What do you think?
Rate this book
Wise Investing Made Simple: Larry Swedroe's Tales to Enrich Your Future
Larry Swedroe offers engaging stories to readers as a way of explaining sound investing concepts.
197 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 2007
154 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 3, 2007
This book provides extremely persuasive fables, logic, and evidence that the passive method of stock investing (i.e., buy and hold index funds) is the wisest path. Cited references were credible.
Some highlights:
1) In a study of six NBA seasons, actual point differences of final scores were within a quarter point of Vegas point spreads. And that's just an amateur market.
2) His chapter on confusing after-the-fact outcome with before-the-fact strategy is a classic. (Just because your house didn't burn down, it's still smart to have homeowner's insurance.)
3) His thought experiments are interesting. In one of these, he says, let's say you're the 11th best golfer in the world, competing against the top 10 golfers in the world. To give you a fighting chance, the other 10 go first on a par 4 hole, and report their scores. 8 get bogies and 2 get birdies. You now have a choice to accept par without playing, or to play the hole. What would your choice be? (I think the corresponding lesson in investing is fairly predictable, but the analogy is very persuasive.)
In short, the book is good. Unfortunately, I do have some quibbles. The editing is a little sloppy. The author mentions some of his other titles several times within the text. And finally, maybe because I've read too many books like this, I felt the author belabored some of his points; for example, in the golf analogy above, the full explanation took about four pages, even though I understood his meaning with no explanation.
Still, I think I can honestly say that this book is much more persuasive than Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street and somewhat more persuasive than Jack Bogle's books. So, within this genre, it's a four star book.
Some highlights:
1) In a study of six NBA seasons, actual point differences of final scores were within a quarter point of Vegas point spreads. And that's just an amateur market.
2) His chapter on confusing after-the-fact outcome with before-the-fact strategy is a classic. (Just because your house didn't burn down, it's still smart to have homeowner's insurance.)
3) His thought experiments are interesting. In one of these, he says, let's say you're the 11th best golfer in the world, competing against the top 10 golfers in the world. To give you a fighting chance, the other 10 go first on a par 4 hole, and report their scores. 8 get bogies and 2 get birdies. You now have a choice to accept par without playing, or to play the hole. What would your choice be? (I think the corresponding lesson in investing is fairly predictable, but the analogy is very persuasive.)
In short, the book is good. Unfortunately, I do have some quibbles. The editing is a little sloppy. The author mentions some of his other titles several times within the text. And finally, maybe because I've read too many books like this, I felt the author belabored some of his points; for example, in the golf analogy above, the full explanation took about four pages, even though I understood his meaning with no explanation.
Still, I think I can honestly say that this book is much more persuasive than Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street and somewhat more persuasive than Jack Bogle's books. So, within this genre, it's a four star book.
July 29, 2011
an indirect endorsement of passive investing via a biting critique of active investing. he makes good points. i agree with him that the bulk of equity wealth should be invested "passively"; however, i think he fails to address asset allocation (and reallocation) adequately... and this is an important oversight. on "market timing", i only partially agree with him. when the market is down, it makes sense to drop a few more dollars into the market... and that IS market timing (which, the author claims, you should never attempt to do). i like how the author organized the book into a series of topics, often using stories or pseudo-interviews.
June 18, 2020
A great book to learn fundamental investment principles through everyday relatable stories. I recommend this book for anyone interested in learning about investing.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews