Top 20 of Best Finance Books Recommended Most Times by Finance Pros

Books that teach the art of Finance offer a great way of learning the ins and outs of Finance and at a much lower price than taking, for example, a specialist Finance Course. By reading a book, you consume a huge amount of research in a relatively short amount of time, and it is one of the best ways to improve your skills.

The only problem is that there are a lot of Finance Books in the market and there are much more to come. For instance, just doing a search for “Finance Books” in Amazon results in more than 60,000 books about Finance, so how do you make up your mind about what to read?

You can do a google search and search for the Best Finance Books but then you get hundreds of “Best of Lists” in front of you, so that doesn’t help a lot either unless you want to spend a full day going through all those lists. Well, that is exactly what we did! We searched for 50 “Best of Lists” highlighting the most recommended Books about Finance by various authority sites. Then we selected and combined the 20 most valuable “Best of Lists” and earmarked and ranked what Finance Books keep up appearing on most of those recently published lists. From a total of 174 Finance Books reviewed and ranked, here are the Top 20 of Most Recommended Finance Books that appear on most of the Best Finance Books lists!

Top 20 of Best Finance Books
Recommended Most Times

#1. The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing
by Benjamin Graham and Jason Zweig

Listed 13 out of 20 times. Benjamin Graham (born Benjamin Grossbaum; May 8, 1894 – September 21, 1976) was a British-born American economist and professional investor. Graham is considered the father of value investing, an investment approach he began teaching at Columbia Business School in 1928.

Jason Zweig is an investing and personal finance columnist for The Wall Street Journal. Previously, he was a senior writer at Money magazine, mutual-funds editor at Forbes magazine, and a guest columnist for Time and cnn.com.

“By far the best book on investing ever written.” (Warren Buffett)

Recommended by:
– The world’s most successful investor of all time, Warren Buffet
– Barron’s, America’s premier financial magazine
– Fortune Magazine

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#2. Think and Grow Rich 
by Napoleon Hill

Listed 7 out of 20 times. Ever the ambitious mind, Napoleon Hill’s writing career started at 13, when he gave himself the job of “mountain reporter” to small-town newspapers in West County, Virginia. As an adult, Hill became an author of personal growth books, including the multi-volume The Law of Success and one of the 10 best-selling self-help books of all time, Think and Grow Rich. Hill pioneered the modern genre of personal success literature.

“I knew Napoleon Hill in 1922 when I was a student in Salem College in the town of my birth. Mr. Hill came to our campus as the commencement speaker in that year. As I listened to him, I heard something other than just the words he spoke, I felt the substance – the wisdom – and the spirit of a man and his philosophy. Mr. Hill said, “the most powerful instrument we have in our hand is the power of our mind.” Napoleon Hill compiled this philosophy of American achievement for the benefit of all people. I strongly commend this philosophy to you for achievement and service in your chosen field.” (Senator Jennings Randolph West Virginia)

Recommended by:
– Over 100 million copies sold since its first publication, says it all

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#3. One Up On Wall Street
by Peter Lynch

Listed 7 out of 20 times. Peter Lynch is America’s number-one money manager. His mantra: Average investors can become experts in their own field and can pick winning stocks as effectively as Wall Street professionals by doing just a little research. Peter Lynch is vice chairman of Fidelity Management & Research Company — the investment advisor arm of Fidelity Investments — and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Fidelity funds. Mr. Lynch was portfolio manager of Fidelity Magellan Fund, which was the best performing fund in the world under his leadership from May 1977 to May 1990. He is the co-author of the bestselling Beating the Street and Learn to Earn, a beginner’s guide to the basics of investing and business. He lives in the Boston area.

“Mr. Lynch’s investment record puts him in a league by himself.” (Anise C. Wallace The New York Times)

Recommended by:
– The elite of the investment community

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#4. Security Analysis
by Benjamin Graham and David Dodd

Listed 9 out of 20 times. Benjamin Graham (May 8, 1894 – September 21, 1976) was an American economist and professional investor. Graham is considered the first proponent of value investing, an investment approach he began teaching at Columbia Business School in 1928 and subsequently refined with David Dodd through various editions of their famous book Security Analysis. Disciples of value investing include Jean-Marie Eveillard, Warren Buffett, William J. Ruane, Irving Kahn, Hani M. Anklis, and Walter J. Schloss. Buffett, who credits Graham as grounding him with a sound intellectual investment framework.

