2024 the best side by side on the market review

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The legendary investor shows how to identify and master the cycles that govern the markets.

We all know markets rise and fall, but when should you pull out, and when should you stay in? The answer is never black or white, but is best reached through a keen understanding of the reasons behind the rhythm of cycles. Confidence about where we are in a cycle comes when you learn the patterns of ups and downs that influence not just economics, markets and companies, but also human psychology and the investing behaviors that result.

If you study past cycles, understand their origins and remain alert for the next one, you will become keenly attuned to the investment environment as it changes. You’ll be aware and prepared while others get blindsided by unexpected events or fall victim to emotions like fear and greed.

By following Marks’s insights - drawn in part from his iconic memos over the years to Oaktree’s clients - you can master these recurring patterns to have the opportunity to improve your results.

Cover design by Mark R. Robinson.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

Reviewer: peter
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Mastering The Market Cycle
Review: "Mastering the Market Cycle: Getting the Odds on Your Side" by Howard Marks is a must-read for any investor who wants to gain a deeper understanding of the cyclical nature of financial markets.Marks draws on his decades of experience as a successful investor to provide a comprehensive overview of market cycles, including the factors that drive them and the common mistakes that investors make during each phase of the cycle.One of the things I appreciate about this book is that it is written in a clear, concise manner that is accessible to both novice and experienced investors. Marks uses real-world examples and analogies to illustrate his points, making complex concepts easy to understand.The book is divided into three sections, each of which focuses on a different aspect of market cycles. The first section provides an overview of the concept of cycles, including the different phases and the drivers of each phase. The second section delves into the psychological and emotional factors that influence investor behavior during market cycles, including the role of greed and fear. The third section offers practical advice on how to invest during each phase of the cycle, including strategies for mitigating risk and capitalizing on opportunities.Overall, I found "Mastering the Market Cycle" to be an insightful and thought-provoking read. Marks' wealth of experience and expertise shine through in every chapter, and his advice is grounded in sound principles that are backed by decades of market data. Whether you are a novice investor or a seasoned pro, this book is an invaluable resource that will help you navigate the ups and downs of financial markets with greater confidence and success.

Reviewer: Dennis G.
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: A great book about the market.
Review: Mr. Marks explains how all kinds of cycles (economical, credit, real estate, etc.) are formed and how we can take advantage of them to become better investors. This is a great read that can really improove your understanding of the market and help you become a better investor.

Reviewer: investingbythebooks
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Prepare, don't predict
Review: The holy grail of investing is market timing and its realization is about as elusive. This is a guide on how to master the financial market cycle, which is something in a way related to market timing, but still very, very, very different. The master (that word again…) corporate bond investor and investment writer Howard Marks at Oaktree Capital Management is among those whom I admire most in financial markets and his first book The Most Important Thing ranks among my top five all time investment books. In a way this is a slight problem when it comes to Mastering the Market Cycle. A classical advice to companies reporting their financials is to “under-promise and over-deliver” – the thing is that Marks’ first book drives up expectations for this one to a level it cannot fully live up to. But it’s still a really inspiring book on an important and under-discussed area that I will put to good use immediately.A fundamental cornerstone for the author is that financial markets cannot be predicted with any practically usable precision in the short to medium term. This doesn’t mean that all market outcomes are equally probable at all times. By looking to current conditions and by this forming an opinion on where we are in the market cycle an investor, according to Marks, can tilt his portfolio to take advantage of what is more likely to happen in the years ahead. It’s both about what one thinks will happen depending on where one is and about the probability of this happening compared to other scenarios. If an investor is good at this game it should pay off in the long run and he tilts the odds for success in his favor. Prepare, don’t predict. I think he is totally spot-on in this respect.Another key basis in mastering the cycle is to understand that things don’t just happen one thing after another in – unfortunately irregular – cyclical patterns. What happens in one stage of a market cycle is instead causing it to move on to the next stage. Cycles are chains of cause-and-effect relationships. After a pair of introductory chapters the main part of the book is devoted to describing a large set of interrelated and parallel such cycles: the economic cycle, the profit cycle, the risk attitude cycle, the credit cycle and so on. Underlying all these is the cyclical patterns in investor psychology – a topic clearly nearest to Marks’ heart. To a large extent Marks reads various psychological markers and positions himself in the cycle by these. Next comes one chapter that tries to assemble all the above cycle inputs into the full mosaic of the market cycle. The book finishes with a few concluding more practical chapters and a needlessly cut-and-paste type of summary.It is honestly a luxury to have 50 years of hard won experience condensed in such a graspable format. Marks is a simply superb writer. Much like Warren Buffet the language can be deceptively simple, causing fairly complex issues to sound like child’s play. Make no mistake – this is investment thinking on the highest level. Still, compared to the high standards set by the author’s investment letters some passages of the book are a bit repetitive with their long and recurring chains of cause-and-effects and some newly written chapters that don’t build on previous investment letters, but are required to make an coherent story, are perhaps slightly less inspired than the others.There are clearly others who have made contributions to the understanding of market cycles such as Hyman Minsky, various Austrian economists, the books from Marathon Asset Managed edited by Edward Chancellor plus many others. However, since Marks is so focused on reading non-fundamental and non-economic signposts I think the most complementary book might be Big Debt Crisis by the more Borg-ish Ray Dalio with his “economic machine”-concept, who obviously mostly zeros in on the central bank dominated cycle of monetary policy.When it comes to books on market cycles this is a must read – but it could have been even better.This is a review by investingbythebooks.com

