Fooling Some of the People All of the Time

A Long Short Story

By: David Einhorn

Narrated by: L. J. Ganser

Length: 13 hrs and 20 mins

Publisher's summary

A rare look inside the world of activist hedge funds from one of this country's top investors.

In 2002, David Einhorn, the president of Greenlight Capital, gave a speech at a charity investment conference and was asked to share his best investment idea. He described his reasons why Greenlight had sold short the shares of Allied Capital, a leader in the private finance industry. What followed was a firestorm of controversy.

Allied responded with a Washington, D.C. style spin-job - attacking Einhorn and disseminating half-truths and outright lies. Undeterred by the spin-job and lies, Greenlight continued its research after the speech and discovered Allied's behavior was far worse than Einhorn ever suspected. Fooling Some of the People All of the Time is the gripping chronicle of this saga, and this edition contains all new updates from the author.

Minute by minute, it delves deep inside Wall Street, showing how the $6-billion hedge fund Greenlight Capital conducts its investment research and detailing the maneuvers of an unscrupulous company. Along the way, you'll witness feckless regulators, compromised politicians, and the barricades our capital markets have erected against exposing misconduct from important Wall Street customers.

• Goes behind the scenes to detail the truth about investing, short selling, and the politics of business
• Shows the failings of Wall Street: its investment banks, analysts, journalists, and especially our government regulators
• Offers insights into the battles surrounding hedge funds
• Reveals the immense difficulties that prevent the government from sanctioning politically connected companies

At its most basic level, Allied Capital is the story of Wall Street at its worst. But the story is much bigger than one little-known company. Fooling Some of the People All of the Time is an important call for effective law enforcement, free speech, and fair play.

©2008 David Einhorn (P)2010 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"[A] welcome antidote to the thousands of books written for investors that paint a sunny picture of companies.... Mr Einhorn's book recounts behind-the-scenes details of the sort that are seldom made public...an instructive guide for general investors." ( Financial Times)

Decent Story

If you could sum up Fooling Some of the People All of the Time in three words, what would they be?

Anti-Climatic Story. This story drug out the story line and in the end, the "good-guys" really didn't even win.

If you’ve listened to books by David Einhorn before, how does this one compare?

NA

Which scene was your favorite?

NA

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Crooks win

Any additional comments?

It was a good book, but, kinda dragged out everything.

One of the best finance books in a long time!

What made the experience of listening to Fooling Some of the People All of the Time the most enjoyable?

This was an incredibly enjoyable book on all levels. You just have to admire the tenacity and intellect of Einhorn. It would have been the easy way out to cover the short on Allied and let it go, but he stuck with it as he had strong conviction. The amount of detail in his research is astounding. You have to hand it to Einhorn: he deserved to come out victorious in the end. He just did his homework better than anybody else.

Great Book

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

If they work in investing, ohh yeah! Just shows how corruptible the media and government pretend they aren't.

Any additional comments?

I think in time some of these lessons willl be vital.

Amazing, intriguing and disappointing

Sophisticated or unsophisticated, rich or poor, the only way to remedy what has been described in this book is to read it and stand up for the country. So many charged with that responsibility are not.

Great listen

Presenter has a wonderful muse of voices and nails sarcasm wonderfully throughout the story. Sad we never learn.

Riveting

Fascinating. I appreciate the author's powerful analytical mind and relentless determination. Some may find it too detailed, but I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Eye Opening

Liked the book as it is relatively light reading and gives an insight into how a hedge fund guy like Einhorn approaches his short positions. Really seems like alot of fundamental block and tackling to be sure. I would have guessed he is far more aggressive than it appears in the book and press reports.

Having worked in the commercial, state, and federal sectors, I thought I had gained enough perspective to understand the differences and critical insights across the sectors. This book showed me I don't have a clue as to the depth of problems that have been created across these sectors by our "well-intentioned" representatives.

Democrat, republican, independent, we've sent these people down to Washington and they've given us what we probably in retrospect should have expected. A bureaucracy beholden to none except those willing to buy political influence. A modern day PIIGS come to the new world. This book will show you how a wall streeter attempted to cajole push and gain insights into the role function and workings of the SBA, SEC, and DA's organizations. Ultimately it sounds as if nothing would have happened were it not for Homeland Security being concerned about SBA fraud being utilized to finance jihad against the US.

You can't make this stuff up. You can't help but be worried for our children when a mild mannered guy like Einhorn is in one of the leading proponents of capital markets efficiency.

Ultimately this book won't tax you mentally, but will probably spark deeper interest in various topics contained within the book. Would love to see Einhorn's next book describe how "well intentioned" legislation such as Reg FD, Dodd-Frank, etc, etc have changed the relationship that corporate management has with the media, wall-street, and shareholders. Most companies are reasonably well run, but there are some companies that appear to be relying upon the holes and lack of transparency and accountability this legislation has created. It would be interesting to read a book comparing and contrasting of the various mechanisms hedge funds use to find short ideas, propagate analysis, and ultimately effect change that brings more efficiency to the capital markets. Shorting is just mathematically such a nutty idea, but with the changes being brought into effect by legislation I have to imagine short hedge funds are likely to be a growth business in the years to come.

Don’t listen to this if you have investments in public companies!

A fascinating, frustrating, and frightening story for any individual investor. The fact that a public company could behave in such an unethical way without any recourse for many years should scare the pants off of anyone investing in public companies. Couldn’t stop listening!

An inside look at a public short sale

This book is very good if you are interested in investing, Einhorn is a gifted writer and obviously a financial genius. However, be warned that it is full of accounting and regulatory jargon that fill up chapters at a time as Einhorn goes into immense detail of the problems of Allied and the regulatory bodies. Overall, a fascinating story that takes you into the mind of one of modern day's best investors.

where's the epilogue?

A wonderful, albeit heavily detailed account, of Einhorn's search for corporate justice. Given what has happened in the capital markets the past several years, it is easier now to understand the incompetence of regulators. Still, it is a little curious that Einhorn found so few takers of his perspective among what would have appeared to be unbiased professionals (journalists, professors, investors). Also disappointed how casually he dismissed the abusive and illegal tactics of naked short selling. But he does tell a convincing tale and one that should make us think every time we read a glowing account from a Wall Street analyst.

My biggest disappointment was the absence of the epilogue that is included in the newly published book version. Since Allied hit the wall after the completion of this book, I was very much looking forward to hearing how the market finally caught on to the systematic fraud and deception. It would be nice if Audible.com could offer this add-on to its customers who bought this book.