Customer Reviews

The Fortune Tellers: Inside Wall Street's Game of Money, Media and Manipulation

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

If you want to know a stock to buy tomorrow or which way the market is going, this is not the book for you. But, if you want to know why not to trust analysts, the CNBC talking heads, or almost anyone connected to Wall Street, then this comes close to explaining it all. In my 35 years of investing, I have learned these lessons. It is all to obvious from paying attention to the market in the past few years that most people have not. Before you spend your hard earned money on that next chat room can't lose, you would be well advised to spend the $20 to buy and read this book.

Kurtz spent months in my office and he got the real story of the pressure and the pain.I think the book should be read for its insights into the way Wall Street now works, and I contrast that with the way it worked even a decade ago. It is a whole new ballgame. I wish I looked better. But then again I wish I were better. (Irony police--I am short Amazon)

Reporting on the stock market is like giving a play-by-play report on a Mexican jumping bean. There's almost constant motion, but little of the movement has long-term consequences.

However, stock market reporting has increased the fluctuations into gyrations which make for trading opportunities that Wall Street professionals and on-line traders love. So financial coverage has been good for stock trading, brokerage houses, and those who need momentum up or down.

'Amid the endless noise, whom do you trust?' is the prescient question that Mr. Kurtz asks. Based on his descriptions of the financial journalists involved, their sources, and the checks and balances, the answer for many people will be 'no one' in the financial media.

'. . . a gust of rhetorical wind can buffet your stock like a sailboat in a hurricane.' If you are a long-term investor, this doesn't much matter. If you own index funds or their synthetic equivalents, it matters even less. Mr. Kurtz points out that mutual funds rarely beat the index funds, and that some professionals use them. On the other hand, you are unlikely to hear much about that circumstance on the television financial news reports.

Mr. Kurtz proposes reform, ' . . . it would be a significant improvement if more media outlets resisted the temptation to engage in hype and rumor-mongering in an attempt to stand out from the crowd.' On the other hand he warns that, 'Those who blindly follow them have no one to blame but themselves.'

Now you know the serious, but spare, message of this book. The rest is basically a series of detailed stories about financial media personalities like Jim Cramer, Maria Bartiromo (Money Honey), Mark Haines, Steve Lipin, David Faber, Ron Insana, Lou Dobbs, Alan Abelson, Gene Marcial, and Dan Dorfman. An occasional Wall Street analyst and strategist makes the book, as well.

I found these detailed stories to be fairly uninteresting, over-long, and filled with more trivia than substance. That's why I rated the book down one star. In particular, although I was glad that Jim Cramer was covered in the book, there is entirely too much Jim Cramer. Once you know that he has straddled too many worlds in the past (creating either conflicts of interest or the appearance of such conflicts), there is not too much more to be gained to reading about him.

I know some of the people covered in the book, and found the detail about them to be less than revealing. There is much more that could have been discussed than is contained here. The research for the book seems to have been superficial in many cases, and overly dependent on public stories rather than interviews. I was tempted to mark the book down another star, but did not. Most people new to the world of financial journalism would probably make similar errors.

After you read this book, ask yourself where else you get more information than is really needed for your purposes. Then consider how you could reduce that information flow to make it more relevant, dependable, trustworthy, and valuable. That's the ultimate challenge of the New Economy. Whom can you trust? How little time can you spend to get trustworthy information?

In rating a book, it's important to keep in mind the author's original intent. Complaints that this book is useless as an investment guide don't tell us much except that some readers bought the wrong book. For better or worse this is not an investment book. It's not even a book about Wall St. per se. It's a book about the most prominent segment of the financial media and its ambiguous relationship with the business world it covers, specifically between 1998 & early 2000. A timely and important topic if there ever is one, which can certainly use a hard-hitting piece of journalism. Unfortunately Mr. Kurtz never took his kid gloves off and the entire book is infused with a somewhat quaint, Liz Smith-like quality. Although there were a few tidbits of info scattered here and there. For instance, did you know that the guests on Taking Stocks actually get to pick the stocks they wish to talk about?

