The Financial Review

HOW DOES MONEY HELP IN CREATING A HAPPY LIFE? In The Geometry of Wealth, behavioral finance expert Brian Portnoy delivers an inspired answer based on the idea that wealth, truly defined, is funded contentment. It is the ability to underwrite a meaningful life. This stands in stark contrast to angling to become rich, which is usually an unsatisfying treadmill. At the heart of this groundbreaking perspective, Portnoy takes readers on a journey toward wealth, informed by disciplines ranging from ancient history to modern neuroscience. He contends that tackling the big questions about a joyful life and tending to financial decisions are complementary, not separate, tasks. These big questions include: • How is the human brain wired for two distinct experiences of happiness? And why can money “buy” one but not the other? • Why is being market savvy among the least important aspects of creating wealth but self-awareness among the most? • Can we strike a balance between pushing for more and being content with enough? This journey memorably contours along three basic shapes: A circle, triangle, and square help us visualize how we adapt to evolving circumstances, set clear priorities, and find empowerment in simplicity. In this accessible and entertaining book, Portnoy reveals that true wealth is achievable for many—including those who despair it is out of reach—but only in the context of a life in which purpose and practice are thoughtfully calibrated.

Guide to understanding information presented in the financial pages of newspapers. Using the 'Australian Financial Review' as a model, it describes the kind of information presented in its various sections. Offers assistance in interpreting tables and understanding financial terms and concepts. Includes an index. The author is an experienced financial journalist and bureau chief of the 'Australian Financial Review' in Melbourne.

There's nothing quite like the feeling of having your own money to spend. All those things you've wanted forever now feel within your reach ... But it's easy to make mistakes when you go from having no money to having some. Money can be really easy to lose track of, especially if you have no clue how to manage it. And when you learn that men and women are still not equal when it comes to money, it can feel like a lot. Luckily, Money Queens: Rule Your Money is full of tips and tools to help you avoid the gaps, traps and mishaps of money management. Queens, start ruling your money before it rules you: you can't afford not to! From personal finance writer Michelle Bowes comes a self-empowerment guide that covers all the must-know money basics like saving and budgeting, as well as bigger topics like credit cards; buy now, pay later services; superannuation; and investing. It even explains how to write a CV, what to do when you get your first job and what to expect to pay for when you finish high school. This guidebook is the best friend that every teen girl needs as she embarks on her first relationship with money.

The importance of disclosure as a regulatory device in company law is widely recognized. This book explores the disclosure requirements of companies in their reporting activities, and seeks to bring together the main features of the reporting system. The book considers the theoretical basis of the corporate reporting system and describes the regulatory framework for that system. It explores financial reporting and 'narrative' reporting, highlighting the fact that financial reporting requirements are more substantially developed than narrative reporting requirements - a consequence of the shareholder-centred vision that persists in company law. The roles of those responsible for providing corporate reports and those entitled to receive such information are examined. The book concludes with some broad suggestions for future development, with particular focus on the need to recognize the relevance of the communicative role of corporate reporting. The use of new technology also presents both challenges and opportunities for improving the regime.

An “artfully presented [and] engaging” look at the insidious effects of financialization on our lives and politics by the author of Treasure Islands (The Boston Globe). How didthe banking sector grow from a supporter of business to the biggest business in the world? Financial journalist Nicholas Shaxson takes us on a terrifying journey through the world economy, exposing tax havens, monopolists, megabanks, private equity firms, Eurobond traders, lobbyists, and a menagerie of scoundrels quietly financializing our entire society, hurting both business and individuals. Shaxson shows how we got here, telling the story of how finance re-engineered the global economic order in the last half-century, with the aim not of creating wealth but extracting it from the underlying economy. Under the twin gospels of “national competitiveness” and “shareholder value,” megabanks and financialized corporations have provoked a race to the bottom between states to provide the most subsidized environment for big business, encouraged a brain drain into finance, fostered instability and inequality, and turned a blind eye to the spoils of organized crime. From Ireland to Iowa, he shows the insidious effects of financialization on our politics and on communities who were promised paradise but got poverty wages instead. We need a strong financial system—but when it grows too big it becomes a monster. The Finance Curse is the explosive story of how finance got a stranglehold on society, and reveals how we might release ourselves from its grasp. Revised with new chapters “[Discusses] corrupt financiers in London and New York City, geographically obscure tax havens, the bizarre realm of wealth managers in South Dakota, a ravaged newspaper in New Jersey, and a shattered farm economy in Iowa . . . A vivid demonstration of how corruption and greed have become the main organizing principles in the finance industry.” —Kirkus Reviews