#ReadThis @simonschuster #TheHarderYouWorktheLuckierYouGet by #JoeRicketts @Cubs Founder of #Ameritrade

It's not who you know, it's WHOM YOU KNOW and after reading this, you'll also know Joe Ricketts, an all-American winner who has taken the time to share the wisdom of his life with you.  Aptly titled, The Harder You Work The Luckier You Get is his life story which any investor can appreciate and everyone that has or does work on Wall Street absolutely will.

For our eleven years and counting, we have always celebrated the entrepreneur and business world, and lessons in business and in life are told by Ricketts himself with his refreshing midwestern flair.  It's very not New York so reading it is like a vacation!  His ties to Wall Street however are obvious and they are anchored in Nebraska with ties to CBOE-Chicago.  With Morgan Stanley's recent acquisition of ETrade online brokers are in the headlines lately, and the entire market is and we picked today to publish as the market is UP.  Finally.

The simplicity with which Ricketts preaches the gospel of the buzz saw and pure discipline and persistence tells lessons through stories that illustrate what we all should strive for.  We love how he views opportunity (p. 17) and how he makes choices based on his dad's guidance (Credit reporter).  You'll see his take on the story of McDonald's (p.35) .  And if you think $25 is a good deal for commission, you must not remember George Brown's $5 market orders!  Joe's prehistoric days of having his people calculate margin calls before computer programs and excel sounds worthy of drama on the big screen.

The pictures in the center were among our favorite aspects of this book.  And, PS. Joe you may have noticed we critique an awful lot of cuisine, INCLUDING BISON MEAT so do email Peachy!  And GO CHICAGO CUBS.

A total must-read for every red-blooded American and everyone that appreciates American accomplishment, THE HARDER YOU WORK, THE LUCKIER YOU GET is Recommended by Whom You Know.  Long live CAPITALISM!

***

Joe Ricketts, founder of TD Ameritrade, didn’t grow up with a silver spoon in his mouth, but instead had something far greater -- the gift of seeing what others missed. The son of a house builder, he started life as a part-time janitor, but by the age of thirty-three he saw the chance to challenge the big brokerage firms by offering Americans an inexpensive way to take control of their own stock trading. For the first time ever, Ricketts pulls back the curtain on his life with his new book The Harder You Work, The Luckier You Get: An Entrepreneur’s Memoir (Simon & Schuster; 9781501164781; $28.00; on-sale November 5th) in which he shares the inside story of how a working-class kid from the Nebraska prairie took on Wall Street’s clubby brokerage business, busted it open, and walked away a billionaire. 

Nowadays, we take for granted that Main Street is playing right there on Wall Street, but Ricketts made that happen. His company, begun with $12,500 borrowed from friends and family, took off like a rocket thanks to an early embrace of digital technology and irreverent marketing. But Ameritrade also faced a series of near-disasters: the SEC almost shut him down; his partners tried to force him out because of his relentless risk-taking; penny brokers swindled the company; the crash of 1989 nearly cost him everything; and he was almost shut down again when a customer committed massive fraud. By the time of the dot-com bust, he had proven that his strategy based on frontier values could survive just about anything. 

The Harder You Work, The Luckier You Get offers a view inside Joe Ricketts’s mind, giving readers a visceral understanding of how entrepreneurs think and act differently from the rest of us—how they see the horizon where we just see a spreadsheet. As unvarnished as the prairie he comes from, Ricketts also talks honestly about his shortcomings as a manager, the career sacrifices his wife made for his business, the complexity of being a father, the pain of splitting with his mentor, and of his brother’s death from AIDS. Overcoming these and other challenges, he built a company now worth $30 billion.

A must-read for anyone who’s ever dreamed of starting their own business, The Harder You Work, The Luckier You Get is the ultimate only-in-America story.

About the Author:

Joe Ricketts is the founder, former CEO, and retired chairman of online brokerage TD Ameritrade, and the author of The Harder You Work, The Luckier You Get.