Thanks to the ever-changing nature of the economy, beginners and seasoned investment professionals alike have to stay on top of their game and look for the little bit of knowledge that will help them remain one step ahead of the curve. Information is so accessible for veteran successful investors and new individual investors looking to get a start on investment portfolio management. From real estate investing to financial planning, we have the best investing books for beginners and experts. These must-read investment books can provide the perspectives, lessons, and investing advice you need to challenge yourself and grow. So if you’re a new investor looking to dive into mutual funds and hedge funds or a fund manager looking for advice on long-term investment and money management; we have the finance books to help navigate the choppy waters of the financial markets. Here are the 20 best investing books we've found, the perfect financial advisor in audiobook form.
The keywords in this title are common sense—this is not a selection for expert traders for whom the advice may seem elementary. However, for those needing an accessible entry into the investing field that offers a cut-and-dry, well-explained strategy for maximizing long-term savings, The Little Book of Common Sense Investing is largely unmatched. And though its explanations may be to-the-point, L.J. Ganser skillfully maintains an upbeat tone that makes it easy to stay engaged. For listeners looking for practical, no-frills advice, Vanguard Group founder John C. Bogle's famous treatise on index funds and the rest is a great place to start.
Investment is one genre that can be slightly difficult to absorb in longer, traditional formats, so The Art of Investing is such a stellar entry in the canon. Instead of a conventional series of chapters, John M. Longo has assembled over 30 half-hour lectures on different history-making investors, each of which highlights the arc of the person's career and the lessons to be drawn from their trading experiences. Longo's professorial style will resonate with those who thrive in a classroom setting, and the accompanying outline feels delightfully like a syllabus for your favourite economics course.
The Intelligent Investor is a comprehensive primer on a conservative financial strategy called value investing. In other words, this is not an audiobook for thrill-seeking day traders looking to build a meteoric fortune. Benjamin Graham's balanced, well-rounded advice offers an uncomplicated and accessible path to relatively stress-free investing that will pay dividends in the long term. Hall of Fame narrator Luke Daniels brings his background in classical theatre to his performance, keeping the narration dynamic and helping Graham's takeaways resonate with the listener.
If you've been under the belief that seven-figure savings aren't possible, Thomas Stanley and William Danko's The Millionaire Next Door is the audiobook to disabuse you of that mindset. They offer advice on how to join the ranks of the mega-earners that live among us. Narrator Cotter Smith is well-known in the audiobook industry for his work in historical nonfiction. His practised skill in enhancing education to entertainment is displayed as he narrates the authors' unveiling of the wealthy's most well-kept financial secrets. Basing their writings on thorough research and informative interviews, Stanley and Danko drill down quickly to the practical advice at the centre of the mysteries of the rich, teaching listeners how to emulate the behaviours of those millionaires who weren't born into wealth, but achieved it nonetheless.
It makes sense that listeners looking to learn about investment would want to hear from Warren Buffett, the billionaire chairman of Berkshire Hathaway. Voiced by acclaimed narrator Stephen Hoye, The Warren Buffett Way traces Buffett's meteoric rise. But unlike traditional biographers, Robert Hagstrom skips over the biographical details that are less relevant to Buffett's investment career instead of taking the time to discuss the principles and strategies used to build Buffett's empire. An excellent selection for those who learn by example, Hagstrom also interviews a handful of Buffett's most successful followers, tracing how they employed Buffett's tactics to great success.
Suppose Hall of Fame narrator George Guidall's name alone isn't enough to sell you on this selection. In that case, Burton Malkiel's flawlessly researched advice for investing is as high calibre as the narrator who performs it. Malkiel's strategy centres on the random walk hypothesis, which posits that, though various stocks' peaks and valleys may seem extreme, the average pattern of the stock market is no more unpredictable than the steps of a random walk. Backed by ample research, with real examples pulled from history, Malkiel explains how the average person can make solid investment decisions. Based on this theory, this makes an excellent choice for listeners looking for help developing a moderately conservative long-range investment strategy.
Thanks to gender differences in financial education and cultural conversations, women can face unique challenges regarding money, such as anxiety and lack of confidence. With this direct, tactical guide to investing from Clever Girl Finance founder Bola Sokunbi, you can overcome these systemic hurdles and maximize your money-making potential. Read by the author in a clear, motivating style, this short but powerful guide breaks down how investing and the stock market work—and can work for you—while helping you conquer negative thought patterns and learn from real-life tips from wealth experts worldwide.
In the saturated genre of investment wisdom, it's challenging to write something truly unique. Still, Oaktree Capital Management chairman and cofounder Howard Marks manages to do just that by displaying the honest day-to-day thoughts and considerations derived from a long career in investment. Bolstered by the performance of narrator John FitzGibbon, Marks encourages listeners to be contrarian, finding opportunities to think innovatively and being willing to switch tactics to stay ahead of the pack. His takes are as functionally practical as they are off-the-beaten-path, making this an excellent choice for those just starting and long-time investment listeners looking to switch things up.
As its title indicates, this is the later, greater version of Joel Greenblatt's 2005 best-seller The Little Book That Beats the Market. That original work has remained popular throughout the years. Still, its sequel, narrated with crisp confidence by Adam Grupper, makes necessary updates to incorporate over a decade of economic events and the lessons they impart. Not only is Greenblatt's style effortless to understand, but this audiobook is also relatively short by genre standards. In just under four hours, The Little Book makes it possible to get a start on one's investment career in just an afternoon. But don't be fooled: Greenblatt's work's plain language and overall brevity do not make it any less helpful in getting a comprehensive understanding of investment basics.
