ISBN0071448209

Want to get started investing the right way, start with the basics and build a foundation. Started investing as of Jan '08, it's now March '08 and I gotta tell you, there's no rush in investing by skimming thru this book. Sit down, relax and educate yourself. It's a good start and it's the right start. I'll keep you all posted on my investment progress. Aloha!

This book is rightly considered the true bible of stock analysis, and is famous also for being how Warren Buffet approaches investing, as Graham was Buffet's own teacher.

The book has extensive chapters dealing with every topic useful to the subject of stocks, from reading financial statements (one of the things that almost all amateurs could probably be better at, including myself), to assessing the company's true value, breakup value, etc. As one writer here already said, this is no easy path to riches, since this is a true discipline that takes a lot of work, but it can be done.

However, late in his life, Graham was interviewed and said that his views had changed, and made a very important statement at the time. He said that for many decades, exhaustive methods of stock analysis had been profitable, but that was no longer the case. One must remember that the goal of his method is often not so much for determining the true value of a stock to be bought as an investment, so much as whether it should be liquidated, and the parts sold off, which are worth more individually than the company itself.

In other words, the parts are worth more than the whole, and his method was a profitable way to assess likely candidates for this process. If I remember right, Graham himself was involved at least once in regard to a certain company as an activist investor who successfully pressured management to accept a buy-out or liquidate the company.

In fact, at the time of the interview, Graham said that "He was no longer a proponent of detailed methods of stock analysis." He said that there had been a time when that was quite profitable, but that times had changed, and he now favored a cash-flow oriented approach. This method has many adherents now, and Standard and Poors, for example, is known today for using a proprietary cash-flow analysis. Basically, the true value of a company, and therefore its stock, is essentially the present discounted value of all future cash flows.

That having been said, I still learned a lot from this book, and it has probably never been equalled as a rigorous text on the skills to do true stock evaluation and value-style investing.

I had to put this book down after skipping pages, sections, chapters, etc due to the academic writing style (way too wordy) and the vague examples/formulas. Like another reviewer I'd suggest that someone take all of the information in this book and boil it down to something easily readable with concrete examples. I've read tons of investing and educational texts and was bored to tears with this one but gave it 3 stars as I think there are some good nuggets buried in it. My most recent investing book was Rule #1 and it seemed like a very simplied version but an easy, understandable read, so maybe I'll wait for the Cliff Notes ;) I'm a trader/investor and don't need one on my shelf to "appear" smart...anyone want to buy my copy of this book?!

This is the a must read for any investors. It is, however, quite difficult for beginners to comprehend, though. At least I didn't understand it quite well until after I took Corporate Finance, Accounting, etc... and studied for my CFA exam.

I'd recommend beginners read Graham's "The Intelligent Investor", which help create a concrete basis of your investment philosophy.

While the fly on this text touts the fact that this edition is photocopied from the original text, the process did not work. The text copy is fuzzy and blurred making it hard to read. This process was not disclosed in the Amazon summaries available for purchase decision which I find troubling. I would not recommend this text.