Trade Like a Hedge Fund: 20 Successful Uncorrelated Strategies & Techniques to Winning Profits by James Altucher (2004)

Mr. Altucher is a hedge fund manager and a protege of Jim Cramer of TheStreet.com "fame", and this unfortunately shows in this book. Of the promised 20 strategies, only 18 are really supplied, as the last two chapters give some generic advice on "what does not work" and what other books to read. As Mr. Altucher explains, he is offering these strategies, because he happens to like to write. Studying closely, there are some other patterns are also discernable, including the fact that several of the strategies touted show losses (or bring in T-Bill like returns) for current years. Basically they made it into the book, because they stopped working. Even for many of the assumed working ones (for these there is no year-to-year breakdown provided, so the possible deterioration cannot be quantified), the number of occurrences during multiple years is so low, that the results probably not to be considered statistically significant. Several of the strategies seem to be curve fitted (this is a very bad word for trading strategies), using specified number of days, percentages, and the like to enter/exit positions. There was one thing to be noted, based on calculations offered, many strategies cannot be mirrored, they how different results comparing long and short executions. Greed and fear apparently exhibit different characteristics. If these strategies are anything close to what hedge funds offer to us, than there is little reason to invest with them. To be read strictly as entertainment (if any ...)

Robert Ludlum's The Arctic Event (2007)

Starting out somewhat confusing, the plot unfolds nicely. Predictably, good Americans, bad Russians, coverup of cold war remnants, and of course at the end, the good guys come out on top, saving the world again. Good listening, except the presence of too many adjectives at certain places, making some sentences as from a school writing assignment. One also wonders, who will be the next bad boys for similar books in the future ...

Library ISBN search from browser

Book Burro
Greasemonkey Peninsula Library System Lookup (can be modified to look at other library ISBN searches)

The Billion Dollar Sure Thing by Paul E. Erdman (1973)

While slow flowing at times, this is still a good read. The information on the planned devaluation of the dollar is stolen (and just simply deducted by some quick minds), and memorable characters of international finance get into the action, including sleazy Swiss bankers, a US hedge fund manager, the Arab/Lebanese money changer and Russian foreign exchange bankers. The author, as the founder of a Swiss bank, is able to put real life perspective into the imaginary events.

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner (2005)

The "economist with no unifying theme" explores various real life situations with the perspective of incentives triggering these said behaviors. If nothing else, the incentives discussed at work, unify the the discussions around the membership structure and finances of a crack gang, the relationship between Roe vs. Wade and the decreasing US crime at the end of the 1990s, cheating teachers and test scores, cheating in professional sports (like sumo) and child names selected (and they pretend to mean to parents).