Reviewer: Santiago Oberto
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Todo lo que esperaba de un libro de Howard Marks
Review: Me gustó mucho el libro. Posiblemente un poco de difícil aplicación algunos de los conceptos volcados, pero sin ningun lugar a dudas un libro que te abre la cabeza para pensar algunas cuestiones vinculadas al ciclo económico y su impacto en el mercado de capitales.

Reviewer: Regis
Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars
Title: The Most Important Is Still The Most important Thing
Review: 'The Most Important Thing' had an enormous impact on me because of its crystal clear ideas and messages and I finished it eager for more. In 'Mastering The Market Cycle', Marks go deeper into what he certainly see as one of the key factors for his contrarian investment strategy to thrive. It still a very interesting and insightful book, but as more focused it ends up a little more repetitive. It also republishes full sections of 'The Most Important Thing' when thought appropriate. The book certainly helped me have more ideas on cycles, and it was also fun going through this subject into more detail, but for sure Marks' first book remains 'the most important' one.

Reviewer: Phillip sears
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Very imformative
Review: Good foundation info

Reviewer: Nick
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Love this book
Review: My #1 Book on Cycles.

Reviewer: Parthik
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: A must read that could have been shorter
Review: This is a must read book for all investors, period. However, I thought it was a bit to repetitive (the book in its current form could have been half as long). Also, I think the author could have delved into more details about how to actually determine investor enthusiasm (or lack thereof). He does touch on the fact that credit spreads, PE ratios, and cap rates are quantitative tools used to test investor sentiment for extremes, but I think this book could have used a short chapter dedicated to explaining the nuances and pitfalls associated with using such figures to understand where one stands in a cycle.Nonetheless, this is a fantastic book that has definitely made me a wiser investor.

Reviewer: Jorge Fortes
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Enriching understanding about the ebbs and flows of business, finance, the economy.A must have piece of literature art in the top shelf

Reviewer: Mr X
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Everything Howard Marks writes is super interesting

Reviewer: Kindle Customer
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Howard Marks shows he is a master of the game in this fantastic book. He writes with great clarity of thoughts and deep understanding of the psychology of humans that underlie market cycles. A must read

Reviewer: Client d'Amazon
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Definitely one of the best business books I’ve read during the past years. Mr. Marks shares valuable insights accumulated over his lifelong exposure to financial markets and its experience of several financial crises. This book does an amazing job of explaining how all cycles (capital markets, real estate, credit, etc.) are interlinked and impact one another. Most importantly, it stresses out the importance of investors psychology in creating and inflating cycles, notably during market bubbles or crashes.This helps you get a good understanding of the 2008 GFC , and hopefully - that’s the book’s objective anyway - will help you understand where you’re standing now in the market cycle.The book is well-written, trying too avoid too technical jargon so I’d say it’s addressed to a rather large public. I would recommend it to anyone who’s interested in investing in the stock market, professionally or personally.

Reviewer: Henry
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I think this book has repetitive content. Not sure how often he talked about Mark Twain's quote on how 'the past doesn't repeat, but it often Rhymes'. The whole book was set up that way, perhaps not repeating, but often rhyming with what he wrote earlier on. He was like the preacher that gave the same sermon three Sundays in row and then afterwards was asked "Why do you keep repeating the same sermon?"The preacher simply replied.."I will give keeping the sermon until everyone gets it!"I will have to admit that I do not think that I fully did get 'it' (the explanations of the market cycle), in the beginning of the book, but by the end I did get message.This is not the first lesson I received from Mr. Marks, I also appreciate the continued sermon on risk vs reward. He did write on it again in this book as well. As risk and reward is different at different stages of the cycle.Higher risk does not equal greater reward, unlike what they taught him in school. In fact Michael Milken taught him the reverse lesson, that lower risk can equal greater reward. Mr. Mark then used this new perspective to buy distressed debt (junk bonds) at low prices to gain great gains for his funds. You have to ask yourself "At what price does it get so low that it reduces the risk?"To give an example..In 2019, Oaktree Capital (Mr. Marks fund) bought 500,000 plus shares in a company for 10-20 cents each. He manages $200 Billion. The investment is an estimated $100,000. At that price, what is the risk? There is uncertainty with this company, it could go bankrupt and therefore he could lose the investment, but that would not make a dent in his portfolio. Whereas the upside is that the company has the potential to battle back, and it definitely is working hard. It might take ten years or more, but by then it could build itself back to a $10 per share company. It is nice to see a portfolio where the investor practices what he preaches.Low risk vs High reward. Due diligence on the company and its potential future. Investing with a long time horizon.