Nonetheless, the book is an easy and entertaining read, especially for the biz news junkie who enjoys a tour backstage, even if one doesn't exactly get to step into the dressing room so to speak. There are a good deal of trivia. We learn that CNBC actually stood for Consumer News and Business Channel and in its first incarnation, they actually sent reporters out to squeeze tomatoes at the local produce stand. We learn about David Faber's daily grapple with his personal demon in the form of Steve Lipin - a square-jawed Clark Kent to Faber's Lex Luthor. We learn about Bob Pisani's brief but memorable video appearance opposite a porn star in a pink bikini (the girl was wearing the pink bikini). There was a great deal of ink devoted to Jim Cramer, the pugnacious Wall St "Wild Man" whose manic energy makes me want to suck on a D-size lithium battery just watching him; as well as Money Honey Maria Bartiromo, who evidently works very hard but had been reluctant to challenge her sources in public. As a side note Maria's reporting has been improving steadily much to my gratification, although unfortunately she goes home every night to a comically inept self-admitted pump-n-dumper whose stock... Aw forget it, no fun kicking a guy when he's down. Let's just say the guy has neither the incentive nor the ability to help her fulfill her journalistic potentials and I shudder to imagine what idiocies he spews over her each day.

Wall St analysts do not fare well in this book. Kurtz is probably not familiar with the esoteric world of finance and he did not discuss the analysts in any depth. (His lack of familiarity also leads him to harp on certain trivial issues such as "whispered numbers" etc.) Nonetheless, yesterday's golden boys and girls such as Blodget and Meeker looked downright foolish in retrospect. The media certainly played its part. Take Ralph Acampora. Now, I think technical analysis can be useful in gauging market psychology, but its value is limited and strictly secondary. You'd therefore expect technicians to be relegated 2-to-a-stall in that windowless office possibly converted from a bathroom. But no, they become giant media personalities with thousands hanging onto their every word, most of which turn out to be (very expensively) wrong. And why is it that people who worked so hard at self-promotion are uniformly "bemused" at all the media attention they do wind up getting? I for one promise I will not be "bemused" if I ever become a media star, except perhaps at all the other media stars.

A few heroes do emerge from this book. Mark Haines, the Jabba the Hut-like presence on the set of CNBC's Squawk Box who looks almost cute when angry, turns out to be the closest thing to the conscience of CNBC. And Chris Byron, the caustic and sometimes crude columnist for the Observer, is that rare breed of financial reporter who doesn't care if his sources refuse to return his calls. He finds it more productive to dust off the financials and follow the paper trail. This reluctance to offend is in fact one of the biggest problems in financial journalism. I don't pretend to know the pressures facing a reporter, but I do know that the "pros" on Wall St. have agendas very different than my own and once I've taken a position on a particular stock, I have an agenda very different than those of other individual investors. Heck, if I could get away with it I'd gladly supply every story from my desk. What use is keeping a channel open when nothing but hot air ever comes through the channel?

But I digress. Overall, this is not a book that will surprise the seasoned investor, although it may confirm the suspicions of the novice investor. It may read a bit too much like something out of People, but face it, how many people actually tune in to CNBC just to hear Fred Sears's latest opinion on GE? ("It's a wonderful stock Jack Welch is such a handsome man!" He helfully explains, spitting out dingleberries as he speaks.) I know half of you pervs tune in to ogle Maria and the other half Liz Claman. So bring this book to the beach. But when you want to get serious, read Chris Byron.

As a fam of Spin Cycle I was eagerly anticipating this book, but after reading only half way through I must say this is one of the most boring books I have ever read. The author brings nothing new to the table and he repeats old news stories over and over again to the point of making the reader fall into a deep coma.I don't buy new books to read old news stories. Most of the material is "ancient" in that it took place a few years ago and any respectable investor knows that Wall Street is all about today or tomorrow--not what happened in 1998. He puts CNBC, Jim Cramer and others under such a microscope that it becomes silly. I really don't care when Maria gets a cup of coffee or Jim clicks his mouse to buy a stock. Give us something we care about it and can learn from--not a book based on old news and yellowing newspaper articles.

