Finance

On p. 96-104 the author attempts to give spreadsheet formulas to compute stochastics, Welles Wilder RSI, and two other indicators he recommends. The formulas are outright wrong for the Stochastics %K-%D signal. Had someone proofread or even tried to recreate these in Excel, it would be blatantly obvious they are wrong. Upon contacting the author at his email address, he suggested that I pay him to receive the full version of the spreadsheet for several hundred dollars, rather than giving me the correction to the wrong information in his book. Also, on p. 78, the computations of the "safe" strike prices are based on erroneous data. I compared historic data from the time frame he references and it looks like he omitted data from August 1996 and just relabeled all of the rows so that the data from Nov-94 through Aug-96 is actually for Dec-94 through Jul-96. The Mar-97 MAX data appears suspect, being 10.33 rather than 10.25. The Aug-97 data for MAX and MIN appears suspect, being 43.63 and 1.59, rather than 42.72 and 26.50, respectively. It also appears that he is using the wrong standard deviation function to compute sigma. You can't duplicate his numbers in the C2sig13 and P2sig13 columns with the data he provided in the table in Figure 5.1.

His latest newsletter shows that the "safe" strike price for the February 2000 short puts was 720, but if you followed the instructions in his book, you would have sold the Feb 745 puts short and been out 22 points per contract on naked puts, or you would have lost your entire spread when the market dumped from 752.19 to 728.52 on options expiration Friday in February. His system for mitigating losses would not have worked either because when the market broached 745 that day, you would have paid about 6 points to close out a losing spread that you may only have received 1-2 points to open. These spreads he advocates are based on some very fast and loose statistical claims and not very thoroughly explained at all. Very dangerous!

Mr. Schiller has a PhD, but his book does not reflect much quality control went into its composition. There are missing figures, but yet referenced in the text. The book lacks an index. Several words are abbreviated, but there is no apparent explanation for them. I get the feeling this book went from first draft directly to publication. The hefty price is not justified. I am glad I only borrowed it from a library. The one purpose of the book seems to be to promote Excel spreadsheets he has created to track the OEX; and their prices are equally inflated. Why must you, Mr. Schiller, sell them from Spain? Isn't trading the OEX sufficiently profitable by itself?

I found this book valuable in the development of my options trading strategy. I do not follow it to the letter but I think it provides great food for thought. It's not great, it's not perfect, but it's not horrible either for someone looking for ways to trade. Dr. Schiller has answered my e-mails to him every time I had a question. In summary, I believe there are better ways to trade credit spreads but I probably wouldn't be doing it at all were it not for this book.

That's probably not really high praise, but this book just doesn't seem as useful as "The Well Fed Writer" or some of Bob Bly's books on the subject of freelance copywriting.

To her credit, the author is sometimes strikingly blunt and honest, admtting that it will probably take years for most to reach a six figure income (if ever). But she also seems to spend a little too much time patting herself on the back and occassionally becoming to harsh. I don't know, maybe she was going for a brutally honest approach. It does work at times but it also is off putting at other times.

She does offer some ideas that others don't really cover in their books. Still, I would recommend getting "The Well Fed Writer" first and then supplementing the information there with this book. It certainly can't hurt to include it in your arsenal if you are seeking to become a freelance writer.

The title of Flynn's book makes a grand promise - and she delivers. As a person who's made a better than good living as a writer (and info entrepreneur) for the last 15 years, *this* is the one book I'd give to any of my writer friends who aspire to independence and a six figure income. Her material on how to find clients and how to manage them once you find them is priceless. I can't imagine a better introduction to the realities of this potentially lucrative business that is a mystery to so many.

Wow! This book is incredible. Nancy Flynn has given me ideas I never could have imagined. I especially like the "scoop" on setting fees and the "skinny" on creating products to sell again and again. I understand how you can make six figures with The $100,000 Writer.

53 Pages... Go figure. I received a one page mailer from the publisher on this book referring me to Amazon and [another online site]. The mailer is printed in simple black and white text spead across the one page mailer. There is a 112 word description of the contents. I have not read it nor do I intend to. Credit card fraud? What about publishing fraud? [item price] for a 53 page book!

I am a young entrepreneur. I took an introductory business risk management class to better understand the environment, and to avoid or at least minimize possible business problems. I found this book very helpful. The language is simple & clear enough to understand as I didn't have any anti-fraud background. I will definitely keep this as reference. I recommend this book for anybody selling on internet.

This book answers the question, "What is the best way to protect from credit card fraud online?" The author found how swindlers penetrate different anti-fraud systems, both manual and automatic. Then he collected, filtered and studied tons of data on these "penetration methods" and determined the best way to protect from them. While the book is based on very in-depth research, it does not read like a research report. The author has done an excellent job at bridging the gap between first rate research and a mass market audience.

Strengths: The author's writing is very interesting and easy to read. The book is a quick read and many readers will finish it within a weekend. While based on lots of research, the book does not read like a boring textbook. The author's conclusions are delivered simply and concisely.

Weaknesses: Minor but: It may be hard for novice online sellers to fully understand this book.

Who should read this book: All managers, executives, and leaders of any type of organization that accept credit cards online, as well as those others interested in credit card fraud.

Also consider: Nothing. This is the only helpful book on this topic.

This book, rich with wonderful old photos, gives a concise history of the last 100 years of the financial culture that has come to be known as Wall Street. A good blend of text, photos, and charts make this book interesting to the non-financial reader.

The author divided the book into decades and each chapter outlined the changes that occurred over those years.

At the beginning of the last century, Wall Street was known for its lack of financial regulation regarding trades. Scandals and outright swindles abounded. Four years after the Crash of 1929, FDR's administration passed nationwide banking and securities laws to make sure that this kind of disaster did not happen again.

Unfortunately, the real and distasteful inner workings of Wall Street were revealed in the Senate hearings. An SEC commissioner called investment bankers "financial termites". This knowledge scared investors away for the next 20 years.

In the early 50s, investing became popular with middle class investors for the first time in a generation, and mutual funds were developed after being gone for 30 years.

The 60s brought the birth of the modern mergers and acquisitions business in the U.S, and the days of small brokerage firms were coming to an end.

The 70s brought extensive reforms concerning commissions while the 80s were the years of junk bonds, insider trading scandals, and the savings and loan crisis.

The author called the 80s the decade of greed and the 90s the decade of boom. The Internet has brought about a totally new way of trading stocks and has made up-to-the-minute financial news available to everyone.

The changes in the last 100 years on Wall Street have been phenomenal, mirroring the technological changes in our society.

Charles R. Geisst's enjoyable book chronicles Wall Street in the twentieth century. He effectively captures the feel of the various boom and bust periods. The clear, informative text is supplemented with incredible black and white photographs of each period's key events and people, making it very evocative and intriguing. We at ... recommend this book to anyone - not only someone in business - who wants to learn about Wall Street's history. It would make a great gift for anyone who works in the financial industry or for a young person who is interested in how money works.

I enjoyed looking at the pictures and reading the headlines. Very educational and informative.