Full of Bull: Do What Wall Street Does, Not What It Says, To Make Money in the Market

7. Reform Research to Level the Playing Field

A number of elements of Street research are detrimental to individual investors. There needs to be an array of alterations in the manner in which brokerage firms conduct research, to make the game more fair and to put individuals on par with professional Street insiders. The system that went so awry in the 1990s will not be corrected until all parties involved in the investment business have altered their behavior and are brought into the proper balance. Analysts hardly have time to conduct true research. They manage a team, grind out or massage intricate earnings models, tune in to incessant conference calls, attend meetings to deal with the bureaucracy, and scramble to respond to scores of telephone ...