Wise Up!

This book will make better investors of people who have a lot, a little or absolutely no experience in the stock market, but want to use their intelligence, common sense, and knowledge and curiosity about the world to make better and more profitable investment decisions. There is no simple formula for successful investing. Successful investing is part common sense, hard work, knowledge, and art form. Hopefully what follows will impart some of these qualities to those who read it.

Although I am a professional investor, I wrote this book in an easy to understand style. As my college professors can attest, I was a poor student of finance and accounting-I found the subjects extremely boring. Once in the working world, though, I discovered that finance was exciting and dynamic. However, having been through the drudgery of textbook and classroom learning, I wanted to write a book for others that would make finance and investing easy to understand, interesting, useful, and relevant.

This book will primarily address the skills and knowledge needed to successfully invest in publicly traded stocks, but some of the topics discussed will also aid the reader in evaluating investments in other asset types, such as real estate, private businesses, and fixed income instruments, such as bonds.