Sold Short: Uncovering Deception in the Markets

by Manuel P. Asensio and Jack Barth

Book Overview

Manuel Asensio geh?rt zu den wenigen erfolgreichen Leerverk?ufern, die ?ber ihre Gesch?fte reden. Viele professionelle und individuelle Anleger praktizieren Shortverk?ufe - aber dar?ber redet man nicht. Asensio wird viel gelobt und auch heftig kritisiert, aber seine Methode funktioniert. "Sold Short" ist eine spannende und faszinierende Lekt?re mit zahlreichen Anekdoten ?ber Asensios Leben und die mitunter mysteri?se Praxis der Leerverk?ufe.
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• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0471383384
• ISBN13: 9780471383383
• Release Date: April 2001
• Publisher: Wiley
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Open your eyes to the world of bad apples

This is an excellent book that you should know about the context of shorting and the risk you'll be exposed to when shorting a stock. I repect Mr. Asensio's attitude of doing continuous researches about the same companies that he believed would go down eventually, and keeping all these information public on the Internet that you can always read them for yourself after all these years. The books covers real cases of companies that he shorted and he made available to the public about the 'facts' he found. Granted the whole truth is not possibly disclosed fairly by all parties (short and long), the final results spoke for itself - many of the companies are already off the market. Mr. Asensio's thoughts on a couple technical companies that he recommended sold short hit many essential points from technical standpoints. This is a book for you to get the background and environment you're dealing with in the stock market. After reading this book, you'll have more sense about getting away from longing bad apples and not hitting on potential hyped companies. The book is about stories of 'sold short', long can sure benefit from the book. Ethical or not doesn't matter, the important thing is that you can learn from the stories and make your long position more robust. All investors should have this books on the shelf and read at least a couple chapters.

How to avoid being a victim of a fraud

This book is one of the best investment books I have read. Being more of a technical trader with some respect for the fundamentals, Mr. Asensio reminded me when these so called "fundamental facts" did matter: When they are material and purposefully ignored, misrepresented or talked down by the company or sell-side analysts. I would suggest every investor, novice or professional should read this book. I don't agree with the review stating that it is badly written. It took me two days to finish 250+ pages. Again, if you really want to understand who are the "one reader"s who voted 1 star and laid their unrooted and obscure blaming on Ansensio, read the book! Even the reviews on the book took a different color...

Excellent book for any investor!

I do not necessarily think that Asensio's style of shorting stocks is appropriate for most people, but this book is FANTASTIC. I seriously include it in my list of top 10 all time favorite investment related books. Why? Because Asensio is a master at discovering and exposing companies. This book provides valuable insight on how you can avoid such companies as well as how they accomplish their dirty work. The case studies are absolutely hilarious and make very enjoyable reading. In short, I highly recommend this book and I think you will gain valuable insight from it. Anyone giving the book a negative review has probably lost money on any of the dozens of scam companies Asensio has exposed.

Uncovers the sleazy self dealing on Wall Street

This book hits hard, naming names, dates, and connections. After reading this you will wonder why these people that are detailed in the book are not in jail. For the most part, historical info as detailed in the book is still available. I went to the SEC site and looked up 4 of the mentioned companies and whoa, all the filings are there. Read them yourself, they are free to the public. There are companies out there who make nothing, sell nothing, and their only source of income is selling (scamming) stock. Asensio unmasks a few of them and it's like stirring up a hornet's nest.The book itself is fun and reads like a mystery, you don't get bored. He has some personal history which explaines where he came from. He does do a little cheerleading but it should be expected. Asensio and his small crew take on the Giants of Wall Street, wage battle, and sometime win. Along with "The Predators Ball" this book is a must read for new or experienced stock investors.

Character is what you do when no one is looking

This book covers the anatomy of various stock promotions and it takes no prisoners. It implicates company managements', brokers, analysts, the financial press, the government regulators, the industry's self-regulators, and the corporate finance departments of all firms issuing stock to the public. It is dead-on accurate and a wonderful addition to the rich trove of books on Wall Street. Asensio provides an invaluable service to the public by going through the mechanics of short selling, street name stock, stock held in safe keeping, rule 504 Reg. D, Rule 144 and 145, accounting artifices, offshore rules and manipulations, and all the other techniques that shysters, and those who merely want to mislead you until times and circumstances improve, use. Too often you the investor end up as the sheep and the other guys have the shears and not so coincidentally your money. If the SEC wanted to do something productive instead of engaging in its ponderous, bureaucratic, expensive, ham-handed approach to protecting small investors through policing capital markets, it should require that this book be sent at government expense to everyone who opens an account with a brokerage firm. It should also run ads in as many financial publications as possible so that the widest number of investors will have a chance to learn of its existence. The government wastes enormous amounts of money trying to find solutions to problems in a "trade-off of risks" world. Why not cut to the chase and opt for efficiency? Speaking as someone who once wrote a white paper on how stock frauds are perpetrated, for a famous financial letter writer, I will tell you that this is without a doubt the best book on the subject. All stock brokers should have it as required reading in their training classes and they should be tested on it with some kind of an essay examination, perhaps 25-50 pages. The SEC gleans correctly that many people lose their money betting on stocks because they want to hit a home run or to get rich quick. This isn't news it's why Las Vegas has so much traffic. It's why people bet the ponies, that and the addictive emotional rush it provides. But for the thinking man, who's a bit of a dreamer and an idealist, this book would save vast sums of time, money, anguish and agonizing self-reappraisal. Full disclosure was the raison d'être for one of the two principle securities acts enacted in the early 30's by the FDR administration. It was meant to curb stock market abuses perpetrated in the 20's such as stock manipulations aided by "pools" of managed money. This private management of particularly small investor money later reappeared as the heavily regulated mutual funds industry. This spawned the mutual fund holding company act of 1940, and so on and so forth. Since that time we have seen the rise in power of the SEC, the NASD and of the various state securities commissioners. At every step the promoters find new ways to shear the sheep as regulators are always behind the c