24 Essential Lessons for Investment Success: Learn the Most Important Investment Techniques from the Founder of Investor's Business Daily (Paperback)

~ (Author) "Loeb was a highly successful investor and preached cutting all your losses short..." (more)
Key Phrases: Bill O'Neil, Relative Price Strength Rating, Cisco Systems (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In 24 Essential Lessons for Investment Success, the founder of Investor's Business Daily and author of How to Make Money in Stocks, William O'Neil, distills his 40 years of experience, study, and analysis of the market into a series of lessons about how to buy and sell stocks. O'Neil is neither a pure fundamentalist nor a technician--instead, he advocates blending both approaches, applying fundamental analysis to identifying the best companies and technical analysis to understanding the price actions of those stocks. The lessons cover everything from protecting your investment account (always cut your losses at 8 percent of the purchase price) and basic chart reading (identifying market tops and bottoms) to understanding relative price strength and tips on building a concentrated portfolio. While not absolutely necessary, it helps to have a copy of Investor's Business Daily handy: these lessons were drawn from a series that O'Neil wrote, which frequently mention features unique to that newspaper. 24 Essential Lessons for Investment Success is a easy-to-read, commonsense guide to stock picking that both novices and seasoned investors should find extremely useful. --Harry C. Edwards

Product Description

Provides proven, easy-to-apply techniques for building a profitable portfolio. Cuts through the static of conventional wisdom with a refreshing array of common-sense strategies that help you accurately gauge the market, buy and sell at the right moment, and successfully manage your portfolio. Softcover.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 176 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (December 13, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071357548
• ISBN-13: 978-0071357548
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (77 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #69,858 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

60 of 62 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Further Directions on How to Make Money in Stocks Using IBD, June 22, 2000

By	Professor Donald Mitchell "Jesus Makes Me a P... (Boston) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)

This book is an elaboration on the investment techniques in Mr. O'Neil's prior book, How to Make Money in Stocks. The elaboration focuses on additional insights into avoiding losses and using technical analysis (examining stock price and volume charts) to pick optimal stocks and times to buy and sell. If you haven't already read How to Make Money in Stocks, this book will lack context. I suggest that you not read this book until you have read that one. If you have read that one, this book will be valuable to you only if you plan to do your own stock picking and wish to use the Momentum Growth Investing model that Mr. O'Neil recommends in that book, and supports in Investors Business Daily. If this book is not yet right for you, based on these qualifications, you need read no further.

If this book fits, then, let me go on to provide some caveats. First, it is often hard to limit your losses in the kinds of stocks recommended by this technique. Following a company warning about earnings, it is not unusual for these stocks to fall 15-40 percent without ever trading at any price in between. So your losses may well be larger than he suggests here.

Second, technical analysis is a field that is filled with ambiguity. Your success in reading charts will not be as good as these examples suggest. Many academic studies fail to find any value in technical analysis.

Third, the kind of stocks that are recommended can perform very poorly if the market goes through a prolonged drop in valuation (as last occurred from 1973-1975). You will be buying stocks that are trading at enormous multiples. You could experience more sustained losses than Mr. O'Neil suggests in such a changed market environment, if it were to recur.

Fourth, few individuals have the discipline to adopt and follow a philosophy like this over a long enough time period to be successful.

Fifth, if you are curious, it doesn't hurt to look. But remember that over most time periods 90 percent of professional investors do not match the market averages. And they have a lot of advantages you don't have. Be sure to also look at John Bogle's, Common Sense About Mutual Funds, to get the other side of the story.

Having heard the caveats, let me say that Mr. O'Neil's advice is basically sound, well articulated, easy to follow, and balanced. It will make good reading for those who want to move toward developing the skills needed to be a self-directed investor in growth stocks being pushed along by earnings and investor momentum.

Good luck with your investments! May they do well regardless of the philosophy you follow!

51 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Practical and Lucid, May 9, 2000

By	Robert Morris (Dallas, Texas) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

O'Neil has attracted a wide and deep following as founder of Investor's Business Daily and as author of a previous best-selling book, How to Make Money in Stocks. In this book, he offers 24 "essential lessons" which he has learned from his extensive prior experience. Each of the "essential lessons" makes sense but I think they have the greatest value only when used together (in combination) as you formulate an investment plan. Once you have your plan and begin to implement it, understand that your work has only begun...not ended. Track earnings and sales, frequently check relative price strength, follow chart patterns, etc. (O'Neil's Lesson 11 explains "How to Read Stock Charts Like a Pro", not occasionally but "frequently" and better yet daily.) No doubt sophisticated investors view this book as "simplistic" and "obvious." For them, it probably is. But for most of the rest of us, this book provides helpful explanations and sound advice. Also, as more people participate in 401 (k) plans and exercise stock options, a book such as this can give them a better understanding of their investments. I also recommend this book as a gift to recent graduates of college and universities. The sooner they understand the vocabulary and the concepts of stock investments, the better.

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Advice from a Great Trader, January 14, 2000

By A Customer

As usual, O'Neil puts out a must-have product for intermediate to neophyte traders. It should also do well as a reference for experienced traders. O'Neil has taught his methods to thousands of traders over the years and made a lot of people very happy.

The advice here isn't anything that hasn't been seen elsewhere, but it hasn't been put together in quite this way before either.

If you aren't quite sure of the success of his methods, go no further than a terrific set of interviews with two of his top disciples. Kevin Marder (another O'Neil-o-phile) formerly of CBS Marketwatch, published the interview at tradingmarkets.com. Its a good read and attests to the potential of O'Neil's strategies.