Customer Reviews

New Dimensions in Investor Relations: Competing for Capital in the 21st Century (Frontiers in Finance)

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I was looking for a great reference book that would quickly answer my questions. Unfortunately, this book must be read thoroughly (or at least a chapter at a time). The index could have been much, much more detailed. As it stands, the index is an afterthought, and a very bad one at that. With a better index, this could be a reference book. As it stands, it's still worth the read. I'll still be looking for a better reference guide, though.

A very thorough review of the growing Investor Relations profession. Identifies modern techniques, strategies, resources, and basic SEC disclosure rules used in everything from the pre-IPO to the annual meeting. A great primer for anyone considering a career in Investor Relations.

NIRI (the investor relations professional body) positions it as the bible of IR, so I thought it worth a shot. Not so.

I used to be a PR person. The book started turning me off the minute it said that PR people can't become IR people - that there's no way even a very able PR person can become a competent IR person. Because IR is far too complicated, apparently. In case I missed it first time round, it repeats this theme many times through the book. Probably a dozen, at least, and I am not exaggerating. I get that IR isn't PR, that there are other skills (that's why I bought the book, after all) but I think a blanket statement that PR people are incapable of developing those skills just is pompous and ignorant. What is _particularly_ annoying is that the book spends fully two-thirds of its pages on how to prepare for analyst meetings, how to organize a roadshow, how to put on an analyst day and various other activities. It goes into extraordinary detail on each of these, despite the fact that any competent PR person could do them in their sleep. It also spends tens of pages on messaging and how to position your company - again, another basic PR skill.

There is also a whole chapter (admittedly a relatively short one) pontificating about how the market has changed forever. The book was written in 1999, just before the dotcom crash. Normally I wouldn't hold a failure to predict a crash against people, but plenty of people did predict that one. Including me (although I was in PR at the time, probably drunk on G&Ts - see quote below). The whole dotcom thing was pretty clearly built on sand. And, anyway, it's foolhardy for anyone to claim that any market has "changed forever" with the implication of no further significant change.

Funnily enough, the useful IR content is all in a couple of appendices at the end, and these are reprints of circulars NIRI sent out a few years prior, and haven't been touched by the authors of the book.

In case you think I'm being oversensitive, here's a typical quote: "Unlike the public relations person, however, the investor relations counsel can't subsist on merely an inventive mind, an outgoing personality, and the ability to express an idea on paper." You're so right: PR people shouldn't try and bother their pretty little heads with anything as complicated as what those clever IR people do. Just stick to buying cocktails for journalists. And don't think I didn't notice that they talked about a PR _person_ and an IR _counsel_. They have no clue what PR is, and that makes me wonder about how well they understand those related aspects of IR. Avoid if you're entering IR from a marketing-related discipline.

In general this is a helpful book for those new to the industry. However, I found it alarming that there has been no revision to this book since the internet bubble, 9/11, the corporate financing scandals of the early 00's, and the implementation of Sarbanes-Oxley. I'm curious about whether Bruce Marcus's newer book might be a better reference.

THIS IS THE BIBLE FOR INVESTOR RELATIONS MANAGERS. YOU CAN FIND ANYTHING YOU WANT TO GET THE MOST OF YOUR FIRM VALUE TO PUBLIC. IT IS THE A-Z GUIDE FOR ALL OF US.

I greatly enjoyed reading NDiIR. I feel that Wallace and Marcus clearly know their subject. The book definitely showed the way to run a successful Investor Relations program. I would definitely recommend it to anyone excperienced in Investor Relations or just starting out. Well done Wallace and Marcus!