Who’s better to learn from than those who have experienced it all – billionaires! Some of them have been through it all, the lows and highs of financial freedom and investing.
And what better way to learn than to follow in their footsteps by reading those materials they have read.
It’s for this reason that we would be looking at the 30 Best investing/investment Books that billionaires have recommended.
The idea is to share in the wealth of wisdom that was propounded by the writers of these books recommended by billionaires.
Nonetheless, take a look at our table of content and feel free to navigate through it.
According to an HBR article, “Nike founder Phil Knight so reveres his library that in it you have to take off your shoes and bow.”
Oprah Winfrey credits books with much of her success: “Books were my path to personal freedom.” She has shared her reading habit with the world via her book club.
These two are not alone. Consider the extreme reading habits of other billionaire entrepreneurs:
- Warren Buffett spends five to six hours a day reading five newspapers and 500 pages of corporate reports.
- Bill Gates reads 50 books a year.
- Mark Zuckerberg aimed to read at least one book every two weeks.
- Elon Musk grew up reading two books a day, according to his brother.
- Mark Cuban reads for more than three hours every day.
- Arthur Blank, a co-founder of Home Depot, reads two hours a day.
- Billionaire entrepreneur David Rubenstein reads six books a week.
- Dan Gilbert, the self-made billionaire who owns the Cleveland Cavaliers, reads for one to two hours a day.
Introduction
In the journey to “become”, your path has been made straight by those who have passed through it. You do not need to go through the same experiences again if you can help it.
Rather, you learn from those before you – implement the lessons you need and stay off their mistake.
This is one way we all can learn from people we admire. It’s a form of distant mentoring that accords you the opportunity to learn from your role models.
However, this distant mentoring can only happen if you seek the same knowledge these “distant mentors” draw their strengths from.
This is why we would be looking at some of the best investing books as recommended by Billionaires.
30 Best Investing Books That 20 Billionaires Have Recommended In 2021
Before we get on with this you have to understand that there are majorly two secrets about these best-investing books. The first is to read and understand what it talks about, and the second which is perhaps the best is implementing what you’ve read.
To kick-start, we will first look at some of the best-investing books Billionaire investor and CEO Warren Buffet recommended.
#1. The Intelligent Investor
According to Buffett, reading The Intelligent Investor was the best decision he ever made in his career.
The book is a guide to the mindset of a successful stock investor Benjamin Graham.
It can be difficult to read for first-time investors due to fancy financial terminology/parlance. The book will you understand a lot about investing if you can get past the jargon.
Fun fact: Benjamin Graham was Warren Buffett’s professor at Columbia – and Buffett was the only student to get an A+ in his investment classes – ever!
#2. Security Analysis
This book is the textbook that Warren Buffett used in college when he studied under Benjamin Graham. In fact, the intelligent investor was a spin-off of the ideas found in this larger text.
However, the book is a tad difficult to understand by an average investor, and for this purpose, a summary guide was written. This will help grasp the message the booking is trying to pass along.
This book is the legacy of a great thinker and an investor who took on the most difficult aspects of investing and quantified them. Security Analysis is an all-time bestseller, and Warren Buffett has repeatedly attributed his investment success and valuation skills to this book.
#3. How To Win Friends And Influence People
The importance of this book to the investment journey and experience of Warren Buffet could be seen in his act of exaltation of the book – one of the acts includes a sign in his office that says “I completed the Dale Carnegie Course – Dale Carnegie’s writing and courses changes my life.”
Therefore, if you’d like to experience what made him give so much praise to this book, you must get the book.
This was written completely by Buffett, and it literally has years of information that document his wise decisions.
This book has an unprecedented amount of positive reviews because of the ever-flowing amount of insights that are contained in the book. Buffett’s Shareholder letters are actually free and on the Berkshire Hathaway website, but the hardcopy is nice to have in the event the site no longer hosts the information.
#5. Common Stocks and Common Profits
According to Warren, he’s 85% Graham and 15% Fisher. And the reason for this isn’t far-fetched. It can be seen in his investing activities that he was highly influenced by the book.
This book has been a #1 best seller for decades and it caters to investors interested in the proper valuation of growth companies and finding quality businesses that endure.
#6. 1. ‘Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger’
The book is a compilation of financial wisdom in form of speeches and essays written by Charlie Munger. Charlie Munger is Buffets’ longtime business partner and VP of Berkshire.
Munger is also the author of Psychology of Human Judgement, a classic that is very popular among his fans. The book is about the traps that some investors fall into in their investment endeavors.
“Just buy a copy and carry it around; it will make you look urbane and erudite,” Buffett joked in his 2010 shareholder letter.
#7. ‘A Few Lessons for Investors and Managers From Warren Buffett’
Unlike the title, it’s an 81(some people would consider it a few though) pages easy and a must-read for managers and investors. So if you’re a manager or an investor looking to soak up knowledge from the Oracle of Omaha, check out the material.
Buffett in his words explains how to think about important topics such as business valuation, traits of good and bad businesses, acquisitions and their traps, how to reduce risk, corporate governance, and the importance of trust.
#8. ‘Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything’
Loomis in this book offers readers insights into Buffett’s investment strategies, along with his wisdom on management, philanthropy, public policy, and even parenting.
#9. ‘The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success
The book was written by William N. Thorndike.
In “The Outsiders,” William N. Thorndike, a graduate of Harvard College and the Stanford Graduate School of Business, details the extraordinary success of eight successful CEOs who took a radically different approach to corporate management.
To understand the stories of these CEOs, get the book for yourself and learn what you need to be doing differently.
#10. ‘The Clash of the Cultures: Investment vs. Speculation’
The book is written by John C. Bogle about the invasion of speculation in the retirement industry and the changing culture in a hedge fund.
