Customer Reviews
Lives up to the hype - By: dilaudid, 07 Jun 2007 
Most investors seem to have heard of this book - many refer to it as the bible of value investing. I think that the esteem that it is held in is probably counter productive (Barton Biggs, hedge fund manager, talks about being asked to read & annotate it twice as a young man), but what impressed me is that it is a very simple readable book that explains how to invest long term, to maximise wealth.
I don't think that Zweig's commentary adds much - I would pay more for a version with it excised - it provides interesting detail on what Graham may have considered important which is great, but it also provides a lot of anecdotal evidence which could be misleading. It also triples the length & provides a lot of distraction.
Invest in this book, invest in yourself. - By: a reviewer, 25 Sep 2006 With more than one million copies sold & an endorsement on the cover by Warren Buffet, you know there has to be something to this book- & I think I know why. Simply because it is the first book ever to describe the emotional framework & analytical tools necessary for financial success for individual investors.
Probably the single best book on investing written for the lay-public & the stock market bible since its first appearance in 1949, it's a great resource, although it's quite a thick book & filled with detail- & probably not for anybody but the serious stock market investor. And if getting motivated to start investing is your problem, suggest "The Sixty-Second Motivator." Good luck!
Two books: one old and good, one new and bad - By: Petrolhead, 21 Sep 2006 
This edition of The Intelligent Investor is reallly two books in one. There is the original 1973 edition of Ben Graham's classic on "value investing" & then a commentary on each chapter by Jason Zweig.
Graham's text is solid, a little heavy, sometimes a little out of date, & some of his tables a bit user-unfriendly; but no matter: it is the timeless lessons he teaches that matter. He is very methodical, a bit mathematical & -- if you follow him alll the way -- will leave you with a good grounding in how to approach the stock market.
Basicallly his gospel is this: ignore alll the hype & blather around the stockmarket. Invest for the long-term in big, rock-steady, simple businesses, after analysing them with a few financial criteria. But only buy when the market is offering them at a bargain price.
Unfortunately, each of Graham's sober tutorials is followed by a commentary by Zweig. He may claim to be a disciple of the great man, but he is certainly not cut from the same cloth. Zweig is just one more financial markets cheerleader: repetitive, pushy, & rolling out the same old disaster stories from the dot.com era ad nauseam, supposedly to show how wise Graham was (in case you didn't understand Graham's chapter). He also repeatedly cites his own magazine & keeps naming the same fund, which is annoying at the very least. He also resorts to a lot of "if you had bought shares on every third Wednesday since 1974 you would have made a 3,859 percent return!!" kind of hocus-pocus which is a complete waste of time.
Zweig could have used the opportunity to unpick some of the knottier points of Graham's book & help readers understand the harder parts. The worst thing is that he sometimes goes against Graham's teachings, so he should NOT be taken as an extension of Graham! (For example, on page 129 he says if you don't have time to choose your own stocks, there's no shame in hiring someone to pick them for you. On page 243, he says "In the financial markets, luck is more important than skill". Ben Graham must be turning in his grave.)
One more caveat: this volume boasts a preface & appendix by Warren Buffett, Ben Graham's most famous pupil. But don't be swayed by that. The preface is an obituary written by Buffett & the appendix is an edited talk that Buffett gave in 1984. They're okay but it doesn't mean that Buffett is backing this schizoid volume.
My advice: read the Graham chapters, ditch the Zweig commentary. You'll save time AND be wiser.
Definitive guide to value investing - By: Book Worm, 10 Sep 2006 This is probably the best place to start if you are interested in value investing. Although the latest revision by Graham was in the seventies, Jazon Zweig adds commentaries to each chapter to bring the information right up to date. The principles of investment are sound & the style of writing is very accessible. This is a classic investment book & should be read by most people planning for their financial future. Highly recommended.
A Timeless Classic - By: David Munt, 09 Jun 2006 The original text was written quite some years ago, yet like most truly good advice it survives the passage of time very well. An essential classic to read if you want to get your mind & attitude properly focused on Value Investing.
