Investment Team Holiday Reading List

Investment Team Holiday Reading List

Tue 17 Dec 2019

With Christmas Day just around the corner the Investment Team have compiled a business/economics themed reading list for those looking for a quick stocking filler. Below is a book recommendation from each of us, and a few sentences explaining why you should rush out to your local bookshop, or if it is too cold out, add each to your online basket, today, before that dreaded last minute Christmas shopping anxiety kicks in!

• David Baker, Chief Investment Officer; The AI Economy, Roger Bootle

From early man’s rudimentary tools, through the industrial revolution, and the advent of the internet, technology advances over the ages have shaped the way we live and work. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is often spoken about, but’s its practical applications and impact it might have on society remains unclear. In this book, Roger Bootle considers AI from an economists viewpoint, rather than that of an AI evangelist, and attempts to address how it might impact our day to day lives including how we learn, work, and play.

• George Lagarias, Chief Economist; Fooled by Randomness, Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Much of life is virtually random. Yet, man, keen to avoid ambiguity, is always trying to find a pattern. Where there is none, we may yet imagine it. How does this affect our decisions, in investments and life itself? The answer may reside in the field of statistics. Taleb goes on to address how non-normal distributions govern financial markets, and relates these concepts to real world examples such as option selling strategies.

• James Rowlinson, Head of Fund Selection; Golden Hill, Francis Spufford

Although the book revolves around serious topics, the main character ends up in several comic situations due to the limitations of banking in 18th Century New York. The book raises the issue that an asset (in this case a promissory note) is of limited value to the holder if there is not sufficient liquidity when disposing of the asset. Whereas in the book a lack of currency in the entirety of New York is the main issue, it is a reminder that even today illiquid assets (such as property and micro-cap equities) cannot be sold immediately and the values ascribed to them should be treated with caution.

• Prerna Bhalla, Investment Analyst; The Third Pillar , Raghuram Rajan

According to Raghuram Rajan, there are three pillars that run an economy – the state, markets and the community. The focus of this book is the third pillar, which is the community we live in today and what the social and economic consequences are on the community due to globalisation. This book is a good read for someone who wants to understand the need for free markets and independent central banks. Raghuram Rajan is one of the most important economic thinkers of our time; he is ex-governor of India’s central bank, The Reserve Bank of India and was once the chief economist at the IMF.

• Patrick McKenna, Investment Analyst; The Wisdom of Finance: Discovering Humanity in the World of Risk and Return , Mihir A. Desai

Desai’s book on ‘how the humanities can illuminate and improve finance’ is an easy, entertaining and insightful book uncovering the shroud of finance. Desai effortlessly analogises mergers to marriages and questions ‘what if Isaac Newton had worked at Goldman Sachs’. Whilst the discipline of finance has followed the mathematical models of the physical sciences, in this light read Desai explains why financial themes have always been lurking in the shadows of the artistic realm.

• Daniel Gorringe, Investment Analyst; Zero to One, Peter Thiel

In Zero to One, American entrepreneur and investor Peter Thiel explores how competition affects business models and how innovative technologies, whether that be operating systems or search engines, can create value. The book sheds light on the network effect, and helps explain the controversial dominance of technology giants such as Google and Facebook.

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