard for me.
My major complaint! is that! there is not a single! page in this book! where there is not at least! one exclamation point. I suppose that is simply a style of writing, but I found it very sophomoric. The book is about a very complex subject. Anything to do with investing and finance, it seems to me, has to be complex, if you intend for it to cover the subject. This book seems to be written at the 8th grade level.
I won't be looking into his earlier books.
My major complaint! is that! there is not a single! page in this book! where there is not at least! one exclamation point. I suppose that is simply a style of writing, but I found it very sophomoric. The book is about a very complex subject. Anything to do with investing and finance, it seems to me, has to be complex, if you intend for it to cover the subject. This book seems to be written at the 8th grade level.
I won't be looking into his earlier books.
June 22, 2021
Beat the Crowd: How You Can Out-Invest the Herd by Thinking Differently by Kenneth Fisher and Elisabeth Dellinger is supposed to help the investor think differently about investing. The only people making money with this book is Fisher and Dellinger. My advice is to save the $29.95, which the books costs, and give the money to those who need it. Donate to Goodwill or add it to your Fast Offering donation. This will help those in need and make you feel better. And the time you feel better is much more worthwhile, than spending your time reading this book.
November 18, 2023
thing to to remember when you watch the news or read a book
and you think of stocks or certain sectors
most of the news is past events
and
most of the news is about long term issues that might have an impact
.........
stuff in the past - stuff far into the future
stories about companies in the news are past events
and things like the climate or artificial intelligence are long term events, and not really fully understood
March 15, 2021
The title of Chapter 8 of the book is entitled "Throw Away This Book!". I would not have thrown the book of course, but I am sorry I have not put it aside way earlier. It is full of reiterations of old platitudes and well-known concepts, and judgmental conclusions, as well as excessive name-dropping. Not worth one's time and little relevance to the title of the book.
May 12, 2017
The title of this book is, "Beat the Crowd: How You Can Out-Invest the Herd by Thinking Differently." I don't understand why Goodreads lists it as "Gaming the Herd;" the ISBN number is identical as is the cover art.
A slim, easy to read book.
A slim, easy to read book.
May 22, 2017
I'm not sure there are really any actionable insights here, but this book is an interesting read about politics, news, history, and psychology and how they all relate to the stock market. It is well written, interesting, funny at times, and very informative.
February 18, 2018
Okay, but not his best book.
November 17, 2019
Mish-mash of ideas
Nothing original here. You'll be better off reading his father's seminal classic "Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits" than this one.
Nothing original here. You'll be better off reading his father's seminal classic "Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits" than this one.
January 3, 2020
What will happen in 30 months?
October 6, 2020
This book was admittedly given to me at a Fisher Investment seminar, which is why I read it, since I have money to invest, and want to be able to manage it better.
And while I learned a lot from the book, achieving that aim of becoming a better investor, there were some factors that we so discounted, that I am still wrangling with how much to apply, what the book teaches.
The fact that the market is always looking to the future, but never more than 30 months ahead, is going to be the first thing I'm going to think about when I think about this book.
And while I learned a lot from the book, achieving that aim of becoming a better investor, there were some factors that we so discounted, that I am still wrangling with how much to apply, what the book teaches.
The fact that the market is always looking to the future, but never more than 30 months ahead, is going to be the first thing I'm going to think about when I think about this book.
January 14, 2016
Contrarian investing. Don't let everything from the market or the news rattle you as you invest.
September 13, 2016
I'll admit I had to skip to the end of several chapters, because Ken tended to get carried away a bit. Overall it was a decent book, near the end there's also quite nice list of more books to read.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews