The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets: How to Keep Your Portfolio Up When the Market is Down (Little Books. Big Profits) - Harry Potter 6 Books

Product Description

Written by seasoned Wall Street prognosticator Peter Schiff–author of the bestselling book Crash Proof: How to Profit from the Coming Economic Collapse–The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets reveals how you should protect your assets and invest your money when the American economy is experiencing perilous economic downturns and wealth building is happening elsewhere. Filled with insightful commentary, inventive metaphors, and prescriptive advice, this book shows you how to make money under adverse market conditions by using a conservative, nontraditional investment strategy.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #224 in Books
• Published on: 2008-10-06
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 264 pages

Review
"Certainly a savvy buy in the current climate...timely advice on how to survive the bear's bite." (CEO Middle East, November 2008)

From the Inside Flap

"Peter Schiff is one of the few financial analysts who understands the Federal Reserve's responsibility for the boom-and-bust cycle plaguing the American economy. Anyone wishing to know why the American economy is in trouble should add this book to their reading list."
—Ron Paul, United States Congressman

"Schiff was warning us about our fragile economic foundation long before the first cracks started to appear. There are plenty of market cheerleaders out there, but if you want advice from a market realist who has been proven right again and again, read this book."
—Glenn Beck, host, The Glenn Beck Program

"Peter Schiff understands the big financial picture better than most Wall Street professionals. Investors—with or without experience—will benefit from his insights, making this book a must-read."
—Jim Rogers, international investor and author of A Gift to My Children

From the Back Cover

In the wake of declining stock prices, the bursting of the real estate bubble, and a weakening dollar, the American economy is poised for a prolonged contraction and U.S. stocks will suffer a protracted bear market, so says seasoned Wall Street prognosticator Peter Schiff. Having accurately predicted the current market turmoil in his recent bestseller Crash Proof: How to Profit from the Coming Economic Collapse, the CNBC-dubbed "Doctor Doom" has helped savvy investors protect their portfolios in some very turbulent markets—and now, he'll show you how to do the same.

Written in a straightforward and accessible style, The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets reveals how you should protect your assets and invest your money when the American economy is experiencing perilous economic downturns and wealth building is happening elsewhere. Filled with insightful commentary, inventive metaphors, and pre-scriptive advice, this book shows you how to make money under adverse market conditions by using a conservative, nontraditional investment strategy.

In detailing lessons learned from the 1930s and 1970s—and from the ways people invested when other economies experienced high inflation, collapsed markets, and rising interest rates coupled with declining currencies—The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets shows you how to successfully implement various bull moves so that you can preserve, and even enhance, your wealth within a prosperous or an ailing domestic economy. Strategies include a top-down investment approach; cutting expenses where you can; buying high-yielding equities in resource-rich and rapidly growing foreign markets; and investing in commodities, natural resources, and precious metals. Plus, at the end of each chapter, Schiff provides you with witty and insightful "parting words" that provide core advice for you to use as you work toward growing your wealth in any market environment.

Smart investing will always pay off; the key lies in using the best strategies for the market at hand. For investors who see the writing on the wall, but don't know what to do about it, The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets offers timely insights into how you can protect your portfolio and even profit during these uncertain economic times.

Customer Reviews

The Little Book of Bull Moves in a Bear Market
The book is very distressing. I hope the US is not in such dire economic condition. I am too old to leave the US, so that advice is not going to be possible for me. Book is well written with much information.

Flawed, but worthy
Schiff was among the few who predicted the economic crisis (way before this book was written). Therefore, what he had to say obviously came with some credibility.

In this book (completed in June of 2008), Schiff identified a number of problems with the US economy, most notably that it produces little exportable goods and services, imports and consumes more than it exports and produces, and from the average individual to the federal government the US is living beyond its means. The account deficit, the budget deficit, and the average savings rate are all proof for the notion.

Schiff compares the current economic crisis with the Great Depression, and identifies similarities and differences. His description of the current crisis is based on the premise that the demand destruction is mostly affecting the US, whereas the economic engines (the "BRIC" countries, most notably China) are decoupled from the US economy enough to drive demand for commodities even higher. Thus, whereas the demand destruction in the US would be a deflationary force, due to the uncoupling, the globalized economy will cause an inflation of prices, which will make goods even less affordable to US customers because of the continued fall of the dollar.

