Finding the Next Starbucks: How to Identify and Invest in the Hot Stocks of Tomorrow

Interesting book but the fund behind the bok completely dissolved so I guess they never found another Starbucks. A shame because it would be wonderful if it worked. Google them.

Every amateur investor's dream is to find the "next big thing," but actually accomplishing this is harder than it sounds. Thankfully, Michael Moe's book has specifically laid out the industries that are likely to experience explosive growth in the future; and so that we can pick the right companies in those industries Moe has plenty of historical analysis about what other great companies did as they grew into present-day beasts. I especially like the comparative analysis at the end of the book that compares a successful stock pick (like Best Buy) to a bad stock pick (like Circuit City). Even though both companies look seemingly identical within the electronics retail industry the small but important differences are what this book teaches you to pick out.

For the most part, this book is really good. A lot of his individual picks for future growth companies (this was written in 2006) have not panned out (at least not yet), but the book still has a ton of valuable information. The 'Star Gazer' Interviews are worth the price of the book alone.One downside is the website ([...]), which is supposed to compliment the book (it has continuations of many interviews in the book & more) appears to have been abandoned; It has not been updated in years and does not even let your register to view prior information.

This a great read for anyone who wants to invest in the market. The concepts are straight forward and unique. Michael teaches you how to determine what are the next great growth companies in the future. It reminds me of another great book called One Up on Wall Street by Peter Lynch.

Thankfully, this is not a "get rich quick scheme", and more importantly, the author doesnt indulge in self promotion or promote his partners/products. In an engaging discussion, the author tries to explain his underlying philosophy of investing - "earnings growth drives stock prices" - simple (to an extent, cliched, perhaps) premise. As simple as the premise is, the discussion behind that premise discovers some interesting aspects in the form of emerging trends and its impacts on investing. Trends like globalization and outsourcing have been mentioned by a million other authors, but Moe looks at those issues (and a few other megatrends) to identify potential developments in the investment landscape. Later, he discusses his 4P approach of evaluating a company (products, people, potential and predictability) - not dramatically unique, but discussed in an novel way. There is a pithy discussion on emerging Internet-business models and how it will impact consolidation, convergence, branding and other related issues. Towards the end of the book, Moe identifies some potential sector trend plays for investment - an excellent source of investment ideas. The discussion is interspersed with interesting interviews from a wide variety of people - academics to football coaches to fund managers. The companion website and the list of interesting blogs worth watching are an excellent resource as well. An informative, easy-to-read, and engaging book. A must have.

Who doesn't want to find the next Starbucks or Microsoft? These companies are not easy to find, but they can definitely generate incredible returns. The author says that $1 invested in Wal-Mart when it went public would be worth $5,809 at the end of 2005.The author provides a recipe for finding these megawinners through ten commandments. He describes the process as a top-down approach versus the bottom-up approach used by value investors such as Warren Buffett. In the top-down approach, investors start with megatrends and industry drivers that are influencing the industry. Then a list of companies is generated. Based on the rankings he provides, the best ones are separated from the worst. Finally, the companies of choice are valued based on earnings growth and price to earnings to determine near-term and long-term attractiveness.Some of the megatrends listed in the book include the knowledge economy, globalization, consolidation, brands, and outsourcing. I enjoyed reading this book.- Mariusz Skonieczny, author of Why Are We So Clueless about the Stock Market? Learn how to invest your money, how to pick stocks, and how to make money in the stock market

Earnings growth drives stock prices - this is not news.What is absent from this entire book is the notion that there are a lot of losers for every winner. "If you had bought Ebay...." precludes the fact that EBay attracted competition and there were other ides out there for auction websites. Same with Amazon and e-tailing. So it is convenient to say, "You would have made all the money in the world if you bought these stocks", but the odds of getting it right more than 2-3x in a cycle are low.Also....how many times did he mention Starbucks? He went on a company visit, picked them early, and it worked. How many other retail names did he pick? How did they work out? We don't hear about those - survivorship bias.

interesting book, but the concepts are not really so newthe book list at the end is very helpful

It has its plus points but overall I must rate this book pretty mediocre. You will not miss much if you do not read this book.Update in Oct 2020I think my previous feedback was too harsh. I have read this book couple of times since then and also allowed the passage of time since my first review. My current assessment is that this book has some good points on how to evaluate the quality of business. I am not too hung up on high growth and early-stage companies so I will ignore that part. But the core philosophy of identifying and investing in high-quality businesses is sound. In fact, the author has given a complete framework of how to identify quality (and of course high growth) companies at an early stage. I am not confident I can identify the next Starbucks when it is very tiny. I am honest with myself. But I can definitely identify higher quality established mid or large-cap companies using this framework. You may not make 100 baggers with those stocks but you at least will not lose your shirt if you invest in only higher-quality stocks. In that sense, this book and underlying methodology have a great deal of value. I am upgrading the rating to 4.This book may not appeal to Ben Graham type deep value investors. But if you like Buffett's investing style then you will find a few nuggets in this book.

different book recd and was forced to return back the same.