“A classic has now been updated by some of the greatest and most thoughtful investors of our time. The book was a bust read and has now been elevated to a new level.” (Daniel S. Och, Senior Managing Member Och-Ziff CapitalManagement Group)

Recommended by:
– The world’s most successful investor of all time, Warren Buffet, read it 4 times!

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#5. Rich Dad Poor Dad
by Robert T. Kiyosaki

Listed 3 out of 20 times. Kiyosaki is best known for his book Rich Dad, Poor Dad, the #1 New York Times bestseller. Kiyosaki followed with Rich Dad’s CASHFLOW Quadrant and Rich Dad’s Guide to Investing. He has now had at least a dozen books published. Robert Kiyosaki has challenged and changed the way tens of millions of people around the world think about money. With perspectives that often contradict conventional wisdom, Robert has earned a reputation for straight talk, irreverence, and courage. He is regarded worldwide as a passionate advocate for financial education.

“Rich Dad Poor Dad is a starting point for anyone looking to gain control of their financial future.” (USA TODAY)

Recommended by:
– NY Times bestseller for over 6 years

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#6. The Theory of Investment Value | by John Burr Williams

Listed 4 out of 20 times. John Burr Williams (November 27, 1900 – September 15, 1989) was an American economist, recognized as an important figure in the field of fundamental analysis, and for his analysis of stock prices as reflecting their “intrinsic value.” He is best known for his 1938 text The Theory of Investment Value, based on his Ph.D. thesis, in which he articulated the theory of Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) based valuation, and in particular, dividend-based valuation.

“Williams combined original theoretical concepts with enlightening and entertaining commentary based on his own experiences in the rough-and-tumble world of investment.” Williams’ discovery was to project an estimate that offers intrinsic value and it is called the ‘Dividend Discount Model’ which is still used today by professional investors on the institutional side of markets.” (Peter Bernstein)

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#7. The Millionaire Next Door | by Thomas Stanley and William Danko

Listed 5 out of 20 times. Thomas J. Stanley was an author, lecturer, and researcher who started studying the affluent in 1973. He died in 2015.

William D. Danko is a professor emeritus at the School of Business, State University of New York at Albany.

“The kind of information that could lift the economic prospects of individuals more than any government policy…The Millionaire Next Door has a theme that I think rings very true…”Hey, I can do it. You can do it too!”” (Rush Limbaugh)

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#8. The Investment Answer | by Daniel C. Goldie, CFA, CFP and Gordon S. Murray

Listed 3 out of 20 times. Daniel C. Goldie is president of Dan Goldie Financial Services, LLC, a registered investment advisory firm. A former professional tennis player and Wimbledon quarterfinalist, he has been recognized by Barron’s as one of the top 100 independent financial advisors in the United States. He graduated from Stanford University and has an MBA degree from the Haas School of Business, University of California at Berkeley.

Gordon S. Murray spent more than twenty-five years working on Wall Street, primarily at Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, and Credit Suisse First Boston in a variety of institutional sales and management roles. After his Wall Street career, Murray worked as a consultant with Dimensional Fund Advisors.

„Gordon and Murray have distilled the essence of the matter, and explain in clear English, the advantages of using a fee-only financial advisor, how to select such, and how to work with one in the short and long run. This is sound advice, which you will rarely if ever get from a daily financial newscast.“ (Harry M. Markowitz, PH.D., Nobel Laureate in Economics, 1990)

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#9. A Random Walk Down Wall Street | by Burton Malkiel

Listed 5 out of 20 times. Burton G. Malkiel is the Chemical Bank Chairman’s Professor of Economics Emeritus at Princeton University. He is a former member of the Council of Economic Advisers, dean of the Yale School of Management, and has served on the boards of several major corporations, including Vanguard and Prudential Financial. He is the chief investment officer of Wealthfront.

