Introduction to the Millennium Edition This book was written to offer encouragement and basic information to the individual investor. Who knew it would go through thirty printings and sell more than one million copies? As this latest edition appears eleven years beyond the first, I''m convinced that the same principles that helped me perform well at the Fidelity Magellan Fund still apply to investing in stocks today. It''s been a remarkable stretch since One Up on Wall Street hit the bookstores in 1989. I left Magellan in May, 1990, and pundits said it was a brilliant move. They congratulated me for getting out at the right time -- just before the collapse of the great bull market. For the moment, the pessimists looked smart. The country''s major banks flirted with insolvency, and a few went belly up. By early fall, war was brewing in Iraq. Stocks suffered one of their worst declines in recent memory. But then the war was won, the banking system survived, and stocks rebounded. Some rebound! The Dow is up more than fourfold since October, 1990, from the 2,400 level to 11,000 and beyond -- the best decade for stocks in the twentieth century. Nearly 50 percent of U.S. households own stocks or mutual funds, up from 32 percent in 1989. The market at large has created $25 trillion in new wealth, which is on display in every city and town. If this keeps up, somebody will write a book called The Billionaire Next Door. More than $4 trillion of that new wealth is invested in mutual fun
Contents
Introduction to the Millennium Edition
PROLOGUE: A Note from Ireland
INTRODUCTION: The Advantages of Dumb Money
PART I Preparing to Invest
1 The Making of a Stockpicker
2 The Wall Street Oxymorons
3 Is This Gambling, or What?
4 Passing the Mirror Test
5 Is This a Good Market? Please Don''t Ask
PART II Picking Winners
6 Stalking the Tenbagger
7 I''ve Got It, I''ve Got It -- What Is It?
8 The Perfect Stock, What a Deal!
9 Stocks I''d Avoid
10 Earnings, Earnings, Earnings
11 The Two-Minute Drill
12 Getting the Facts
13 Some Famous Numbers
14 Rechecking the Story
15 The Final Checklist
PART III The Long-term View
16 Designing a Portfolio
17 The Best Time to Buy and Sell
18 The Twelve Silliest (and Most Dangerous) Things People Say
About Stock Prices
19 Options, Futures, and Shorts
20 50,000 Frenchmen Can Be Wrong
EPILOGUE: Caught with My Pants Up
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
INDEX