“He figured the odds. And they still beat him”
This book follows the authors self destructive love affair with WorldCom shares as they fell from grace. And describes some of the lessons he learned along the way. I spent about half the book being annoyed by his incorrect grasp of some of the statistics he was quoting, he later redeemed himself by offering some useful insights into the herd instincts of the market. Especially his explanation of the paradox that either fundamental or technical trading is most effective depending on the other being believed by the majority of members of the market – it was something I’d never quite understood, being very much on the fundamentals end of things myself. I was amused also by his debunking of six sigma management aims as being statistical anomolies rather than actually a viable business plan.
For a book about economics it is reasonably accessible, but a good grounding in mathematics or statistics would be a useful tool to understand what he’s talking about.
Who should read this book? If you’ve got a good understanding of schoolboy mathematics and an interest in how the markets work but not much in the way of knowledge about them you will get a lot from this book.
(this brings me up to date on the pile of books in the ‘read but not reviewed’ state, the intention is to keep this state reasonably empty in the future)