The Neatest Little Guide to Stock Market Investing: Fifth Edition

This book is for anyone who wants to know how the stock market works. This book is for anyone who wants to know what influences the stock market. This book is for anyone who wants to make money on the stock market. There is a reason this is the fifth addition of this book, because it work, and because the author wants to keep his readers informed and up to date on the ever changing environment of the stock market. This book begins by spending time making sure the reader understands all of the terms that the author will use throughout the rest of the book. After that he begins to enlighten the reader about general information on the stock market and then starts going in depth more about how the stock market works and how many people have made a fortune through the stock market and how they have also lost a fortune on the stock market. He finishes the book my giving the reader a step by step guide to evaluating any company on the stock market, a key skill to learn when investing with a company. I couldn't put this book down. I was a beginner, not really knowing anything about the stock market when I first decided to read this book, but I quickly became obsessed. I was craving for more and more information on not only how the stock market works, but how to make money using the stock market. This is a very easy read, the words and terms can be challenging, but the book is setup in such a way that the author gradually introduces you to information that you will need to understand for the next chapter. I highly recommend this book for anyone who has any interest in the stock market, or making money in the stock market. The authors ability to prepare the reader for each sequential chapter, by introducing a topic, and then diving deeper in the next chapter makes a daunting topic like the stock market very manageable. If you have any interest in the stock market and are a beginner, then this book is for you!

I first bought the 2007 edition of this book when it was released for Kindle. I never got around to reading it when I bought it. But recently, while researching 529 (college fund accounts), my interest in stock investment grew to a new level and I started reading the 2007 edition of the book that I bought several years ago on my Kindle. For a beginner, who knew absolutely nothing about P/E, EPS or Beta, this book is godsend! The author has written it for the right audience and by the time I finished reading it, I feel that I have a very good understanding of stock investment, how to do the research and how to look at the fundamental and technical analysis. This books does such a great job of covering every topic imaginable that after finishing the 2007 edition of this book, I bought the new 2013 edition and read that too. The new edition covers the housing bubble and gives very good analysis from a stock investment perspective. I learned so much so quickly from this author that I don't think I could have no matter how many articles I had read. In fact I now understand stock investment so well that I have made my own strategies about how I want to invest. To be honest, I do not agree with some of the advice that Kelly has given about leveraging indices. Leveraging can be too risky because the losses are multiplied. Overall, this book is priceless! I highly recommend it to anyone who is venturing into the world of stock investment. If you have to buy only one book that introduces you to stock investment and guides your through the whole process, BUY THIS BOOK! You won't regret it.

This book is a great first read about the stock market. The author presents some basic technical info (P/E, Price/Book, MACD, RSI and others) in a simple and concise way while also providing insight into what the metric means about a company and how it may be manipulated (Earnings, for example). He also provides background from several stock experts and mentions their books should you wish to continue your education. One of the more important features of this book, IMO, is that Jason presents a strategy for how to build a portfolio and how to choose stocks. I think this is something that beginners are really looking for; guidance as to what to look for and how to get started. Knowing some introductory stock metrics does not give you an investing philosophy. Also, Jason posts the quarterly performance of his portfolio (which is based on the methods in the book) on his website. If you are interested in getting in the stock market, I suggest reading this book and then reading books by some of the experts in here (Phil Lynch, Warren Buffet, Ben Graham, etc) and then starting a virtual trading account, which lets you trade real stocks with fake money. OptionsHouse is just one of the online brokers that offers virtual trading. Most of the online brokers also have good educational information for all levels of investors. Read their material while your doing virtual trades and try to pick stocks and learn about options, and then try them out in your virtual account. If you can make money for a few months in virtual trading, then you're probably ready for the real thing. Your virtual account will still be there, so you can buy a few real stocks and play with options in your virtual account until you understand what you're doing.

This book was great. As a beginner investor, I learned a lot about the basics of stock market investing. The author breaks down the information of what you need to know to feel confident. He bases this information on backed up data by O'Shaughnessy's research, other prominent investors, and his experience. The author is very opinionated, which I like because I want to know what the author does personally when he invests. I read one book before I read this and it was highly conservative. It made me never want to put my money into the stock market. Anyways, the author showed several techniques using charts as to when to buy or sell your stocks. Although I got the implication from that section that I will always be buying or selling every month or so, this contradicts keeping stocks long term. Additionally, if I am told correctly, buying and selling short term (less than a year) puts you in a higher tax bracket than if you were to keep the stocks long term (more than a year). The tax % difference of the short and long term capital gain is a big deal to me, which I learned about in the book I read before this, because the government is taking a relatively big chunk out of your potential gain! The author doesn't go into tax discussion, but regardless, if selling short term, you still make money, just less. I hope for future editions the author can discuss his thought process and how to approach taxable gains and/or loss. I didn't really think this was a beginner's book, but I didn't think this was an expert book either. I didn't think it's a beginner's book because it's not a textbook-like book where it gives you a definition of what a certain word means. Instead, it gives you an analogy. I didn't think it was an expert book because, like the author said, he left out all the financial equations. I think reading this book in conjugation with investopedia.com is a good combination to answer your own questions. I also think reading another book for a second opinion is good for understanding the different ways different investors use the terms. This book definitely increased my investing vocabulary AND understanding and confidence significantly. I recommend getting this book.

