Content for True Beginners

Here are some very basic resources for true beginners to investing. I recommend picking 1 or 2 very simple intro investing books, and 1 or 2 behavioral/psychology books. Look things up on investopedia.com if there are terms or concepts you don't understand.

Read a lot, but make sure you pause to absorb, reflect, write, and discuss with friends! Ask why, and write down a list of questions or things you want to understand. 

Books for basic investing concepts

• The Little Book that Beats the Market by Joel Greenblatt - recommended as the starting point for someone completely new to investing. Chapters 1-5 explain the most important basic concepts of "value investing," Pg. 83-87 explain the very important concept of Return on Capital. Pg. 100-103 explain why stocks tend to revert to intrinsic value over time. I advise people to skip the other parts unless they want to hear the "magic formula" strategy the author is pitching in those chapters. 
• The Making of An American Capitalist by Roger Lowenstein
• Essays of Warren Buffett by Lawrence Cunningham

Books for basic behavioral finance concepts

• The Little Book of Behavioral Investing by James Montier (Note: as you may notice, the Little Book series is very helpful - there are many of these!)
• Your Money and Your Brain by Jason Zweig
• The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel

Books/resources for basic accounting and finance concepts

• Why Stocks Go Up And Down by William Pike - highly recommended for a very accessible introduction to core accounting and finance concepts. Billed as "the book you need to understand other investment books."
• The website investopedia.com has excellent basic resources and definitions for beginners. I remember looking up many terms during my first investing internship in college on Investopedia. 

Basic investing/finance/valuation training

NYU Stern Professor Aswath Damodoran has open-sourced a huge amount of material from the classes he teaches on introductory investing, finance, and valuation. You can find them at the links below. Some of the classes can be taken for certificate credit, for fee; others are completely free. 

• Professor Damodoran has a blog post where he recommends how to sequence his online classes. Take a look at that first. There is a helpful flow chart in the section under sequencing.
• Aswath Damodoran classes homepage

Learn from business titans

Founders Podcast - every week host David Senra reads a biography of a great entrepreneur, businessperson, or historical figure and walks you through his key takeaways. It's an awesome, fast way to learn from the titans of history. (Don't let this stop you reading some full-length biographies too!)

The Art of Investing "Podclass"

Paul Buser and Rick Buhrman of Sator Grove Holdings have taught, for years, a class at Notre Dame called the Art of Investing. For the first time, in 2023, they have created a "podclass" following the guest speakers and learnings from the course. I highly recommend giving it a listen. Learn more here.