The most valuable takeaway is his list of 10 simple rules of “Common Senses Investing.” Which he admits “may not be the best strategy ever devised. But the number of strategies that are worse is infinite.”
#11. ‘Investing Between The Lines: How To Make Smarter Decisions By Decoding CEO Communications’
The book was written by L.J. Rittenhouse and was recommended by Buffet in his 2012 shareholder letter.
L.J. Rittenhouse drew from his more than 10 years’ worth of research to outline a system to measure organizational trustworthiness as a predictor of investment potential.
The book was also written by John C. Bogle. It’s an important book and would prove to be very useful to “baby” investors.
In 2014 this was what Warren Buffet wrote in the book “Rather than listening to their Investment managers) siren songs, investors — large and small — should instead read ‘The Little Book of Common Sense Investing.’
Books Recommended By Bill Gate
Just like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates needs no introduction. He’s the owner of Microsoft and a billionaire. Bill Gates has been on the list of the richest men in the world for almost a decade now.
Below are some of the books he recommended.
#13. Capital In The Twenty-First Century
Piketty’s work outlines the problems with inequality in the world. Bill Gates as well as the rest of the world has been amazed by his work.
Gates has personally told Piketty about his concerns regarding the suggested policy descriptions in the book but has also praised him for the spark in the global discussion of the matter. Get the book to find out more.
#14. The Rosie Effect
One of Gates’s favorite books. The book is not about core financial investments but hampers on building relationships and investing time and energy in making it work.
What most people may not realize is that it takes a lot to learn how to invest time and energy in maintaining relationships. Be it intimate or business relationships.
Books Recommended By Elon Musk
Elon Musk is currently the richest man in the world with over 200 billion dollars in net worth. Below are some of his Best investing books.
#15. American Life by Benjamin Franklin
Franklin has always been one of Musk’s heroes. Although he’s living in a different time and age, Musk says that he has been inspired by Franklin’s success as an entrepreneur who started with nothing, a feat Musk can relate to.
Learn from those that have taught the best, read the American Life by Benjamin Franklin.
#16. The Law of Divine Compensation, On Work, Money, and Miracles
The was written by Marianne Williamson and according to Marianne Williamson, our thoughts create our financial reality.
“In our ability to think about something differently lies the power to make it different”.
This is a book of work, money, and miracles. One of the best investment books you’d get.
#17. The Science of Getting Rich
Written by Wallace Wattles in 1910, the book provided the intellectual framework for many personal wealth-building seminars. Wallace Wattle believed that how you think about your ability to accumulate wealth is how you create wealth. If you believe that money is evil, you won’t be wealthy.
#18. The 50th Law
The book was written by Robert Green the author of 48 laws of power and 50 cents.
This book is recommended by top entrepreneurs, with the central theme of this being fearlessness, something much needed in re-framing your thoughts about wealth, being rich, and that anyone can make it financially.
#19. Secrets Of The Millionaire Mind
The book was written by Harv Eker and in this book, he tries to delve into the mind of the rich. The book has simple to follow strategies that would help readers change their attitude towards finance – which he opines is as important as financial education.
#20. How To Get Out Of Debt, Stay Out of Debt & Live Prosperously
Written by Jerrold Mundis. The book helps you understand how to live frugally and the importance of eradicating debt. Ensure you get this one.
#21. Think and Grow Rich
Written by Napolean hill in 1929 after the great depression, it compiles the success stories of over five hundred people. The research was conducted over two decades by Napolean Hill.
#22. The Automatic Millionaire
Written by David Bach, this book is a great start. It’s a common-sense approach that is step by step.
#24. The Intelligent Investor of Practical Counsel
Written by Benjamin Graham and Jason Zweig in 1949 Warren Buffet suggest that every investor reads “Chapters 8 and 20 of this book as it has shaped his shaped his investing activities for more than 60 years,”
Book Recommended By Charlie Munger
Charlie Munger is worth around 2 billion dollars and has worked with Warren Buffet for a long time.
#25 Influence: The Psychology Of Persuasion
“Robert Cialdini (the author) has had a greater impact on my thinking than any other scientist – -Charlie Munger.
He’s one of the best minds in Berkshire Hathaway and if he says a book is good, then it is.
#26. The Life Of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
In today’s money, John Rockefeller would have been worth $340 billion dollars. In 1999, Charlie said, “I found this book very intriguing. His life, his company, his investments, and his management style are all worth studying.”
Books Recommended By Mark Cuban
#27. The Only Investment Guide You’ll Ever Need
Cuban might have been inspired by the very title of the book when he said that it’s the only investment book that made truly sense to him. This is a book that puts the investor and not the market in the driver’s seat.
#28. The Richest Man in Babylon
Written by George S. Clason. It’s about parables and acquiring wealth, and the book has inspired investors since the 1920s. He emphasizes charitable giving and saving overspending.
#29. The Millionaire Fast Lane
The book was written by MJ DeMarco and it’s about how to use the volatility of the financial markets to get rich quickly and enjoy it.
#30 Rich Dad Poor Dad
The book was written by Robert T. Kiyosaki. This book makes it to most lists on financial freedom and wealth. He says that the key to great wealth is a person’s ability to convert earned income, such as a paycheck into passive income.
Conclusion
There’s a saying that when a man who isn’t rich continues to hang around men that are rich, he becomes the next rich guy.
But we all know it’s not all white and black, people don’t just start hanging around people they really don’t know.
So until you get to meet them, you have to start thinking and acting like them. The books above are such books that would change your perspectives about investing, finances, and life in general.
Get yourself as many of these books as you can to get started.
Good luck.
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