I've been following the financial arena for about 3 years now. Basically ever since my roommate pointed me in the direction of the Motley Fool. My father has been preaching exactly what this book says. I really have enjoyed this book. Easy to read, very well put together and it's full of fact not some theory or predictions. Just cutting thru the blizzard and getting right to the point. The author does an excellent job. I would recommend this book to anybody who's the least bit interested in finances. Really points out the power the media and individuals have over the direction of a stock and the market regardless of fact. Excellent read.

What was the point of this book? If you are a CNBC junkie, you will like the peek behind the curtains. If you have a life, and happen to be an investor, there is nothing in this book to hold your interest. There is no scandal revealed, no call to action by business or government, nothing useful about the investment world that anyone with a mild interest in the market wouldn't already know. This book is a 309-page People Magazine article.

Definitely not interesting financial journalism ........I've read LOTS of books on financial satire, economics, finance, etc but this was one of the most worthless books I have ever read. At the end of the day, what did I get out of it? Not much was my conclusion.....

The book, as someone else mentioned goes something like this......

* The market goes up. Jim Cramer rants. Maria Bartiromo pouts

* The market goes down. Jim Cramer rants. Maria Bartiromo pouts

Repeat - over and over again

Remember, these folks in the media are talking heads. If the market is going up or down they don't care as they just report what is going on. They are in the business of generating ratings, which pays the bills for the large corporations that own them. They try to deliver breaking news and many do but, at the end of the day they are journalists. It does talk about some of the history behind the financial news industry but, in general, I didn't really learn a lot that I find of value or humorous nature.

I love CNBC......I love REALMONEY.com but this book was lackluster. Most folks don't want to write negative reviews but I won't hesitate to do so when I come across something that people should avoid. It is well written, has a very nice front cover design but, at the end of the day, it is basically the life of Jim Cramer, CNBC folks and other related parties. Modern day hoopla......Its got buzz appeal and that is about it.

If you want to learn something about the characters on Wall Street/society read some stuff by Michael Lewis such as Money Culture of Liars Poker. Or you could read about how great companies are built and run by Jim Collins in his classic Built to Last and new book Good to Great. If you are going to spend the time reading a book get something out of it of some value. This is just drivel.

Mr. Kurtz begins with a valid thesis; that investors today are overwhelmed by an excess of financial information, provided by analysts incapable or unwilling to provide accurate and honest information, channeled by the financial news media and their need for ratings. The difficulty with this book is that, despite the jacket's claim of providing "an indispensable guide" to investors, the work fills 300 pages with meandering, and ultimately irrelevant war tales. The simple fact is that the book is not a guide, but rather, a long winded, thoroughly disorganized narrative of, and I quote from the book, "conversations . . . either witnessed by the author or based on interviews with one or more of the participants." Mr. Kurtz apparently spent 18 months researching this book, only to discover at the end of the period, his research consisted simply of tale after tale. Each chapter within itself is merely short story after short story, with an absolute lack of coherent theme within. The chapters themselves seem to lack any continuity with each other. Mr. Kurtz is, I am certain a fine columnist; but his book reads more like a string of individual columns, wrapped up in the guise of investigative reporting. Fortune and Business Week both have reported upon the thesis of this book, and both, in the space of 10 page articles, have managed far better assessments of Wall Street, financial information, and financial reporting. For those who suffer from insomnia -- this book is your cure to getting back to sleep.

Any one who still thinks Wall Street is a dull and dusty place only has to pick up this book. It reads like a character driven novel, bearing out the truism that truth is often harder to believe than what passes for fiction. Hard to put down and absorbing, the reader comes back to earth with a crash when remembering that what all these "characters" are so glib about is really the billions of dollars Americans have invested in reitrement and their children's educations.