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Here is our collection of the best books on value investing for 2022. We have separated them by best in category, as each author may have a different experience and may aim for a select or targeted audience.
Value investing as an investment method has a long-proven track record. From our selection of books on value investing, we hope you’ll learn the know-how and knowledge to apply them in your investment decisions.
Living examples of investors that use value investing as their main concept are countless and well-known. Probably the best-known value investor is Warren Buffet, but there are many more such as Peter Lynch, Bruce Flatt, Jonathan Gray, and Abigail Johnson among many others.
Best Book for Beginners – The 8-Step Beginner’s Guide to Value Investing, by Freeman Publications (Rating 
$14.95)
This book wins the best for beginners’ category because it is written in plain and easy-to-understand English. There is no jargon, just knowledge, and information about becoming a successful value investor.
Having said that it may also be useful to more veteran investors as it is full of tips and processes to refine your investing decisions. The book states various examples of companies that are currently undervalued and may become the next Amazon or Netflix.
More important than the tips themselves, is the fact that the book teaches you how to find companies that have value and can become big revenue creators in the long run. The book also covers how to manage your investments.
The book teaches you how to avoid the three big mistakes investors make:
- Exiting a stock as soon as it loses some cash and exiting a winning investment too early.
- Relying only on social media and stock tipsters for their information.
- Jumping into hot stocks of overvalued companies for fear of missing out.
These are classic mistakes many investors and traders make constantly; you’ll learn how to avoid them.
The authors also describe a rational process for investing, designed for long-term profits. And the book comes with an extra free online video course “Company Valuation 101”.
Best Classic Literature – The Intelligent Investor, by Benjamin Graham (Rating 
$14.29)
This book comes in first place for the classical literature category. I can’t think of any other book on value investing that is so renowned and has been around for such a long time. The book was written by Benjamin Graham and was first published in 1949.
Benjamin Graham was a Wall Street top investor during the 1920s and a professor at Columbia University, New York where he graduated. His teachings have become the foundations for many value investors and the proof of their validity is the decades-long legacy of his book.
There are many books on value investing but this one lays the grounds for those that follow. This book may not be the best book to pick up if you are a complete beginner, but we highly recommend it as an essential read to every value investor at some point.
Graham’s principles were based on buying stocks with market prices that were lower than their real value. To be able to achieve this, he came up with security analysis, a novelty at the time. His principles are based on creating long-term strategies and avoiding substantial errors.
Best Overall – Value Investing: From Graham to Buffet and Beyond, by Bruce C. Greenwald (Rating 
$31.28)
Among the best books on value investing this one takes the top spot for best overall. Value Investing: From Graham to Buffett & Beyond is now in its second edition. The authors have substantially rewritten this book and added two new chapters and investor profiles.
The two new chapters discuss the valuation of growth stocks, while the investor profiles include Tom Russo, Paul Hilal, and Andrew Weiss. Plus, an extended discussion on risk management and modern best practices.
This book would probably not be best suited for a beginner and seems aimed at institutional and retail investors and asset managers.
The authors bring together decades of experience in value investing in academia and the real world of asset management. The experience of the top three authors is outlined below:
- Bruce C. Greenwald – Professor of finance and asset management at Columbia University Business School, since 1991.
- Judd Kahn – CFO Summit Street Capital Management, New York.
- Erin Bellissimo – Managing Director Notre Dame Institute for Global Investing
Best From a Market Professional – One Up on Wall Street: How to Use What You Already Know, by Petr Lynch (Rating $9.39)
A series on the best books on value investing wouldn’t be complete without a publication from a major market player. Peter Lynch is a Warren Buffet style asset manager, just as successful but not as well known.
Peter Lynch’s book has sold over one million copies and makes great leverage of this successful fund manager’s approach to investing. He has always believed that you should invest in things you know. And that the retail investor actually has advantages compared to institutional asset managers.
In the book Lynch explains what these advantages are, and that the average investor has opportunities around them everywhere. As we go about our daily lives, we encounter products and services all the time. He maintains you should pay attention to these as you can discover the next ten-bagger early on.
In the book, you’ll find advice on how to read a company’s financial statements. Which of these numbers and figures are really important, to figure out the desirable companies from the undesirable. He also offers insight into investing in cyclical and fast-growth stocks.
Best From Personal Experience – The Education of a Value Investor: My Transformative Quest for Wealth, Wisdom, and Enlightenment, by Guy Spier (Rating $17.99)
Guy Spier’s book on value investing bags the top spot from a personal experience viewpoint. Spier tells a great life story and explains what it takes to become a performing value investor. The author details how he set out for riches in a career on Wall Street only looking out for himself.
And how through a series of events that shaped his views and gave him an insight into the correct path, he changed his direction. Spier went from an asset management job with a tier-3 firm to running his own fund. And making great returns for his investors at the same time.
He relates how he first ran into the book mentioned above, The Intelligent Investor, and then an extremely expensive paid lunch with Warren Buffet. And in between a life-changing meeting with investor Mohnish Pabrai.
Spier learned that having the right mentors and role models was key to his success. He also says his key takeaway from his lunch with Buffet was that the ultimate goal in life is to be true to yourself. The book mixes financial success with transformational awakening.
Bottom Line
When making investment decisions the amount of information out there may seem overwhelming, and that’s because it is. So, going it all alone, may not be the most productive path. Institutional traders and investors are more likely to succeed than their independent retail investor peers.
The reason is that institutional investors have a whole team of analysts working with them. They are very unlikely to miss anything about a possible asset and are more likely to make an informed decision.
No matter whether you are investing instocks, real estate or precious metals you may want to make use of professional help in making your investment decisions. You can read our reviews on the top investment newsletters here.
Gino D'Alessio is a Broker/Dealer with over twenty years experience in various OTC markets such as Bonds, FX and Derivatives. Currently a Financial Markets and Investments Writer & Analyst
