If you want to get rich, no matter how inexperienced you are in investment, this book can help you. Its message is that you must learn neither to avoid risk nor to court it foolhardily, but to manage it - and enjoy it too. The 12 Major and 16 minor Zurich Axioms contained in this book are a set of principles providing a practical philosophy for the realistic management of risk, which can be followed successfully by anyone, not merely the 'experts'. Several of the Axioms fly right in the face of the traditional wisdom of the investment advice business - yet the enterprising Swiss speculators who devised them became rich, while many investors who follow the conventional path do not. Max Gunther, whose father was one of the original speculators who devised the Axioms, made his first capital gain on the stock market at the age of 13 and has never looked back. Now the rest of us can follow in his footsteps. Startlingly straightforward, the Axioms are explained in a book that is not only extremely entertaining but will prove invaluable to any investor, whether in stocks, commodities, art, antiques or real estate, who is willing to take risk on its own terms and chance a little to gain a lot. contents Introduction: What the Axioms Are and How They Came to Be The First Major Axiom: On Risk The Second Major Axiom: On Greed The Third Major Axiom: On Hope The Fourth Major Axiom: On Forecasts The Fifth Major Axiom: On Patterns The Sixth Major Axiom: On Mobility The Seventh Major Axiom: On Intuition The Eighth Major Axiom: On Religion and the Occult The Ninth Major Axiom: On Optimism and Pessimism The Tenth Major Axiom: On Consensus The Eleventh Major Axiom: On Stubbornness The Twelfth Major Axiom: On Planning [The 16 Minor Axioms appear within each of the chapters on the Major Axioms]