Book Review – Bulls Bears and Other Beasts: A Story of the Indian Stock Market – Santosh Nair

Over the last few months have started reading through Kindle on PC/Ipad so I keep searching for discounted books once in a while.

Happened to read this book - Bulls, Bears and other Beasts : A Story of the Indian Stock Market which was avaialble at a great discount.

I loved the book and finished it in 2-3 days as its an easy read. I enjoyed the chapter - "The Denouement" where the fictional character Mr Lala ( which I think is a real character or from the trading circle ) explains the 2008 year starting with Reliance Power and ends with a quick explanation of how he was part of bear hammering an energy stock  alongwith Old Fox. Would recommend reading it.

It is available on Amazon for Rs 260 for paperback and 275 for Kindle.

Bulls, Bears and Other Beasts: A Story of the Indian Stock Market

( Disclosure - This is not a paid post. I am an amazon affiliate and may get some pennies if you buy from above link. Will buy more books. )

I aksed my team mate Harsh Doshi who has spent just a year trading to write a book review, as he would give a freshers perspective on the book as well.

Book Review

The book written by Santosh Nair (Editor, Moneycontrol.com) claims the book to be a story of Indian Stock Market ; Well, to a great extent it is!

The story is narrated by a fictional character named ‘Lalchand Gupta’. Though the character is fictional (purposely), the stories mentioned are quite realistic. Lala as he is known in his friend circle takes you through his experience of the events which panned out at the Dalal Street from 1988 till the recent times.

Lala starts the journey with his troubled childhood at school to his boring accounting job and how his curiosity landed him to the world of stock market. Back in those days, when awareness about investing was at a nascent stage, money making was a different ball game altogether. From easy IPO money to dubious operators selling fake shares to insider trading, Lala takes through the journey in a most lucid and simplistic manner which makes it all the more interesting to read.

Lala has many interesting stories to share, some of which are listed below:

• · How dealers used to trade based on Insider trading and front running the trades of big players
• · Who were the famous stock operators on Dalal Street and their modus operandi
• · The gloom and doom of the big bulls Harshad Mehta and Ketan Parekh
• · How the stocks were being operated on behest of promoters
• · The constant tussle between Bull cartel & the Bear cartel
• · Who were the Big Bulls of different times & who used to influence the investors
• · Transition from Ring trading to Screen based trading
• · How global events like Gulf War, Y2K bug, Quantitative Easing etc. impacted the Indian Stock Market.
• · How domestic events like Terrorists Attack, Elections, Scams, Govt. and RBI Policies, impacted and shaped the structure of Indian Stock Market.
• · How entry of NSE changed the old way of trading
• · How entry of SEBI shaped up the Indian Capital Market structure.
• · Big players then (LIC, UTI) v/s Big players today (FII,DII).
• · Satyam Scam and NSEL Scam
• · How IPO over the years fared in terms of number of new issues and capital raised and how it were traded in Grey market
• · IPO’s that were block buster and those which were lacklustre.
• · How promoters were involved in manipulating the stock prices of their companies.

Also, Lala has described various stock operations in which he himself was part of with his affiliates; Interactions he used to have with his mentors and learning’s he got from them, mistakes he committed and some good decisions he made on his journey to success. He has also shared how emotions can play game on a trader’s mind and how he managed to remain sane in tough times. Finally, how he came under the lenses of regulatory bodies and how he had to stay low.

Who should read this book?

Everyone who currently follows the stock market or have an interest in knowing how the Indian stock market works. A new bird in the industry (like me) who only has a little idea of the history of the Indian stock markets and also the veterans in the industry should also grab the book, just for the old times’ sake and reliving the old memories.

Do post in your comments after you read the book.

The last book review I wrote  100 to 1 in Stock Market by Thomas Phelps – Review – Highly Biased and Glorified – Not Worth it.

Another book which I read recently and should have read much before -

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do, and How to Change