“[This] timeless classic… offers a vast array of advice on how investors can tilt the odds in their favour.” (The Observer) “…deservedly a perennial bestseller.” (The Economist)

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#10. Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk | by Peter L. Bernstein

Listed 4 out of 20 times. Peter L. Bernstein is President of Peter L. Bernstein, Inc., economic consultants to institutional advisors and corporations. His semimonthly analysis of the capital markets and the real economy, Economics and Portfolio Strategy, is read by managers and owners of investments totaling over one trillion dollars. Mr. Bernstein is the author of many articles in the professional and popular press, as well as six books in economics and finance, including the bestselling Capital Ideas: The Improbable Origins of Modern Wall Street.

“With his wonderful knowledge of the history and current manifestations of risk, Peter Bernstein brings us Against the Gods. Nothing like it will come out of the financial world this year or ever. I speak carefully: no one should miss it.” (John Kenneth Galbraith Professor of Economics Emeritus, Harvard University)

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#11. The Richest Man in Babylon | by George S. Clason

Listed 6 out of 20 times. George Samuel Clason was born in Louisiana, Missouri, on November 7, 1874. He attended the University of Nebraska and served in the United States Army during the Spanish-American War. Beginning a long career in publishing, he founded the Clason Map Company of Denver, Colorado, and published the first road atlas of the United States and Canada. In 1926, he issued the first of a famous series of pamphlets on thrift and financial success, using parables set in ancient Babylon to make each of his points.

“What can a book written in the 1920s tell modern investors about their finances? A whole lot of it’s George Clason’s delightful set of parables that explain the basics of money. This is a great gift for a graduate or anyone who seems baffled by the world of finance and a wonderful, refreshing read for even the most experienced investor.” (Los Angeles Times)

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#12. Market Wizards | by Jack D. Schwager

Listed 3 out of 20 times. Mr. Schwager is a recognized industry expert in futures and hedge funds and the author of a number of widely acclaimed financial books. He is perhaps best known for his best-selling series of interviews with the greatest traders and hedge fund managers of the last three decades: Market Wizards (1989), The New Market Wizards (1992), Stock Market Wizards (2001), Hedge Fund Market Wizards (2012), and The Little Book of Market Wizards (2014). Jack Schwager is a managing director and principal of The Fortune Group, an alternative asset management firm regulated in the UK and the United States. Schwager is the Senior Portfolio Manager for Fortune’s Market Wizards Funds of Funds, a broadly diversified series of institutional hedge fund portfolios.

“I’ve read the book at several stages of my career as it shows the staying power of good down-to-earth wisdom of true practitioners with skin in the game. This is the central document showing the heuristics that real-life traders use to manage their affairs, how people who do rather than talk have done things. Twenty years from now, it will still be fresh. There is no other like it.” (Nassim N. Taleb, former derivatives trader, author of The Black Swan, and professor, NYU-Poly)

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#13. Common Sense on Mutual Funds | by John Bogle

Listed 3 out of 20 times. John C. Bogle (Bryn Mawr, PA) is Founder of The Vanguard Group, Inc., and President of the Bogle Financial Markets Research Center. He created Vanguard in 1974 and served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer until 1996 and Senior Chairman until 2000. He had been associated with a predecessor company since 1951, immediately following his graduation from Princeton University, magna cum laude in Economics. The Vanguard Group is one of the two largest mutual fund organizations in the world. Headquartered in Malvern, Pennsylvania.

“A powerful no-nonsense prescription for how individual investors should structure their portfolios in the current market environment” (Martin Leibowitz, Managing Director, Morgan Stanley)

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#14. Your Money or Your Life | by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez

Listed 4 out of 20 times. Vicki Robin is a renowned innovator, writer, and speaker. In addition to coauthoring the bestselling Your Money or Your Life, Robin has been at the forefront of the sustainable living movement. She has received awards from Co-Op America and Sustainable Northwest and was profiled in Utne Magazine’s book Visionaries.

Joe Dominguez (1938-1997) was a successful financial analyst on Wall Street before retiring at the age of thirty-one by following the nine-step program he formulated for himself. He taught this formula for many years and preserved it for future generations in Your Money or Your Life. From 1969 on, he was a full-time volunteer and donated all proceeds from his teaching to transformational projects.

