Now Available: The Four Filters Invention of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger
I received the news that Bud Labitan has released his first book entitled The Four Filters: Invention of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger. As you might recall, I provided a sneak preview of The Four Filters back in March. That excerpt provides a good overview of the book.
As significant as the refinement of the microscope by Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Labitan believes that Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger invented an investing formula that is underappreciated by the business and academic communities. In his view, the Four Filters developed by Warren E. Buffett and Charles T. Munger is an amazing intellectual achievement in both practical and behavioral finance. He thinks it will have a major future impact in the way business, management, and behavioral finance thinkers shape new methods of combining qualitative and quantitative valuation. After all, the Four Filters are an important set of steps used by the world’s greatest investors. While Mr. Buffett does not endorse this book, he did give Dr. Labitan permission to use his quotes from the annual letters to shareholders. Labitan weaves the material into the story of successful “framing” and the “filtering out” suboptimal investment choices.
Bud’s book is available for order via the secure Google Checkout system at Bud’s website, www.frips.com. The Four Filters is being released in two formats, a spiral bound book for $39.95 and $29.95 for an audio cd generated from text to speech technology read at a rate of 150 words per minute. Bud was planning to publish with a major publisher and he had a contract offer. However, they had wanted to change the book and drop Charlie Munger and Four Filters from the title. This along with plans to expand and dilute the prose was too much for this first time author to bear. Therefore, Bud Labitan decided to self publish his book so that his work could be shared the way he intended, lean and valuable, the new standard in “intelligent investing.”
Is this article an ad for the book?
No, this article is not an ad for the book. Fat Pitch Financials was not paid for this post and I don’t receive any compensation for sales of this book. In the spirit of full disclosure, Dr. Labitan has decided after this post was published to sponsor the montly contest at Value Investing News for the month of May. This only means he will be providing me with a copy of his book and 3 autographed copies to give away to active members at Value Investing News. Sponsorship of the Value Investing News monthly contest remains free, as long as valuable prizes are provided.
I decided to publish this post since Dr. Labitan gave me exclusive rights to be the first to announce the availability of The Four Filters. I have also previously discussed this book, so I thought readers here would be interested to know they can now get the book. I suggest that other authors and publishers take the same steps Dr. Labitan took in order to get similar attention from Fat Pitch Financials.
Just a bit of warning: the guy’s web site is, ehem, rather eclectic. Don’t know how much you think it reflects on the book, judge for yourself.
Thanks to those of you who have ordered my book. Like any book, it will have to stand or fall on its own merits. But, I think you will like it. I tried to keep the foundation of the book true to the Graham Buffett Munger style of investing, while building a story of how this unique “four filters formula” could have evolved from the early use of checklists by Phil Carret and Phil Fisher.
Those familiar with the story will also appreciate and better understand the intellectual contributions of Munger in this book. Those of you who are students of Behavioral Finance will appreciate the efforts to explain why Buffett and Munger bat at a higher long term average than the rest.
In simple terms, if we could all eliminate 99% of all suboptimal investments on a normal distribution, we would be left with the best 1%. Furthermore, if we could buy a steady quality grower of 7% at a 50% bargain, we would end up with an effective yield of 14.68% per year after 10 years.
I had a contract offer to publish with a major N.J. book publisher. However, they wanted to change the book and drop Charlie Munger and “Four Filters” from the title. This along with plans to expand and dilute the prose was too much nonsense and twaddle for this first time author to bear. So, like it or not, this is the work that this author intended, lean and valuable… the new standard in “intelligent investing” that examines the four filters process and innovation of Buffett and Munger.
After you read it, you may be convinced that Munger and Buffett deserve a Nobel Prize in Economics for their contributions to Behavioral Finance. Just ask Takemura and Thaler…
The Four Filters Invention of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger
link to amazon.com site for the book:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0615241298
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