CFA Institute Blogs
James Owen Weatherall argues that given the proven track record of applying ideas developed in physics to finance, it is time to do it again. His book is about the future of finance and the new set of tools that will facilitate the proper functioning of the world’s economies. Read more
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Gary B. Gorton challenges much of the conventional wisdom regarding financial crises and laments the tendency of mathematics to crowd history out of the study of economics. Read more
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A concise introduction to IPOs for the uninitiated, this book is also an excellent resource for finance professors wishing to supplement investment textbooks that touch only briefly on the IPO process, professionals at the outset of their careers who contemplate moving into IPO investing, and owners of new businesses. Read more
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Robert Hagstrom makes a persuasive case for the study of liberal arts as a means of achieving investment excellence, maintaining that the knowledge conveyed in a liberal arts curriculum opens one’s mind to ideas that may well lead to valuable insights about the financial markets. Read more
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John Coates, senior research fellow in neuroscience and finance at the University of Cambridge, offers a number of fascinating lessons from a booming new field, the biology of risk, revealing how risk taking and stress transform our body chemistry and drive us to irrational exuberance or pessimism. When such chemical surges overwhelm traders and investors, they tend to suffer either euphoric overconfidence or extreme timidity. Read more
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The United States and many other countries are in the infancy of significant demographic changes. Over the next four decades, the retiree demographic will constitute an increasingly large percentage of the population. Read more
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Like powerful tools or drugs, high-frequency trading (HFT) is both extraordinarily valuable and incredibly dangerous. Although HFT greatly reduces average trading costs for investors, it also poses systemic risks to the markets, hurts investors through front running, and decreases investor confidence. Read more
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Adapted from four lectures given by Ben Bernanke in March 2012, this book is a good primer on the workings of the central bank throughout its history, including its role in the recent financial crisis. Read more
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The Graham and Dodd Awards recognize excellence in financial writing and honor Benjamin Graham and David L. Dodd for their enduring contributions to the field of financial analysis. Read more
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Thomas Mayer argues persuasively that Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) could work if the member states would embrace a new EMU architecture. Even though all past monetary unions of sovereign states have failed, Mayer remains hopeful that the EMU can develop a more robust framework and contribute to the historical work of European unification. Read more
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