Find the Right Mutual Fund: Morningstar Mutual Fund Investing Workbook, Level 1 [Paperback]

Christine Benz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 29, 2004

The Morningstar Investment Coach: Finding the Right Funds allows readers to take their first steps in the world of mutual funds with confidence. Filled with informative topics such as how to purchase a fund and how to find a fund's total return, as well as important fund documents, this guide has been designed to give readers a solid mutual fund investing foundation.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

3 Easy Steps to  Fearless Investing

Morningstar^® Fearless Investing Series helps you overcome your fear of making investment mistakes. Workbooks in the series help you build skills progressively at you own pace. Look for other titles in the Fearless series covering funds, stocks, bonds, and portfolios.

Morningstar^® has been helping investors make better investing decisions for more than 20 years with independent information and analysis. Morningstar people are passionate about helping you invest successfully.

About the Author

Christine Benz is editor of the Fearless Investing Mutual Fund Series. She is also the editor of Morningstar^® Mutual Funds^TM, the gold standard in fund reports. She coauthored the Morningstar Guide to Mutual Funds: 5-Star Strategies for Success (Wiley).

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 2 edition (December 29, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471711853
• ISBN-13: 978-0471711858
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #498,012 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Christine is Morningstar's Director of Personal Finance, a position she has held since early 2008. In that capacity, she writes and edits a monthly newsletter, Practical Finance, which advises do-it-yourself investors on every aspect of the financial-planning process. She also writes a weekly column, "Improving Your Finances," on Morningstar.com, and was the creator of Morningstar's "The Short Answer" column, which is geared toward investors just starting out. She is widely quoted in the media, including the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and MarketWatch, and has been a frequent guest on CNBC, PBS' Nightly Business Report, and Fox Business News.

Since joining Morningstar in 1993, Christine has been a central part of Morningstar's effort to deliver quality financial investment information to Morningstar's 6 million-plus clients. As an analyst and editor, she has served as Morningstar's director of mutual fund analysis. Prior to assuming that position, she was editor of Morningstar Mutual Funds and Morningstar FundInvestor. Christine co-authored the company's first book, "The Morningstar® Guide to Mutual Funds: 5-Star Strategies for Success," a national bestseller published by John Wiley & Sons in 2003, and was the lead author of the book's second edition, which was published in 2005. Christine's newest book, "Morningstar's 30-Minute Money Solutions," which provides readers with the necessary guidance in tackling money challenges and building a comprehensive financial plan in easy-to-manage increments, is set to be released by John Wiley & Sons in January 2010.

Christine holds a bachelor's degree in political science and Russian/East European studies from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She lives in the Chicago suburbs with her husband, Greg. She is an avid cook, a political junkie, and a long-suffering Chicago Cubs fan.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Check under the hood of a mutual fund before purchasing it, August 14, 2009

By 

Mariusz Skonieczny "Author" (Schaumburg, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Find the Right Mutual Fund: Morningstar Mutual Fund Investing Workbook, Level 1 (Paperback)

The founder of Morningstar used to work as an analyst for a money management firm. He left the company to start Morningstar to provide research information about mutual funds. Because of this history, the company has a tremendous amount of knowledge on the subject of mutual funds.

This book covers basic information about mutual funds such as net asset values, fund costs, taxes, investment strategies, and the fund's management. When people buy used cars, they usually have their mechanic check under the hood. This book teaches investors how to do just that but with mutual funds.

According to the book, investors should ask themselves these five questions before purchasing a mutual fund:

1. How has it performed?
2. How risky has it been?
3. What does it own?
4. Who runs it?
5. What does it cost?

At the end of each chapter, there is a quiz and worksheet. Since the book is written by Morningstar, it references the company throughout the book. Morningstar offers subscription services to individual investors who can get access to its mutual fund research. At the end of the book, the author provides other recommended readings.

- Mariusz Skonieczny, author of Why Are We So Clueless about the Stock Market? Learn how to invest your money, how to pick stocks, and how to make money in the stock market