where are the customers' yachts

A Wealth of Common Sense

10 Great Lines From ‘Where Are the Customers’ Yachts?’

Posted February 15, 2015 by Ben Carlson

Where Are the Customers’ Yachts by Fred Schwed was written almost 75 years ago. I only read this book for the first time a few months ago and it’s remarkable how well it still holds up after all these years. It’s probably the funniest investment book I’ve ever read (out of an admittedly small set of competitors).

Here are some of my favorite lines:

1. On using statistics to your advantage:  “One can’t say that figures lie. But figures as used in financial arguments, seem to have the bad habit of expressing a small part of the truth forcibly, and neglecting the other part, as do some people we know.”

2. On the value of “I don’t know”:  For one thing, customers have an unfortunate habit of asking about the financial future. Now, if you do someone the single honor of asking him a difficult question, you may be assured that you will get a detailed answer. Rarely will it be the most difficult of all answers – “I don’t know.”

3. On the cyclical nature of the markets:  “When “conditions” are good, the forward looking investor buys. But when “conditions” are good, stocks are high. Then without anyone having the courtesy to ring a bell, “conditions” get bad.”

4. On the usefulness of theories:  “All of these theories are true part of the time; none of them true all of the time. They are, therefore, dangerous, though sometimes useful.”

5. It’s a little different every time: “History does in a vague way repeat itself, but it does it slowly and ponderously, and with an infinite number of surprising variations.

6. On the emotions of losing money:  “Like all of life’s rich emotional experiences, the full flavor of losing important money cannot be conveyed by literature. You cannot convey to an inexperienced girl what it is truly like to be a wife and mother. There are certain things that cannot be adequately explained to a virgin by words or pictures.”

7. On second-level thinking: “Those classes of investments considered “best” change from period to period. The pathetic fallacy is that what are thought to be the best are in truth only the most popular – the most active, the most talked of, the most boosted, and consequently, the highest in price at that time.”

8. On leverage: “A man who borrows money to buy a common stock has no right to think of himself as a constructive social benefactor. His is just another fellow trying to be smart, or lucky, or both.”

9. On short sellers before the Great Depression:  “Before October 1929, nobody objected to short sellers except their families. The families objected to going bankrupt.”

10. On who’s to blame for poor advice:  “The burnt customer certainly prefers to believe that he has been robbed rather than that he has been a fool on the advice of fools.”

Source: Where Are the Customers’ Yachts

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BEN CARLSON, CFA

A Wealth of Common Sense is a blog that focuses on wealth management, investments, financial markets and investor psychology. I manage portfolios for institutions and individuals at Ritholtz Wealth Management LLC . More about me here .  For disclosure information please see here . 

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Where Are the Customers' Yachts?: or A Good Hard Look at Wall Street

Fred schwed jr. , peter arno  ( illustrator ) , jason zweig  ( introduction ).

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1940

About the author

Fred Schwed Jr.

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Where Are the Customers' Yachts?

• or A Good Hard Look at Wall Street
• By: Fred Schwed Jr. , Peter Arno
• Narrated by: Mark Moseley
• Length: 4 hrs and 2 mins
• 4.4 out of 5 stars 4.4 (144 ratings)

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Humorous and entertaining, this book exposes the folly and hypocrisy of Wall Street. The title refers to a story about a visitor to New York who admired the yachts of the bankers and brokers. Naively, he asked where all the customers' yachts were? Of course, none of the customers could afford yachts, even though they dutifully followed the advice of their bankers and brokers. Full of wise contrarian advice and offering a true look at the world of investing, in which brokers get rich while their customers go broke, this book continues to open the eyes of investors to the reality of Wall Street.

• Unabridged Audiobook
• Categories: Money & Finance

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What listeners say about Where Are the Customers' Yachts?

• 4.5 out of 5 stars 4.4 out of 5.0
• 4.5 out of 5 stars 4.6 out of 5.0

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Audible.com reviews, amazon reviews.

