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Full of Bull (Updated Edition): Unscramble Wall Street Doubletalk to Protect and Build Your Portfolio
 
 
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Full of Bull (Updated Edition): Unscramble Wall Street Doubletalk to Protect and Build Your Portfolio [Paperback]

Stephen T. McClellan (Author)
3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)

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Book Description

013702312X 978-0137023127 June 29, 2009 1

“Only Stephen McClellan could have written this book. As a senior statesman of industry analysts, Steve has worked in the inner circles of Wall Street for over thirty years. When Steve talks, everyone in the industry listens. This book is like a college extension course for investors, and it’s taught by the Dean.”

–H. Ross Perot, Sr., Founder, Electronic Data Systems, Founder, Former Chairman, Perot Systems

 

“Steve McClellan has drawn on an insider’s lifetime view of how Wall Street really works to produce a practical and entertaining book of advice for investors. Whether you are a new or experienced investor you’ll get something valuable out of it, including more than a few chuckles.”

–Charles O. Rossotti, Former Commissioner, Internal Revenue Service

 

“Steve McClellan’s Full of Bull provides a long overdue insight into the confusing maze of Wall Street analysis and stock recommendations. This book exposes The Street’s ‘insider code’ and provides both a cautionary tale and an indispensable guide into the Byzantine world of investment analysis.”

–Thomas M. Siebel, Founder, Siebel Systems, Chairman, First Virtual Group

 

“Steve McClellan is one of the smartest guys in the investment industry. For years his research helped investors figure out how to get better returns. Now he’s collected a career’s worth of observations and conclusions about how Wall Street works and how to avoid the mistakes that cost ordinary people millions–no, billions–of dollars everyday. Read this book and have more money for your retirement.’’

–Doron Levin, Columnist, Bloomberg News

 

“Today the typical share is held much less than a year, usually by an institution, speculator, or insider whose gains are at the expense of the under-informed or misinformed individual investor. Securities analysts are of little help. With his 30+ years of relevant experience, Steve McClellan tells you why and how to better protect yourself if you’re an individual investor.”

–Josh W. Weston, Former Chairman, Automatic Data Processing

 

Discover the truth about stock analysts’ research.

 

The  Truth  About  Wall  Street  Stock  Research–Now  100%  Updated  for  Today’s  Markets!

 

They mislead. They confuse. You can’t afford to listen to one word stock analysts say–especially not right now. Wall Street won’t tell you how to protect your capital or steer you toward gains. The Street is good at selling, not analyzing; it wants you to trade, not invest. In Full of Bull, one of the Street’s leading insiders reveals the hidden code behind Wall Street’s Byzantine practices.

 

For decades, Stephen McClellan was one of the Street’s top analysts–he knows exactly how the game is played. Now, in this revised guide for the individual investor, he describes how Wall Street came to cost investors billions by denying the realities of a market collapse in progress. He explains how a congenitally favorable bias led brokerages to keep recommending stocks, such as AIG and Fannie Mae, up until the moment of their ultimate demise.

 

In Full of Bull, you’ll learn how to look for analysts’ favoritism and blind spots; how to react appropriately to upgrades, downgrades, and price targets; and how to recognize what company announcements really mean. Drawing on his immense body of experience analyzing top companies, McClellan shows you how to systematically evaluate a company’s prospects and choose investments based on principles that work. This is exactly the kind of objective, focused guidance you won’t be getting from your broker!

 

 

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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Stephen T. McClellan was a Wall Street investment analyst for 32 years, covering high-tech stocks as a supervisory analyst. He was a First Vice President at Merrill Lynch for 18 years until 2003, and ranked on the annual Institutional Investor All-America Research Team 19 consecutive times, The Wall Street Journal poll for 7 years, and has a place in the Journal’s Hall of Fame. From 1977 to 1985, he was a Vice President at Salomon Brothers and before that held a similar position at Spencer Trask for 6 years. Before commencing his Wall Street career, he was an industry analyst with the U.S. Department of Commerce. From 1964 to 1967, the author served as an operations officer aboard the USS Suffolk County (LST-1173) in the U.S. Navy.

    Mr. McClellan has a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation, is a member of the New York CFA Society and the CFA Institute, was President of the New York Computer Industry Analyst Group, and was President and Founder of the Software/Services Analyst Group. He has made television appearances on Bloomberg TV, FoxBusiness News, CBS, CNN MoneyLine, CNBC, and Wall Street Week. He has conducted several radio interviews on such programs as Bob Brinker’s Moneytalk and given presentations to numerous organizations, at conferences, and to companies. Mr. McClellan has published articles in the Financial Times, The New York Times, Forbes, and other publications. His MBA in Finance is from George Washington University and his BA is from Syracuse University.

    The author’s speaker’s bureau is Leading Authorities, Inc., in Washington, DC. His website is www.stephentmcclellan.com.

