Engines That Move Markets - 2nd Edition by Alasdair Nairn (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Engines That Move Markets is a comprehensive history of market-shaping industries and their impact on how we invest today. Now in its second edition, this modern investing classic highlights the history of industrial development and its impact on investors. By exploring key technological advances of the past and what they meant for investors - including electricity, the railroad, the telephone, the computer and more - it provides vital insights on how to appraise the new technology companies of the future. A complete and deeply researched history of industries and investing, the book is filled with fascinating and instructive details, including how Thomas Edison lost control of his company, the impact of the Standard Oil breakup, the early days of the wireless industry, and the course of the computer and internet revolution. Investors looking for industry-shaping investments will undoubtedly use Engines That Move Markets as their guide. This revised and updated second edition is the most definitive and comprehensive version yet.

Review Quotes

"This book has much wisdom, and much that could be learned by investors or companies plannning to back new technologies." --Financial Times

"An outstanding book - a must read for all serious investors and for anyone interested in technology. A meticulously researched, scholarly, yet very readable and often amusing account of how technology has changed our lives and the world we live in over the last 200 years. The focus is on the returns from investing in technology, the pitfalls, and the timeless lessons." --Professor Paul Marsh, Emeritus Professor of Finance at London Business School and coauthor of the Triumph of the Optimists and The Global Investment Returns Yearbook

"An intriguing study of the psychology and market dynamics underlying technology-based stock market manias." --Barry Riley, Financial Times

"Engines That Move Markets is an insightful study into the history of technology and the lessons it has taught us. This book reveals in detail how technology has changed our economy, our markets, our society and the world we live in. Sandy Nairn has combined his talents as a scholar, analyst and investor to guide us through the past and help us understand where the future has yet to lead us." --Thomas L. Hansberger, CFA, president and CEO, Hansberger Global Investors, Inc.

"One of the best books ever written on investing - and on technology, too. History repeats itself, especially in technology. You should not invest in new technologies before you study how old technologies were created, developed, matured and disrupted. What is happening today in AI and cryptocurrencies might be analogous to the whale oil industry of 1850s or the horse-drawn carriages of the 1890s." --Philippe Laffont, Founder of 5starrated technology hedge fund, Coatue Management

About the Author

Alasdair (Sandy) Nairn is one of the founders of Edinburgh Partners, an independent fund management company which was acquired by Franklin Templeton in 2018. Prior to establishing Edinburgh Partners he was chief investment officer of Scottish Widows investment Partnership, and between 1990 and 2000 was employed by Templeton Investment Management where he was executive vice president and director of global equity research.
Before joining Templeton investment Management, Sandy spent four years at Murray Johnstone as a portfolio manager and research analyst. Prior to that, he spent a year as an economist at the Scottish Development Agency. He is currently Investment Partner and CEO of Edinburgh Partners and Chairman of the Templeton Global Equity Group.

Sandy graduated from the University of Strathclyde and has a PhD in economics from the University of Strathclyde/Scottish Business School. He is an Associate of the UK Society of Investment Professionals in the UK and is a CFA charterholder with the CFA Institute in the United States. In 2020 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

In 2001, he published the first edition of Engines That Move Markets, with the updated second edition being published in 2018. He has won multiple performance awards for the management of global equity portfolios over his 37-year investment career. In 2012 he co-authored the book Templeton's Way With Money with Jonathan Davis.