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A Man for All Markets

From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market

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About this listen

 The incredible true story of the card-counting mathematics professor who taught the world how to beat the dealer and, as the first of the great quantitative investors, ushered in a revolution on Wall Street.

A child of the Great Depression, legendary mathematician Edward O. Thorp invented card counting, proving the seemingly impossible: that you could beat the dealer at the blackjack table. As a result he launched a gambling renaissance. His remarkable success—and mathematically unassailable method—caused such an uproar that casinos altered the rules of the game to thwart him and the legions he inspired. They barred him from their premises, even put his life in jeopardy. Nonetheless, gambling was forever changed.

Thereafter, Thorp shifted his sights to “the biggest casino in the world”: Wall Street. Devising and then deploying mathematical formulas to beat the market, Thorp ushered in the era of quantitative finance we live in today. Along the way, the so-called godfather of the quants played bridge with Warren Buffett, crossed swords with a young Rudy Giuliani, detected the Bernie Madoff scheme, and, to beat the game of roulette, invented, with Claude Shannon, the world’s first wearable computer.

Here, for the first time, Thorp tells the story of what he did, how he did it, his passions and motivations, and the curiosity that has always driven him to disregard conventional wisdom and devise game-changing solutions to seemingly insoluble problems. An intellectual thrill ride, replete with practical wisdom that can guide us all in uncertain financial waters, A Man for All Markets is an instant classic—a book that challenges its readers to think logically about a seemingly irrational world.

Includes a PDF of appendices from the book.

Praise for A Man for All Markets

“In A Man for All Markets, [Thorp] delightfully recounts his progress (if that is the word) from college teacher to gambler to hedge-fund manager. Along the way we learn important lessons about the functioning of markets and the logic of investment.”—The Wall Street Journal

“[Thorp] gives a biological summation (think Richard Feynman’s Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!) of his quest to prove the aphorism ‘the house always wins’ is flawed. . . . Illuminating for the mathematically inclined, and cautionary for would-be gamblers and day traders”—Library Journal Analysis & Strategy Business Economics Investing & Trading Personal Finance Professionals & Academics Investing Mathematics Wall Street Stock Banking Inspiring Wisdom Game Biography Stock Market History
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Really interesting book, but why oh why did the author read it himself rather than using a professional? It’s the most badly read book in my large collection of Audible books. A great shame because Edward O Thorp is one of the most intelligent and influential men of his generation.

Spoilt by the performance

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I’d never heard of Edward O. Thorp, super story but personally I realised that if you aren’t a mathematician like Dr Thorp, stay away from complex trading as boy does it some complicated.
Another good life story

Talk about an interesting life.

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Thank you Mr. Thorp! You and your life are the true inspiration - I hope not only for me, but for the future generations.

a book that changed my life.

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this was a great listen to hear someone's story including what they learnt through their life. excellent insight is provided on our world and how mathematics and how probability has helped develop his decision making. greatly recommend to anyone.

interesting biography of an interesting Man

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I read the paper book some years ago half way, not the book's fault that I did not finish it, nowadays it is much easier for me to listen to books than to read them.
Fortunately this book is perfectly fit for audio so when I discovered that it is available, I listened it from the beginning to the end. The author is reading it himself - this is usually a warning for me, but Thorp's performance is excellent also in this...
It is an interesting life story of an amazing mind.
Some lessons/advice anyone can take from Thorp is to "check for yourself" and be sceptic, if something is too good to be true. Seize the opportunities, but at the same time money and fame is not everything. Know also when enough is enough, and don't forget to live your life and spend time with your loved ones.
He has beaten the casinos in Black Jack and roulette - the latter with a garage-made wearable computer in the 1960's (the first if its kind), with the great Claude Shannon, father of Information Theory himself. They used the hidden device together in the casinos - as "Shannon had a large foot, so he operated the timer button with his big toe" (not an exact citation). He wrote a book (Beat the Dealer) on how to win against the House, so everyone else could do it... He invented and used the Black-Scholes option pricing formula independently 2 years before the Nobel laureates first published it, but this did not bother him.

He is one of the very few people I would surely trust with my money to invest, if he still had his market neutral hedge fund.
Respect.

Amazing man, interesting story and life lessons

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