 


Product Details

  • Paperback: 256 pages
  • Publisher: FT Press; 1 edition (June 29, 2009)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 013702312X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0137023127
  • Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.7 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #476,565 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

43 Reviews
5 star:
 (13)
4 star:
 (15)
3 star:
 (11)
2 star:
 (4)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.9 out of 5 stars (43 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Medicore and out of date... Sensationalized, September 16, 2009
By 
GW (United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   
This review is from: Full of Bull (Updated Edition): Unscramble Wall Street Doubletalk to Protect and Build Your Portfolio (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
Although this is the revised edition, McClellan seems like he is in the wrong decade on much of his advice and ends up sensationalizing his underlying premise. Now I would agree, he is largely correct in his read of security analyst's and the institution environment... but he draws it out over far too many pages. Really this message would be better served in a 10 page article and not a book.

I believe that a lot of the elements that made it into this updated edition end up up going beyond his comfort zone. I think a lot of readers will get bored. I think would be better served by other authors who take a more straightforward approach. A lot of the key points and takeaways are reiterated in these reviews... You loose out on some uninspiring stories half of which were from the times when he was on the other side of the fence.

Also, as another reviewer pointed out some of his suggestions and comments are completely ridiculous: like avoiding NASDAQ stocks. This is like saying you should avoid TV's from non-American companies - outdated and biased.
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8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Only an analyst could write this..., August 28, 2009
This review is from: Full of Bull (Updated Edition): Unscramble Wall Street Doubletalk to Protect and Build Your Portfolio (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
I'm a portfolio manager for a hedge fund, so I have some experience with analysts and a lot of aspects of Wall Street that McClellan outlines in the book.

First, the positives. The part about analysts is absolutely right. Analysts and investment banks are not there to cater to individuals -- they are there to provide support to commission-generating clients, who are large institutions and hedge funds. These funds pay quite a bit for the research, either through commissions or direct payments. Individuals don't pay anything... so individual investors get what they pay for. If you stop and think about it, this shouldn't be a surprise. My experience with analysts is always this: they know everything about the companies they cover, but they have little to no ability to draw good conclusions from that information. I don't know of a single major financial institution that allows an analyst to trade based on his or her analysis. There's a reason for it.

And now the negatives.

The inability to draw sound conclusions shows up in the rest of the book. McClellan shouldn't be giving investment advice -- it is atrocious. Most of the time it is contradictory and uninformed, sometimes he is just reckless. He claims you should invest in themes that will be big -- for example, 2 years ago, commodities were great. Or 25 years ago, computers were just becoming a big deal. But who knew at the time?? These themes are obvious in hindsight, but I challenge anyone to identify that theme today. Social networking (which you can't even buy)? Solar power? Nanotechnology? Genome sciences? Broadband infrastructure? Something completely different?

He claims buy small companies with large revenue growth. However, they should also be listed on the NYSE, not the NASDAQ, which many might find at odds with the "small company" part. Other tips of his: don't invest in mutual funds or internationally. Avoid tech. Don't diversify.

So out of all this, buy small NYSE-listed companies with double digit revenue growth, highly profitable, and trade at low multiples in industries that are going to be hot, but just haven't been identified by the general public. There are so many problems with this, I don't even know where to start. It's equivalent to him saying, "Put most of your money in the 7 companies you think will be the next MSFT. By the way, you should have invested in MSFT 25 years ago when it had its IPO... except you'd be breaking my investing rules by buying NASDAQ stocks, tech stocks and IPOs."

But especially dangerous is his advice for investors in down markets -- if stocks are about to go down a lot, just sell and wait until things go up again. And don't buy if the markets are going even lower. And how exactly are you supposed to know if markets are headed higher or lower? McClellan conveniently keeps that "Wall Street secret" to himself. Oh, and another tip from McClellan: Be calm about your trading and ride out all of the ups and downs in the market -- don't sell if your stocks go down.

Huh?


He claims to be a value investor a la Buffett, but this is certainly not the case. Even Buffett points out that nearly everyone should just invest their money in an index fund and not think about it; be happy with average, at least you're not getting killed by Wall Street and hedge funds. McClellan wants you to believe that everyone can have above average returns. Don't believe a word of it -- it's the same garbage every other Wall Street house and snake oil salesman wants you to believe to get commissions, subscriptions, and royalties out of you.

Key takeaways: Analysts are not helpful for the individual investor. Ignore their "price targets" and their stock rating -- they won't help you. But after the last 10 years of insanity in the markets, what investor doesn't at least suspect this?

I don't recommend this book. There are so many better books out there about investing that lead to these same conclusions about analysts. Burton Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street does this with a more rational approach to investing, so stick with the classics.
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3.0 out of 5 stars Meh. Harmless read so long as you don't follow the investment advice, July 28, 2011
By 
Jared Castle (Roseburg, Oregon United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Full of Bull (Updated Edition): Unscramble Wall Street Doubletalk to Protect and Build Your Portfolio (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
The book's value is directly proportional to your investing experience. Beginners will get a basic overview of the players, tools and events that influence stock prices. The glossary and index alone are worth a quick study. So long as the beginners don't take the investment advice to heart, no harm is done.

Experienced investors will no doubt reel from the contradictory investment advice and wish-upon-a-star keys to avoiding down markets (there's so many tips you can't possibly follow them all without undoing one or more tips).

My three-star rating reflects my ambivalence with the book; I can't recommend this book when there are better investment books available. However, there isn't much harm in reading Stephen McClellan's reflections from a 32-year career. It would have been better to stick with a memoir than to mix it up with incongruous investment advice.

Rating: Three stars
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