In 1973, three years before Vanguard created its first index fund, Burton Malkiel wrote the classic book, A Random Walk Down Wall Street.
It ruffled plenty of Wall Street suits.
The Princeton economics professor argued that actively managed mutual funds were a waste of money. He said most of them perform poorly compared to their index benchmarks. So when Vanguard created the first index fund in 1976, Mr. Malkiel became one of the firm’s biggest cheerleaders.
A Random Walk Down Wall Street is in its 10th edition. It has sold more than 1.5 million copies. It might be the world’s best book on index investing – for Americans. Three great guides on this side of the border are Chris Turnbull’s Your Portfolio is Broken: Who’s To Blame And How To Fix It; Keith Matthews’ The Empowered Investor; and Dan Bortolotti’s MoneySense Guide To the Perfect Portfolio.
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