A unique, truly comprehensive guide to all aspects of investment, that provides a wealth of expert advice and information in clear and jargon-free language that everyone will understand. Part I - getting startedWhat are shares? How to buy and sell shares and what to expect in terms of returns? How to find a stockbroker that's right for you. How much money should you invest directly in shares? Lower-risk investments in bonds, gilts, and unit and investment trusts. Risk - and achieving the balance between risk and reward. Part II - understanding the jargonWhat do company results show? Some key financial yardsticks and how to calculate them. Key accounting issues and how the books can be cooked. Financial ratios and what they tell you. Part III - for the more experienced investorRisk and the psychology of investment. Some theories about markets and stock market investment. Key investment styles and the gurus of investment. Different types of investment opportunities. Futures and options. Commodities.

A unique, truly comprehensive guide to all aspects of investment and saving. Written by a vastly experienced Mail on Sunday journalist, the book provides a wealth of expert advice and information in clear and jargon-free language that everyone will understand. Just some of the areas covered are: Banks and Building Societies Investment Trusts Tax-efficient Cash deposits Stocks and Shares investment and Unit Trusts Bonds saving Pensions Gilts ISAs

A comprehensive guide to all aspects of pensions and planning your retirement that delivers a wealth of information and expert advice in jargon-free language. The author has been a correspondent with Financial Mail on Sunday since 1997.

'Tales from the Marketplace: Stories of Revolution, Reinvention and Renewal' is a highly innovative approach to building an understanding of the realities of market-led strategic change in companies. It provides an engaging, honest, and effective understanding of real market strategy in major organizations by focussing on the forces behind value-driven strategy. Nigel Piercy provides new and incisive insights into strategy and marketing through business "stories" that are contemporary and provocative. These new "stories" depict how major organizations have experienced revolution in their traditional markets - created by new types of competitors with new business models. The search for superior value is overtaking traditional brand and relationship strategies. The challenge to companies is reinvention and renewal and the alternative is obsolescence and decline. After all, did the major banks really expect to be competing with supermarkets, car companies, Virgin and internet-based companies to provide retail bank services? The book is based on the author's view that: · Business is exciting, turbulent and unpredictable - the "stories" we read and study should be too! · From Dell Computers and easyJet to Amazon.com and Skoda Cars, it is the most innovative companies that have most to teach us about reinvention and new business models · The inflexible analytical frameworks of the past no longer apply - "stories" of reinvention and renewal show the creative strategies developed by companies to cope with threats and exploit opportunities around them. 'Tales from the Marketplace' is essential, timely and designed to be highly readable for managers. It also provides an innovative approach for undergraduate and MBA level teachers and students, and for participants on executive programmes in marketing and strategic management.

With the advent of liquid modernity, the society of producers is transformed into a society of consumers. In this new consumer society, individuals become simultaneously the promoters of commodities and the commodities they promote. They are, at one and the same time, the merchandise and the marketer, the goods and the travelling salespeople. They all inhabit the same social space that is customarily described by the term the market. The test they need to pass in order to acquire the social prizes they covet requires them to recast themselves as products capable of drawing attention to themselves. This subtle and pervasive transformation of consumers into commodities is the most important feature of the society of consumers. It is the hidden truth, the deepest and most closely guarded secret, of the consumer society in which we now live. In this new book Zygmunt Bauman examines the impact of consumerist attitudes and patterns of conduct on various apparently unconnected aspects of social life politics and democracy, social divisions and stratification, communities and partnerships, identity building, the production and use of knowledge, and value preferences. The invasion and colonization of the web of human relations by the worldviews and behavioural patterns inspired and shaped by commodity markets, and the sources of resentment, dissent and occasional resistance to the occupying forces, are the central themes of this brilliant new book by one of the worlds most original and insightful social thinkers.

A victim of the Nazis, then the communists. Twice a refugee, yet always remaining a committed socialist. In countless ways, Zygmunt Bauman lived the political upheavals of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. He was an actor within them. Bauman’s own lived history informed his politics, which found expression in varying degrees in his sociology, as he wrote extensively on socialism, democracy, bureaucracy, morality, Europe and the Jewish experience. This volume brings together hitherto unknown or rare pieces by Bauman on the themes of history and politics by drawing upon previously unpublished material from the Bauman Archive at the University of Leeds. A substantial introduction by the editors provides readers with a lucid guide through this material and develops connections to Bauman’s other works. The second volume in a series of books that will make available the lesser-known writings of one of the most influential social thinkers of our time, History and Politics will be of interest to students and scholars across the arts, humanities and social sciences, and to a wider readership.

Most people are rich for a single day in their lives: the day they retire and receive their retirement savings. This moment is more critical than many people realise – it marks the change from saving for retirement to drawing an income from savings that will ideally sustain them until they die. All too often, pensioners end up struggling financially because they make the wrong decisions after they retire. It is crucial for retirees to apply themselves to securing a sustainable income. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the vital issues that impact on retirement, such as taxation, investments, healthcare, estate plan¬ning and where to live when retired. It also identifies warning signs to look out for in order to avoid financial troubles. Written in clear and straightforward language by well-known journalist Bruce Cameron and respected financial planner Wouter Fourie, this is the ultimate guide to help you achieve a secure and successful retirement.

Most people are rich for a single day in their lives: the day they retire and receive their retirement savings. This moment is more critical than many people realise – it marks the change from saving for retirement to drawing an income from savings that will ideally sustain them until they die. All too often, pensioners end up struggling financially because they make the wrong decisions after they retire. It is crucial for retirees to apply themselves to securing a sustainable income. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the vital issues that impact on retirement, such as taxation, investments, healthcare, estate plan¬ning and where to live when retired. It also identifies warning signs to look out for in order to avoid financial troubles. Written in clear and straightforward language by well-known journalist Bruce Cameron and respected financial planner Wouter Fourie, this is the ultimate guide to help you achieve a secure and successful retirement.

'Online Marketing' provides a balance between theory & practice by recognising the advantages & drawbacks of doing business online. Supported by contemporary mini-cases, case studies & expert opinion from leading practitioners, this text covers: the changing online environment, online planning and more.