Content summary:
The subtitle of this book is How I Beat the Professionals in Investing (by Reading Tabloids, Shopping at the Mall, Connecting on Facebook) and How You Can Too. This is a good summary of what this book is about.
The author, Chris Camillo, is described as one of the most successful amateur investors in the world. His claim is that from September 2007 until the book was released in April 2010, his self-managed investment portfolio rose from $83,752 to $2,388,311. The schedule for this performance is available on his website, chriscamillo.com.
Camillo’s method is to be very observant of hot trends and products as observed in malls, in online media, what he sees on TV and in popular publications. The idea is that demand for a particular product or service can rise exponentially for reasons that Wall Street often doesn’t realize and that if you buy the stock of the company in question before Wall Street is trend wise and sell as soon as Wall Street sees the trend you can make some serious gains. . In the book, Camilo explains in some detail how he did this to grow his portfolio impressively.
It tells us that traditional Wall Street types, who are mostly white, male, and middle-aged, are not connected to the popular trends that drive these types of market demand. They rely on corporate reports and mainstream financial news reports and neither report these trends until they become old news.
He gives examples including notes about a hot new pair of shoes he saw on the beach before he became known in financial circles and a brand of clothing worn by the first Obama family to the inauguration that sparked a buying spree that sent stock prices skyrocketing.
Camillo gives some attention to traditional fundamental and technical trading methods and tells how and why they are unreliable. He then discusses how watching this popular trend works best. His method requires a lot of observation, internet browsing, and some form of due diligence to ensure that the trend he suspects he’s seeing is real and that the stock market isn’t yet aware of it on Wall Street. Then he dives in and buys that stock and waits for it to peak when it becomes public knowledge.
The appeal of Camillo’s approach is that it doesn’t require any specialized knowledge of stocks, the market as a whole, the technical stomping techniques or fundamental analysis to run the company made famous by Warren Buffet. This method can be done by anyone who is committed, disciplined, and willing to do the required leg work. A high school student can and has done it.
As with any method of making money, this method requires significant time and effort. This isn’t really a get-rich-quick scheme, though Camillo has shown some great performances in his trading with it. It’s not about day trading either, he waits until he gets to know a real potential money maker, buys stocks and holds them until they take off and market demand ends the uptrend, then he sells before it goes down again once everyone else knows about it.
It should also be noted that the author is a professional market researcher by trade, which is what he does for a living, and in that he watches market trends for a living he starts with some advantages over a novice.
Obviously, this method is not for everyone. It takes time, commitment to methodology, and some awareness and understanding of market trends for a particular product or service that are not yet known. However, it seems to offer a very unique and easy way to beat the odds of the market for someone willing to do the work the way it demonstrates. For anyone with the time and inclination to learn this method, there is clearly potential to beat the index fund averages.
This book is a must-read for anyone looking for an accessible and relatively simple way to capture market gains.
benefit:
For the person who has some money to invest and the time and self-discipline to apply this method, this book is an excellent primer on a new and promising method for maximizing gains from stock investments.
Disclaimer: All investment methods carry some risks including these. This review should not be relied upon as professional investment or financial advice. See a professional financial advisor for professional advice.
Readability/writing quality:
The book is easy to read and easy to follow. It is very well organized.
Notes on the author:
Chris Camillo is a market researcher who was not a fan of traditional stock trading methods and used his own power of observation to beat the averages in the market.
Three great ideas you can use:
1. If traditional market analysis isn’t for you and you don’t want to leave the management of your investment portfolio to a professional manager, there is a method anyone can use to identify promising stocks before they take off.
2. This method requires continuous time observing and learning about emerging products, services, and market trends that one can notice at the local mall, on Facebook, and many other places. Then it takes some due diligence to make sure you’ve noticed a real large-scale trend that will increase the value of the stock.
3. If you follow a proven method and do your homework diligently, you can improve your odds with stocks. You must read the book though to know the details of how to do it.
Publication information:
Laughing on Wall Street by Chris Camillo
Copyright 2011 Chris Camilo. Published by St. Martin’s Press