Fisher Investments MarketMinder Book Reviews

A few weeks back, I decided something important about these book reviews: If a book isn't worth your time then there isn't much point in spending a lot of digital ink excoriating it.

First, credit is due: The authors also wrote America's Bubble Economy: Profit When It Pops, which was published in October 2006—truly prescient. The book says all the other doomsday books about debt are different than theirs; then we read chapter upon chapter about today's debt ills (the differentiator is they say it's not that debt is bad but that people are stupid). Period. We are lectured about how clinical depression will hit an all-time high, as will obesity. Even though we'll have hyperinflation and expanding global population, somehow the price of today's cheap, high-calorie food will remain unaffected—so, of course, people will turn to their refrigerators for respite. 

We are told that others who saw the 2008 downturn coming got it right for the wrong reasons—but this book will get it right for the right reasons and correctly anticipate the anguish of 2010 and beyond. Yet, it's truly rare a book turns out to be wrong so quickly. Aftershock was published in November 2009, about 1.5 months before positive Q3 2009 US GDP growth (+2.2%) was announced, surging productivity prevailed, and second estimate Q4 2009 GDP shot through the roof at 5.9%—not to mention the strong market recovery throughout. 

Above all else, this book isn't so unique as it posits: 

The Ultimate Depression Survival Guide by Martin Weiss

The Return of Depression Economics by Paul Krugman

Fiscal Hangover: How to Profit From The New Global Economy by Keith Fitz-Gerald

When Markets Collide by Mohamed El-Erian 

Is Aftershock really a lone voice in the crowd?  

The huge V-shaped recovery in stocks and the broader economy is just a mini-bounce before the broader fall, right? Believe it or not, I'm glad I picked this book up. If you're going to read an "it's different this time" doomsday missive, it's probably better to go with Mohamed El-Erian's, When Markets Collide.