This book is all about how you start your first step in stock market. The wonderful thing about this book is that it is very easy to read. Probably, you can finish this book within two or three weeks even though you know nothing about the stock market or economy. This book doesn't have any complex investment techniques or accounting principles. However, it still contains everything which you should know as a beginner in the market. This book starts from what the stock is. It also introduces the fundamentals of stock measurement about how to evaluate stock value. The second chapter introduces previous great investors whom you must know if you want to become an investor. Third and fourth chapter briefly shows a few real world stock measurements and how to manage your portfolio. From the fifth chapter, it enters real stock market. The fifth chapter introduces how you buy or sell your stocks. The sixth chapter introduces popular resources to find out the real world stock and economy information. The seventh chapter shows Kelly's investment strategy. I have known Kelly's book and his letters since 2007. I really like his investment style. Especially, I love that he doesn't believe the success of day trading because I don't believe it too. So if you want to become a day trader, this book is not for you. Instead, there are hundreds books out there about chart understanding and techniques. However, if you want to become a real value investor, this book will open a good start.

A must for those interested in the basic mechanics of stock market investing. Kelly's 'Mr.Magazine' examples are a good beginning to understanding the dynamics of a new stock on the stock market as well as why companies choose to go public. He also has an excellent section on the perspectives of stock market 'Masters'! Lynch, Miller, Buffett, etc. From my reading of this book and from other reviews I've read, I can say this is likely the best possible book for beginners interested in learning how to become confident investors. Kelly's prose is concise and kind to readers new to the subject because of ample examples, tips, and repetition. The section on research was a little tedious, and I would have liked some discussion of macroeconomics...but I'm nitpicking. Kelly states in the beginning that this is NOT a book for understanding technical investing. It's too brief and it's geared toward novice investors. Nor is this a book for understanding the more complex aspects of market performance fluctuation, company internal challenges, international price volatility, t-bonds, etc, (in case that isn't clear from the title). This is primarily because the main focus is on communicating stock assessment and performance. If someone is interested in the idea of investing and may someday like to become an active trader, I definitely recommend this book. It's very easy to read, repeats important information, and doesn't lose it's thread. Good read!

A very good, basic, common sense read. It's not meant to be Benjamin Graham's "Intelligent Investor" replacement, but if this is read first, it makes Mr. Graham's tome much clearer. Worth the read.

I was more interested in an analytic approach to portfolio optimization and picked this book up for a quick introductory guide to the market. I found the first 160 pages or so to be very helpful at introducing terms, metrics, & industry standards (although extremely dumbed down at times). The back half is a little repetitive, outlines various resources available (including a never ending advertisement for value line). Overall a good introductory read for the low price but lacking in any real analytic substance though I don't think the book claims to have any. In retrospect I think rereading the front half of the book would have been more valuable than reading the back half.

I bought this book with little knowledge about finance and investing. The book gives us different perspectives of investing. First is a glimpse of the great minds in investor world (e.g. Warren Buffet is one of them without question), on what mindset should we have if we start investing. And then he gives us FACTS, what actually already happened in the stock market, and how we use them for us investing in the future. This book does not give an instant method how to get rich (I wouldn't like it this way), but a method how to find our style in investing, and HOW we should proceed forward. Really recommended for those who want to start learning to invest, and willing to work and do research for it.

Understanding the business behind a stock is crucial to have control on your investments. Jason makes you understand that not getting taken away quickly on the highs and lows of a stock, but rather trying to understand if there's a business reason for it, is detrimental to make money in the long term.

This is a great introduction to the stock market, and is very well written. Kelly manages to avoid using too much jargon, and presents the subject in an engaging and humorous way. He also does a great job of introducing key terms and concepts while still keeping a good grasp on the overall picture. I bought this as my start to learning about stocks, and it definitely served me well. He starts with the very basics and works his way up, so even if you have no prior knowledge you will be able to keep up with a bit of patience. I liked this book so much I actually read it twice to really remember all of the information the author packs into a relatively small space. This book is a great way to introduce yourself to stocks and investing, and provides an excellent jump-off point for delving into more specific areas of the subject.

È proprio quello che cercavo, scritto bene, semplice ma esaustivo. Credo sia un ottimo punto di partenza per chi voglia addentrarsi nel mondo della "borsa".

This book explains in clear terms, without a wasted word, a strategy for embarking on the stock market and should be compulsory reading for anyone who wants to learn the basics - and much more - of investing. It is also interesting and sometimes humorous, highly recommended.