I found this book fascinating. When I mentioned that, I was asked what I was reading. When I replied it was about ideas from evolutionary biology applied to investing, I was told I was probably one of 10 people who would find that interesting. I think it is more than that and I hope I am right.

The book is “What I learned about investing from Darwin” by Pulak Prasad and I  thank Netgalley (“https://www.netgalley.com/) for allowing me to read it before publication.  The book comes out on May 9.

First I should mention that I am a retired geneticist, so although my careeer did not directly concern evolution, I would think I have an about average knowledge on the subject. I am retired now and partly dependent on my investments. I’ve also read a good bit on investing. I also find both investing and evolution interesting. Yet the connection never occurred to me.

But when you think about evolution, one of the first phrases that comes to mind is “survival of the fittest”. And that if you are a long-term investor in a business, you want it to be fit enough to survive changing circumstances.

But then there were factors that I thought would make to book less relevant to me. The author is big-time investor managing billions of dollars which are invested in individual businesses in India. I manage much less money and deal mostly with mutual funds.

But I as I said in reviewing another investing book :

My belief about investing is that it is a very good thing to read widely on investing and financial history. This book is a valuable part of that.

I recommend “What I learned about investing from Darwin” if you are interested in increasing your investment knowledge. There are many more suitable books if you want to learn the basics of investing.