“Your Money or Your Life is nothing less than a clear and profoundly practical path to financial freedom. If you want to bring sanity, stability, and security into your money life, get this book and follow its advice. You will be very glad that you did.” (John Robbins, bestselling author, president of the Food Revolution Network)

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#15. Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds | by Charles Mackay

Listed 4 out of 20 times. Charles Mackay (1841-1889) was born in Perth Scotland. Charles Mackay was a Scottish poet, journalist, author, anthologist, novelist, and songwriter remembered mainly for his book ‘Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds’. He was a friend of influential figures such as Charles Dickens and Henry Russell and moved to London to work on The Illustrated London News in 1848, and he became Editor of it in 1852. He was a correspondent for The Times during the American Civil War but thereafter concentrated on writing books.

“A complete repackaging of the classic work about grand-scale madness, major schemes, and bamboozlement–and the universal human susceptibility to all three. This informative, funny collection encompasses a broad range of manias and deceptions, from witch burnings to the Great Crusades to the prophecies of Nostradamus.” (Amazon review)

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#16. Barbarians at the Gate | by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar

Listed 5 out of 20 times. Bryan Burrough is a special correspondent at Vanity Fair and the author of five books.

John Helyar is a columnist for Bloomberg News. He previously wrote for the Wall Street Journal, Fortune, and ESPN, and is the author of Lord of the Realm: The Real History of Baseball.

“All the suspense of a first-rate thriller… One of the finest, most compelling accounts of what happened to corporate America and Wall Street in the 1980s.” (New York Times book review)

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#17. Liar’s Poker | by Michael Lewis

Listed 4 out of 20 times. Michael Lewis was fresh out of Princeton and the London School of Economics when he landed a job at Salomon Brothers, one of Wall Street’s premier investment firms. During the next three years, Lewis rose from callow trainee to bond salesman, raking in millions for the firm and cashing in on a modern-day gold rush. Michael Lewis is the best-selling author of Liar’s Poker, Moneyball, The Blind Side, The Big Short, and The Undoing Project. He lives in Berkeley, California, with his wife and three children.

“So memorable and alive . . . one of those rare works that encapsulate and define an era.” (Fortune)

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#18. Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits and Other Writings | by Philip A. Fisher

Listed 5 out of 20 times. Widely respected and admired, Philip Fisher is among the most influential investors of all time. His investment philosophies, introduced almost forty years ago, are not only studied and applied by today’s finance professionals but are also regarded by many as gospel. He recorded these philosophies in Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits, a book considered invaluable reading when it was first published in 1958, and a must-read today.

“I sought out Phil Fisher after reading his Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits…When I met him, I was impressed by the man as by his ideas. A thorough understanding of the business, obtained by using Phil’s techniques…enables one to make intelligent investment commitments.” (Warren Buffett)

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#19. The Alchemy of Finance | by George Soros

Listed 3 out of 20 times. George Soros was born in Budapest, Hungary on August 12, 1930. He survived the occupation of Budapest and left communist Hungary in 1947 for England, where he graduated from the London School of Economics. While a student at LSE, Mr. Soros became familiar with the work of the philosopher Karl Popper, who had a profound influence on his thinking and later on his professional and philanthropic activities. In 1956 Mr. Soros moved to the United States, where he began to accumulate a large fortune through an international investment fund he founded and managed. Today he is Chairman of Soros Fund Management LLC.

“A seminal investment book . . . it should be read, underlined, and thought about page-by-page, concept-by-idea… He’s the best pure investor ever… probably the finest analys of the world in our time.” (Barton M. Biggs, Morgan Stanley)

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#20. When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management | by Roger Lowenstein

Listed 3 out of 20 times. Roger Lowenstein (born in 1954) is an American financial journalist and writer. He graduated from Cornell University and reported for the Wall Street Journal for more than a decade, including two years writing its Heard on the Street column, 1989 to 1991. Born in 1954, he is the son of Helen and Louis Lowenstein of Larchmont, N.Y. Lowenstein is married to Judith Slovin. He is also a director of Sequoia Fund. His father, the late Louis Lowenstein, was an attorney and Columbia University law professor who wrote books and articles critical of the American financial industry.