I think that the idea has some merit, at least in the long run. However, since the completion of the manuscript, the market's movements suggest that the decoupling idea is wrong. To be truthful, it might not be wrong, but the internal consumption of China and other countries might take time to compensate for the demand destruction in the US. Whether this is merely a delay, or the decoupling idea is totally wrong, only time will tell, but if one acted on Schiff's notion to invest in foreign markets, his losses have been worse than remaining in US stocks. The S&P500 held up better than the EAFE index, and even more so than the emerging markets.

If the idea of decoupling is wrong (as it looks like), the concern for inflation as the main problem is also wrong because what remains is the global demand destruction. The decreased demand is due to the shrinking amount of credit - Schiff also pointed out in this book that international investors will decrease their willingness to invest in US and to buy its Treasuries. All these factors, and the ongoing "deleveraging" (writing off losses, decreasing the debt levels by paying off more than the amount of new borrowing) point to deflation. Needless to say, investment strategies in deflation are different from those in inflation, and that's where the most important flaw in Schiff's book is.

In addition to investing in foreign stocks, betting against the dollar, Schiff also recommends investing in gold. In a deflationary phase, this is a bad idea. In contrast, the holding physical cash (something that Schiff implicitly frowns on) is a good one. However, I still believe that Schiff's idea of holding gold in the portfolio is worth considering. For one, fiat money is bound to lose value in the long run. In addition, gold would be a good hedge in case the deflation were to be be successfully fought by the Feds (i.e., the efforts of "reflation" succeeded). Gold's advantages also include liquidity. Schiff makes concrete recommendations how to own gold, and some appear to be very sound, offering protection against a potential resurfacing of Roosevelt-era gold confiscation laws.

There is a specific recommendation that I have found suspicious: Investing in gold mining stocks. Schiff stated in this book that gold mining stocks shined during the stock market decline of the Great Depression. This statement is at odds with Robert Prechter's book (Conquer The Crash; Wiley, 2002), according to which gold mining stocks were down. I have no reliable source to verify either claim, but one of them is wrong. (My bias is that Schiff is wrong.)

Schiff's solution to the crisis involves buying gold and buying high dividend foreign stocks on foreign exchanges. For both, one needs the service of a specialized brokerage firm. Conveniently, Schiff's firm is providing these "must have" services... Whether this apparent conflict of interest is undermining your confidence in Schiff's recommendations is up to you.

There were some surprising recommendations in this book to survive the coming calamity. Schiff recommended stockpiling food and other necessities, some of which can be used for bartering. I am sure that Schiff forgot his years in a two-bedroom rental apartment (if he ever lived in one). Where is the storage space? And if one lives in a 4-bedroom family home that has ample storage space, the person may not need to barter. If he needs bartering, the foreclosure of the home is imminent. It is also highly unlikely that the person who invested in gold through the Perth Mint (as per Schiff's recommendation; minimum initial investment of US$10,000) will need to barter a couple of cartons of cigarettes or canned soup... In deflation, these investments will lose value. In addition, they are illiquid. The idea of stockpiling food and water is good for only one thing: To prepare for disasters, either natural (such as a tornado) or man-made (e.g., a terrorist attack).

Some of Schiff's policy recommendations are politically loaded. He would like to avoid social unrest in the US, but the very policies that he recommends would probably bring about the unrest that he fears. Schiff might not like to spend on food stamps, but he seems to forget that a full stomach is the best antidote against revolution and rioting.

Altogether, the book is more flawed than correct. I would rather recommend Prechter's Conquer The Crash, and the strategies outlined there. To be sure, once we are at the bottom of the stock market (and it may need to correct from here downward significantly), buying commodities, and using Schiff's notions of foreign investment will make very good sense. The problem with this book is not what it recommends, but when he recommends to act on the ideas. Unfortunately, timing is crucial in investing.

The Little Book . . .
I was very impressed with the author's first book, Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse (Lynn Sonberg Books), but less so with this one. Though there was enough new content that I marked a few pages.

Peter deepens his explanation of economic principles, which were more difficult for non-economy folk to understand. He did, however, put in new material that brought us forward in time from his previous book. He also discussed in more depth both recommendations for the future as well as the "light at the end of the tunnel."

As he recommends, his first book should be read before this one because Crash Proof better presents his rationale.

Worth the time to read--if for no other reason than to see if his new predictions are correct. They are--again.