This fast-paced, fascinating narrative traces the replacement of Wall Street's old guard—the risk-taking, go-big-or-go-home fat cats who dominated the trading floors of the '80s and '90s—with a new, data-driven breed of investment mathematicians called quants. But the quants' arrival on the scene occurs just as the clouds are gathering around the coming subprime lending storm. Mike Chamberlain, the narrative voice behind a swath of nonfiction best-sellers, provides the perfect balance of sharp intelligence and taut thrills for this fascinating tale. Wall Street Journal reporter Scott Patterson expertly illustrates how the quants' most potent asset quickly becomes their Achilles' heel, blinding them to the signs of the coming disaster. Though it's undeniably educational, for those with a genuine enthusiasm for economics, The Quants packs enough fast-paced action and high stakes to certify as a bonafide financial thriller.
This incredibly original work is author Michael Lewis's scathing, skewering explanation of what happened leading up to the stock market crash of 2007. The very fact that this financial nonfiction was converted into a character-driven blockbuster hit in 2015 is an excellent indicator of how refreshingly action-filled The Big Short is. The narrator, Jesse Boggs, performs with enthusiasm and genuine connection to the story as the actors in the film. You may recognize Michael Lewis' name from the similar smash hit Moneyball. The Big Short again demonstrates Lewis's talent for picking apart a complicated mathematical concept and laying it bare so that listeners can follow.
Jordan Belfort's The Wolf of Wall Street provides an accurate snapshot of exactly what life on Wall Street was like before the quants changed the game. Adapted into an Academy Award-nominated film in 2013, Belfort's original story is just as hard-partying and unbelievable thanks, in part, to narrator Eric Meyers, who specializes in action-filled thrillers. The audiobook goes a step further, including all of the nitty-gritty details that the screenwriters left out. The result is an audiobook that's sometimes jarring, shocking, but always engaging.
Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise isn't an investment how-to so much as a predictive guide—but since the basis of successful investing is the ability to make accurate predictions, Silver's insight is worth exploring. Though Silver does not narrate the work himself, reviewers have confessed to mistaking Mike Chamberlain's authentic tone and performance for that of the author since much of the audiobook discusses Silver's forecasts and relates strategies for mimicking his success. One particularly excellent feature of the audiobook, especially for those listeners whose libraries are filled with investment-themed content, is that it's drawn from many non-economic areas of the world like meteorology, climatology, and political elections. But as fascinating as these asides may be, it's never hard to see how Silver's wisdom relates to investment.
This Great Course is taught by Professor Ramon P. DeGennaro, a banking and finance expert whose natural enthusiasm for the topic keeps his explanations effortlessly engaging, even for relative newcomers to the field of investment. Especially for those who find themselves automatically wary of financial planners or market managers, How the Stock Market Works provides enough basis to allow anyone to approach investment feeling reasonably well-educated and empowered to make solid decisions.
Initially published in 1989, One Up on Wall Street remains on virtually every list of top investment resources, and with good reason: its advice holds up. Not only that, but Peter Lynch's angle has remained relatively unique in a genre populated by what can often feel like repetitions of the same essential advice. The subtitle of this audiobook is How to Use What You Already Know to Make Money in the Market. Therein lies its brilliance: rather than assuming the listener wants to become more like a professional investor, Lynch explains how each person's individual experiences can offer them an edge in investment that could even help them out-earn the pros.
Another short yet surprisingly comprehensive entry in the genre, Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits, is the summation of wisdom from one of the most influential men in the field. Philip Fisher's most famous tactic, and perhaps the most inventive, is the scuttlebutt strategy. The investor finds all of the information possible about a company before making any investment decisions. Still not convinced? Warren Buffett himself has championed the strategy and praised its creator publicly on more than one occasion. Held aloft by the impeccable narration of the incomparable George Guidall, this is about as close to flawless as an investment audiobook can be.
Reminiscences of a Stock Operator is a fictionalized account of a stock trader named Jesse Livermore. Livermore is remembered in the industry as one of the first to introduce day trading as a style of investment, and his career was full of the types of high highs and low lows that are characteristic of the day trading lifestyle. Brought to life by Audie-winner Rick Rohan, Lefevre's narrative offers listeners insight into the life of a day trader at the turn of the 20th century. This rare perspective presents plenty of learning opportunities for the investment-minded listener.
While many of the authors on this list are considered influential in the investment space, Ray Dalio has been among TIME's most influential people. As the founder of Bridgewater Associates, Dalio's is perhaps one of the most valuable perspectives on investing in existence. In Principles, he distills his life's worth of learning into actionable lessons that anyone can apply to their portfolio. In his voice, Dalio couches his teachings in stories of his rise and the formation of Bridgewater that keep the story as entertaining as it is educational.
No matter how valuable various guides and narratives may be, there is no replacement for firsthand interviews with those who have been where you hope to go. In Market Wizards, narrator DJ Holte performs the questions and answers posed to investors like Chairman of CAM Capital Bruce Kovner, Tudor Investment Corporation founder Paul Tudor Jones, commodities investor Richard Dennis, and more. Unfortunately, the first recording of this audiobook had poor audio, but the 16 interviews were so valuable that they were re-recorded to save for posterity—and, luckily, they were.