“Compelling . . . The fund was long cloaked in secrecy, making the story of its rise . . . and its ultimate destruction that much more fascinating.” (The Washington Post)

Best Investing Blogs &
Resources to Follow

Blogs about Investing are another ideal source for staying up to date on the latest developments and learn new insights into all sorts of Investment topics. Here are the top 5 of Investing Blogs that keep up appearing on all the lists of Best Investing Blogs:

1. Musings on Markets
2. A Wealth of Common Sense
3. Oddball Stocks
4. The Reformed Broker
5. The Brooklyn Investor

Best Venture Capital Blogs &
Resources to Follow

Blogs about Venture Capital are another ideal source for staying up to date on the latest developments and learn new insights into all sorts of Investment topics. Here are the top 5 of Venture Capital Blogs that keep up appearing on all the lists of Best Venture Capital Blogs:

1. A VC – Listed 14 out of 18 Venture Capital lists reviewed
2. Both Sides of the Table – Listed 13 out of 18
3. Chris Dixon – Listed 10 out of 18 times
4. Tomasz Tunguz – Listed 11 out of 18 times
5. Feld Thoughts – Listed 12 out of 18 times

The Ivy League
MBA Reading List

We did another research and these Business Books might also interest you. We tried to find the MBA Reading Lists recommended by the Best Business Schools in the world and again earmarked what Business Books are recommended most times by Ivy League schools like Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, and MIT. These Top 20 of Best Business Books keep appearing on the MBA Reading Lists, and here are the top 5:

1. The Lean Startup, by Eric Ries
2. Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis
3. How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie
4. Good to Great, by Jim Collins
5. The Hard Thing About Hard Things, by Ben Horowitz

Do You Have Any Tips for
Your Favorite Books About Finance

Want to share your favorite Finance Books? Just do the following:

• Join the Q&A conversation about What Are Your Favorite Books about Finance?

Later on, we will share the results via Knowledge Resources, so you can quickly find the best Books about Finance on the web as suggested by our users and visitors.

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Consulting

How we Established the
Final Top 20 of Finance Books

• We made a list of 50 posts that we recently published about “Best Finance Books”  to read.
• From this list of 50 posts, we selected the top 20 that seem most valuable to our readers and users.
• We combined the 20  lists of “Best Finance Books” and earmarked all individual books that were on those lists.
• When a book was ranked as number 1, it got 1 point, and when it was ranked 2nd, it got 2 points, etc.
• When no particular ranking was applied to a certain list, then each listed book got the same points.
• To be included in the final list a book should be listed for a minimal number of times.
• More weight was assigned to books which were explicitly listed more times than other books.
• All lists were summed up, and the Finance Books with the lowest number were ranked 1, 2, 3, etc.
• This resulted in the final “The 20 Best Finance Books” that have been recommended most times by all types of finance experts. 

 Sources Used for
Best Finance Books

The 20 “Best of Lists” used for finding out what the Best Finance Books are:

1. 19 Best Finance Books That The Richest People Read
2. 20 Must-Read Books for Finance Professionals
3. Top 10 Best Finance Books of All Times
4. Best Sellers in Finance
5. 13 Best Finance Books (to Create Smart Money Habits)
6. 10 Finance Books Worth Reading This Winter
7. Top 10 Finance Education Books to Transform your Finances in 2018
8. Popular Finance Books
9. The 22 Most Important Finance Books Ever Written
10. 16 Best Finance Books Of All Time
11. Best Finance Videos, Articles and Books for Investors for Amateurs and Experts
12. Summer Reading: Top 10 Finance Books
13. Top 10 MUST READ Books for Financial Advisors
14. BEST FINANCE BOOKS OF ALL TIMES
15. Copylab’s Top Ten Books about Finance and Investment
16. 20 Must-Read Books for Finance Professionals
17. 10 books about markets and finance you should read right now
18. The Best Finance Books 2018 and All Time (Top 10)
19. For a stocking stuffer, 10 books that boost money IQ
20. Top 10 Best Money Books of All Time

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