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These two programs, installments from the PBS series
Beyond Wall Street: The Art of Investing, showcase two entirely different ways of picking stocks and also provide varying opinions on their effectiveness. The idea that a computer--actually roomfuls of computers--can pick stocks better than human analysts may seem ridiculous at first, but a visit to Barr Rosenberg makes it seem utterly sensible. A manager of mutual funds, Rosenberg uses "quantitative analysis" to track the movements of stocks and identify optimum times to buy and sell. His staff, seated at banks of computers, not only crunch numbers about stocks, but even track the habits of other money managers in an attempt to "trade ahead of sentiment." Journalist Andrew Tobias is skeptical, but his visit to Rosenberg raises fascinating questions about a radical approach to stock picking. Another strategy is personified by Bill Sharpe, a proponent of index funds who also happens to be the winner of a Nobel Prize. Index funds reflect the movement of a particular segment of the entire market, and Sharpe makes the case that indexing is more reliable than picking individual stocks; he recommends it as a "boring way to get rich." Hosted by journalists Tobias and Jane Bryant Quinn, these programs offer an insightful look at how alert minds have found new angles to divine the movements of the market.
--Robert J. McNamara
