Predicting the Markets: A Professional Autobiography

by Edward Yardeni

In Predicting the Markets, Edward Yardeni, Wall Street’s legendary economist and investment strategist, shares his insights and lessons learned forecasting the economy and financial markets over the past 40 years.

Ed Yardeni takes readers on a fascinating journey retracing the economic and financial ups and downs from the late 1970s through today. Along the way, he mines the lessons of the past for insights that inform how to be thinking about the future.

“Dr. Ed” was among the first Wall Street prognosticators to see the bullish consequences of disinflation and globalization for stocks and bonds during the 1980s and 1990s. He was the first economist on Wall Street to recognize the importance of Baby Boom demographic trends. In 1993, he started writing about the “High-Tech Revolution in the US of @”—presaging the enormous impact that technological advances would have on life today. After China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, he foresaw the resulting commodity boom. Dr. Ed turned bearish on financial services stocks during June 2007 before the financial crisis hit with full force. Although he wasn’t bearish enough on the overall stock market back then, he correctly called the market’s bottom the week after it was hit in March 2009, remaining steadfastly bullish during the nine-year bull run through the start of 2018.

In Predicting the Markets, Dr. Ed explains his reasoning behind all these predictions. He also explores why so many conventional forecasting models have been so frequently wrong. His approach is based on common sense rather than complicated and often misguided theories. He demystifies what can often seem like a complex tangle of countervailing forces impacting financial markets and provides a highly engaging how-to guidebook for profiting from outside-the-box thinking, while avoiding the groupthink of consensus forecasting. Yet Dr. Ed’s book can be read by anyone with an interest in financial markets and economics; no prior knowledge is necessary. All the major issues that investors must sort through as they navigate financial markets are explained in a clear and logical way.

Dr. Ed believes everyone can benefit from a better understanding of the forces that shape our financial lives. Accordingly, Predicting the Markets is chock-full of important lessons not only for institutional investors but also for individual investors, as well as business professionals and students. When it comes to predicting the global economy and financial markets, Dr. Ed has literally written the book.

Genres: Finance, Economics, Business, Biography

612 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2018

Reviews

[Drtaxsacto · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first encountered Edward Yardeni when I first started investing. His charts on demographics and technology influenced a lot of my investment decisions. This book is in part a series of well focused discussions on what influences the economy and at the same time a set of personal reflections. Perhaps as valuable as the commentary is a series of charts for each chapter which reinforce the ideas. Yardeni is often a contrarian but he bounds his conclusions in data. This should be a required textbook for any introductory course on markets - if for no other reason as it is a fun read.

[Tim Kohn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Strong book on renknowned forecaster Ed Yardeni's methods throughout the decades, with robust and specific tools identified. I will likely refer back fairly regularly as the scope of what is covered is considerable and the insight offered is compelling. The glaring weakness of the book, which prevented a 5 star rating, is that all the charts, for brevity, were excluded and had to be referenced online. Even a few charts may improve the value of the text, or at minimum the eBook version should have the charts integrated.

[Bill Pritchard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Are you an economics geek like me? If so - I highly suggest this work from Ed Yardeni. Mr. Yardeni does not leave anything off the table when it comes to explaining the markets or how he arrives at his forecasts. As a geek, I found this to be the best part. Formulas, suggestions of best sources for data, and the lessons learned from using this data were the highlights for me. I have read Mr. Yardeni for years - at times as a client and then more commonly from afar, and his gift of holding narrative stays strong thru this book. My warning is for the layperson... it is not written for you. You will take things from the book no doubt... but there are sections where the detail may overwhelm. Consider yourself warned... but the good is a gift to those of us who are the satellites around the system of the markets. Enjoy.

[Luis Angolotti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like his blog better.
I like Mr. Yardeni's pragmatic approach to investing and forecasting, but there is maybe too much "I told you so" in this book. That said, the tools he mentions for following the markets and the broad economy are very useful.
The most interesting output from Yardeni is his commentary and point of view on current events, which he shares in his blog and which I follow religiously. If you are looking for that, you are not going to get it in this book, which unfortunately suffers from a relatively short shelf-life.
In any case, I see this book as a good way to support what Yardeni offers for free to his blog-readers, so I'm fine with that.

[Alexander Ruchti · Rating 1 out of 5]

"Predicting the Markets" leans heavily into self-aggrandisement, offering less insight than one might hope. The author's narrative isn't as captivating as it intends to be. A read for die-hard enthusiasts, perhaps.

[And · Rating 4 out of 5]

interesting! I want to read it again and make the charts / indicators he describes

[Mosaad M. Gamal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book about the history of macroeconomics till date , to know where we have been and where we are heading, one of the pros of the book is that it's written in an interesting way so you will not get bored reading about macroeconomists and their models, the cons it has alot of repetitive fill ups. However Ed Yardeni has his own way to let the economic principles get immersed in your memory.

[Ethan Lambert · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's good but not the best book about Macro for that I would suggest Applied Financial Macroeconomics.
But he has very fresh perspective on Demography, GDP growth, Productivity & inflation & also his calculation of monetary flows thanks to his bespoke but simple lagging indicator were quite refreshing.