Preferred Stocks: The Art of Profitable Income Investing

Mr. Winans has written the definitive work on preferred stock investing. Having constructed a century long index for tracking price and yield levels, he has provided the essential data needed to include this underappreciated investment vehicle into modern portfolio theory. Prior to his research, investors did not have the proper history to calculate where exactly preferreds rank for returns and deviations. Seriously, one can gather data on stock indices and bond yields back to 1900. But until Mr. Winans construction of the WIPSI preferred stock index there was no continuous reference data for preferred stocks .Filling this void, in itself, is a significant contribution to the investment community. With lots of data and visuals, This book is an absolutely necessity for anyone interested in the risks and rewards.

There is some interesting statistical information regarding the historical performance of preferred stocks versus common stocks, treasuries, corporate bonds. There's is also a nice recap of the events during the global financial crisis and how preferred stocks were affected and behaved. But beyond that, most of this book was dedicated to technical analysis of preferred stocks with one after another indicator thrown against the wall and if you know anything about TA, you would recognize the poor performance in the charts with glossed over descriptions of that performance. Using a 40 week moving average is a poor choice for a trading system and when evaluating it, the author ignored the whipsaws and only identified the signals that worked. Take a pass on this book. Better information is available.

Clearly identifies the risks and rewards of this assert class . The characteristics and history of preferreds are summarized. The most surprising assertion and presentation was how technical analysis is applicable to evaluating a "momentum" based approach for a fixed income investment. For fixed income investors certainty of return takes precedence over price regression returns. I found the historical yield spread tables to be the most useful since the preferred yield spreads are compared to yields of corporates ,minus ,10yr and 90 day going back to 1900. Although not required for comprehension , some technical analysis - such as trend crossovers - would be helpful.

This book is a complete waste of time. It barely discuses preferred stocks and actually speaks more of technical analysis and bonds, it also does that poorly. Don't buy this book.

Product, packaging, delivery,... all excellent!

The purpose of the book seems to be to try to convince the investor that its too difficult to learn to invest in Perfered Stock,but for a big fee his company will do it for you. While there is some good information in the book but there is very good information on the FFC website for free.

An overall good book offering personal financial advice. The book was well written with accompanying charts to reinforce what is being presented. The author goes at great lengths to explain financial terms for easy understanding. I thought though that there were some instances in the book which took more time to understand and apply. This is a textbook about performing portfolio management and making it more understandable.

Ken is an outstanding speaker and a true 'student of the market.' The covers the market with a particular focus on preferred stocks. Great read!