All About Asset Allocation, Second Edition

WHEN IT COMES TO INVESTING FOR YOUR FUTURE, THERE'S ONLY ONE SURE BET—ASSET ALLOCATION

THE EASY WAY TO GET STARTED
Everything You Need to Know About How To:

Implement a smart asset allocation strategy
Diversify your investments with stocks, bonds, real estate, and other classes
Change your allocation and lock in gains

Trying to outwit the market is a bad gamble. If you're serious about investing for the long run, you have to take a no-nonsense, businesslike approach to your portfolio. In addition to covering all the basics, this new edition of All About Asset Allocation includes timely advice on:

Learning which investments work well together and why
Selecting the right mutual funds and ETFs
Creating an asset allocation that’s right for your needs
Knowing how and when to change an allocation
Understanding target-date mutual funds

"All About Asset Allocation offers advice that is both prudent and practical--keep it simple, diversify, and, above all, keep your expenses low--from an author who both knows how vital asset allocation is to investment success and, most important, works with real people." -- John C. Bogle, founder and former CEO, The Vanguard Group

"With All About Asset Allocation at your side, you'll be executing a sound investment plan, using the best materials and wearing the best safety rope that money can buy." -- William Bernstein, founder, Effi cientFrontier.com, and author, The Intelligent Asset Allocator

Customer Reviews:

Great information but sloppy

By AmazonGuy - August 2, 2011

This is a great book for someone looking to assemble their portfolio and not only successfully diversify it, but understand WHY diversification among asset classes works to reduce risk and increase returns.

My only real complaint is that it's sloppy - thus the three stars. I almost had to put the book down because I found so many spelling and grammatical errors in the first chapter. It was very distracting to me.

One has to wonder if this book was even proofread. (I think one or two errors in an entire volume is somewhat acceptable, but not the level of errors seen here.) I asked myself "Can I take the advice of such a careless author?" But in the end I think the concepts are mostly sound and it's a helpful intro.

But please, do a revision and fix all the errors!

Great Guide

By Karl Borris "Author "Your Investing Bluep... - May 27, 2011

I just finished the outstanding book, All About Asset Allocation, by Richard Ferri. While I am well versed on the topic, I still learned quite a bit as Ferri goes went into detail on every facet of the practice. The only negative was that there seemed to be a lot of repetition, but given how important this topic is, a little repetition is a good thing. Ferri excelled in providing plenty of low-cost providers of index funds to be used in your asset allocation plan, but fell short of suggesting many ETFs as the selection at the time of publication was not as extensive as it is now, 2006 (first edition).

If you want a step-by-step manual on proper asset allocation, this is your guide. Each chapter guides you along as you build fund by fund until you have a portfolio of up to 12 different asset classes by the end of the book. There are plenty of examples on where the research originated from (Fama and French, Markowitz, and more) and makes for an enjoyable and quick read. His... read more

Excellent Investment Blueprint

By Andrew Gurman - February 10, 2013

I found this book to be exceptionally useful in developing a long-term investment plan. Ferri makes excellent use of academic findings and statistical data to support the use of various asset allocation strategies. He provides a fabulous investment blueprint along with specific investment options for the layperson to structure an investment portfolio. Also, he lays out his points in a concise and compelling way.

I have now read John Bogle's "Common Sense on Mutual Funds," Burton Malkiel's "A Random Walk Down Wall Street," and this book. They each naturally have different emphases and taken as a whole are quite helpful. I found this book by Ferri to the most useful in actually structuring a specific investment plan, and I agree with his well-reasoned critique of Bogle, who de-emphasizes international investing to too large an extent. (I also commend Ferri for what he has done with his investment company, which charges a far lower rate than I had thought existed in the... read more