You may not have heard of Ed Thorp, but there surely would be some recognition of the thrilling movie 21 from 2008, where a Math professor recruits students for card counting. Well, here we have the man who is credited with inventing card counting, and beating the dealer on the Blackjack table. But that is not all. he is also the man who caught Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme years before he was caught, and formulated algorithms to beat the markets and make profits. A man who ushered in the era of quantitative finance. A Man for All Markets by Ed Thorp is part memoir, part tutorial, and part investment guide. But above all it is a thrilling ride spanning from the 1920s to the new millennium. Surely not a book that you would want to miss if money, numbers, and algorithms excite you in any way.
Edward O. Thorp is the author of the bestseller Beat the Dealer, which transformed the game of blackjack. His subsequent book, Beat the Market, co-authored with Sheen T. Kassouf, influenced securities markets around the globe. Thorp is one of the world’s best blackjack players and investors, and his hedge funds were profitable every year for twenty-nine years.
A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market
Author: Edward O. Thorp
Hardcover: 416 pages
Publisher: Random House (January 24, 2017)
ISBN-10: 1400067960, 978-1400067961
A man for All Markets Summary
In a world where ‘school-dropout’ has become a celebratory badge than a curse, the author tells the readers how education made things possible. How numbers and Maths unraveled as many mysteries as understanding of chemicals and their interactions. But, he says, the biggest skill he learned was the skill of learning new things himself.
The book takes you down the memory lane to author’s childhood and the times of Great Depression. Here you will get to know the inquisitive Ed Thorp who raced from not talking at all at 2.5 years to becoming a child prodigy of sorts with his numbers and reading skills. You get to hear many stories that leaves no doubt that Ed was intelligent and gifted in many ways. But it was, as he says, his curiosity and desire to learn new things that took him in different directions.
The author then dives into his college life as he chronicles the time with classrooms with more than hundreds of students. This important time also seemed to influence the author’s sense of fair play, as he narrates an interesting incident involving his professor who went back on his word and a ‘deal’. This and numerous college stories will keep you entertained as well as paint the times in a vivid narrative.
The author moves through various milestones in his life: his first experience in Vegas, the card counting idea, building first wearable computer with Claude Shannon, his meetings with Warren Buffet, and his life as a hedge fund manager, with same interesting and entertaining narrative.
A Man for All Markets Reviews
‘In the end, Thorp seems to run out of original ideas, though his stated objective—to make readers “think differently about gambling, investments, risk, money management, wealth-building, and life”—is largely achieved.’ ~ Publisher’s Weekly
“Thorp’s in-the-trenches account of gaming the system(s) is a pleasure—and instructive, too.” ~ Kirkus Reviews
Additional Readnig
Ininterview with Ed Thorp about the book A Man For All Markets.