• Overall 4 out of 5 stars
• Performance 5 out of 5 stars
• Story 4 out of 5 stars

Comedy more than anything

Was a descent book, more comedy about wall street than anything else. Still worth a listen for entertainment only

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• Overall 5 out of 5 stars

Great read after working with Private equity

most people on Wall Street aren’t any luckier or any smarter than the average person. After working with Private Equity I came to really appreciate the humor. Hit me at the right time

• Story 5 out of 5 stars

Very entertaining!

I recommend this to anyone interested in gaining insight into investing in a light, easy manner. This was very entertaining indeed

• Anonymous User

Surprisingly good!

I was blown away by how entertaining and insightful this book is, considering how long ago it was written.

entertaining and enduring

markets and investors haven't changed much over last century. concise , insightful, and funny. recommended for anyone want to get an honest and piercing take and wall street

Relevant Insights for today

Amazing to think this was written so long ago…. Demonstrates that Wall Street hasn’t changed much

• Srisai Vikash Akkineni

Keep reading and finish this book for a good laugh!

Funny, informative, and generally light on material and wisdom. This book was definitely worth a read for a couple of good laughs. And the author is not wrong. The world needs Wall Street. But nobody, not even those on Wall Street, can truly know what they are doing when it comes to investing due to psychological, social, and political forces.

1 person found this helpful

Pretty funny

Very entertaining. I did get a few laughs out of it. Great advice in a not direct way.

Laughing at myself, most enjoyably

No one, having dabbled in active securities trading for longer than a year, should put off reading this book, even a moment longer. You owe it to yourself to take a good, solid look in the mirror and explore the mirth of seeing the absurdity of it all. I still trade and will still trade and will likely make a tradition of reading this book at the end of every fiscal year.

• Overall 3 out of 5 stars
• Story 3 out of 5 stars

• Kevin jarchow

Things haven't changed much since 1930. Yet they have

This book has a great title. And the title poses an interesting question regarding client market success. But it doesn't deliver on that. This is a light hearted poke and jab at Wall Street. You won't likely learn anything new from this book. it isn't insightful or profound, but it is fun in a Dad joke kind of way. You won't laugh out loud, but groans aren't part of the mix either.

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Where Are the Customers' Yachts?: : A Good Hard Look at Wall Street Kindle Edition

It's amazing how well Schwed's book is holding up after fifty-five years. About the only thing that's changed on Wall Street is that computers have replaced pencils and graph paper. Otherwise, the basics are the same. The investor's need to believe somebody is matched by the financial advisor's need to make a nice living. If one of them has to be disappointed, it's bound to be the former." -- John Rothchild, Author, A Fool and His Money, Financial Columnist, Time magazine

Humorous and entertaining, this book exposes the folly and hypocrisy of Wall Street. The title refers to a story about a visitor to New York who admired the yachts of the bankers and brokers. Naively, he asked where all the customers' yachts were? Of course, none of the customers could afford yachts, even though they dutifully followed the advice of their bankers and brokers. Full of wise contrarian advice and offering a true look at the world of investing, in which brokers get rich while their customers go broke, this book continues to open the eyes of investors to the reality of Wall Street.

• Print length 208 pages
• Language English
• Publication date October 10, 2022
• File size 14459 KB
• Page Flip Enabled
• Word Wise Not Enabled
• Enhanced typesetting Enabled
• See all details

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About the author, product details.

• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0BHW54PXF
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Wiley. (October 10, 2022)
• Publication date ‏ : ‎ October 10, 2022
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• File size ‏ : ‎ 14459 KB
• Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Unlimited
• Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
• Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
• Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
• X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
• Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
• Print length ‏ : ‎ 208 pages
• #2,582 in Stock Market Investing (Kindle Store)
• #5,354 in Satire
• #6,045 in Stock Market Investing (Books)

About the author

Fred schwed.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read book recommendations and more.

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