HOW TO PROFIT FROM THE MONEY REVOLUTION: The Insider's Guide to Financial Supermarkets, Their Super Products, and Super Brokers

by Wayne F. Nelson ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 23, 1983

In How to Buy Money (1981), Merrill Lynch V.P. Nelson urged individuals to become actively involved in managing their assets. But he hasn't followed up that propitious reminder by delivering, now, on the promising theme that one-step investment and financial-services shopping is at hand for the general public. Thus, instead of explaining the rise and role of American Express (Shearson), Prudential (Bache), Sears (Allstate and Dean Witter), and other new amalgams, Nelson offers a sketchy guide to familiar commitments. These include equities, money-market funds, fixed-income securities (focusing on zero-coupon bonds and other exotica created by Wall Street to cope with the interest-rate runup), residential real-estate finance (e.g., shared appreciation mortgages), insurance (featuring universal whole-life coverage), and tax-favored instruments (annuities, IRAs, municipals, shelters, unit trusts). Conspicuously absent are a host of venturesome vehicles (collectibles, commodities, precious metals, financial futures), as well as the MMF-like accounts now offered by banks; discreetly(?) and regrettably scanted are central assets accounts, pioneered by Nelson's employer Merrill Lynch (under the name Cash Management Account). Another peculiarity--especially in light of Nelson's succinctly persuasive case for a sustained boom in common stocks--is the amount of space allotted to offbeat market theories (including the correlation of quotes with hemlines lengths, the outcome of Super Bowl games, etc.). Meanwhile, the everyday implications of the financial revolution go begging.

Pub Date: May 23, 1983

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: McGraw-Hill

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1983

Categories: NONFICTION