13 Best Books on Personal Finance for Indian Investors

Last updated Jan 14, 2024
13 Best books on personal finance

There are several best books recommended to every Indian investor including NRIs (Non-Resident Indians) including Mariners.

Each investor has different goals and plans to achieve in their financial life.

Negi Financial recommends below the 13 Best Books on Personal Finance for Indian Investors to read in 2024. 7 out of 13 books are written by Indian authors or writers.

Some books are also available in audio format on amazon audible.

College students can read some of the best books mentioned in order to gain financial literacy.

Investors can increase their financial education by reading Indian authors’ or writers’ best personal finance books.

Beginners can pick up any of the books whether their interest in investment behaviour, financial education, savings, or investments.

You may get free audiobooks after getting an amazon audible trial. Happy Reading…
It becomes difficult to choose which books to select so our list of the 13 best books on personal finance for Indian investors.
To start your investment journey, you should read at least one book on money management.

1. The Psychology of Money Timeless Lessons on Wealth, Greed, and Happiness by Morgan Housel

The Psychology Of Money By Morgan Housel

Doing well with money isn’t necessarily about what you know. It’s about how you behave. And behaviour is hard to teach, even to really smart people.

How to manage money, invest it, and make business decisions are typically considered to involve a lot of mathematical calculations, where data and formulae tell us exactly what to do.

But in the real world, people don’t make financial decisions on a spreadsheet.

They make them at the dinner table, or in a meeting room, where personal history, your unique view of the world, ego, pride, marketing, and odd incentives are scrambled together.

In The Psychology of Money, the author shares 19 short stories exploring the strange ways people think about money and teaches you how to make better sense of one of life’s most important matters.

13 Best Books on Personal Finance for Indian Investors 1

Retire on Your Terms

This book simplifies the jargon and provides practical solutions. Retire on your terms is more than a money management book on retirement planning. It guides you in achieving financial freedom and doing what you have always wanted to lead a meaningful and fulfilling retirement life. Retirement is successful, if we are healthy – physically, intellectually, emotionally, socially and spiritually. The book starts with my story and how I achieved financial freedom at the age of 45 years. It is also about meticulous planning prior to retiring and following inherent passion post-retirement. If I could do it, anybody can!

2. Retire Rich: Invest Rs.40 A Day: New Edition by P.V. Subramanyam (Indian Author)

Retire Rich by P.V. Subramanyam

If you start earning at 24, retire at 49, and live till 94 – what you are trying to do is make sure that the money earned in 25 years is managed well for another 45 years.

This is not easy but can be learnt. What if your monthly expenses at age 80 is 5X of what you earned in one year when you were 30?

Many such insights and gems are hidden in the book – which tells you how you can accumulate a nice round amount by the time you turn 60 years of age.

The author tells you why you need to start early, invest Rs.40 a day and accumulate a nice corpus. If you increase this by 10%, It can lead to, hold your breath, Rs. 13.5 crores! Not bad for just Rs. 40 a day, right?

PV Subramanian tells you how starting early works like magic, and what happens if you live till age 120!

The earlier you start, the greater the flexibility and the greater the options. Of course, as a 24-year-old you have other distractions too, but when you realize that retirement is a sum of money and not a date on the calendar…you will realize that an early start is surely worth it.

When you start will help you decide whether your retirement will be Golden or red! Packed with examples, case studies etc.

This book is a must-read. Whether you are a financial planner or an end user learning and implementing plans aimed at financial freedom should be an amazing journey.

Start early. Navigate safely. Reach surely.

3. Let’s Talk Money: You’ve Worked Hard for It, Now Make It Work for You by Monika Halan (Indian Author)

Let’s Talk Money: You’ve Worked Hard for It, Now Make It Work for You by Monika Halan

We work hard to earn our money. But regardless of how much we earn, the money worry never goes away.

Bills, rent, EMIs, medical costs, vacations, kids’ education and, somewhere at the back of the head, the niggling thought about being under-prepared for our own retirement.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our money worked for us just as we work hard for it? What if we had a proven system to identify dud investment schemes?

What if could just plug seamlessly into a simple, jargon-free plan to get more value out of our money, and have a super good life today?

India’s most trusted name in personal finance, Monika Halan offers you a feet-on-the-ground system to build financial security.

Not a get-rich-quick guide, this book helps you build a smart system to live your dream life, rather than stay worried about the ‘right’ investment or ‘perfect’ insurance.

Unlike many personal finance books, Let’s Talk Money is written specifically for you, keeping the Indian context in mind.

4. If God Was Your Financial Planner by Suresh Sadagopan (Indian Author)

IF GOD WAS YOUR FINANCIAL PLANNER by SURESH SADAGOPAN

Financial planning is explained through a sublime story – get entertained and informed!

The Lord Himself makes several appearances throughout the book & offers counsel and guidance on the philosophy of life.

Your Success with money and life starts with sound knowledge and understanding of personal finance.

Learning about finances was never this easy or entertaining!

In this book, you will learn the essentials of –
• personal finance
• financial planning
• retirement planning
• asset allocation concepts
• risk management
and much more.

5. Common Sense on Mutual Funds by John C. Bogle

Common Sense on Mutual Funds by John C. Bogle

Since the first edition of Common Sense on Mutual Funds was published in 1999, much has changed, and no one is more aware of this than mutual fund pioneer John Bogle. Now, in this completely updated Second Edition, Bogle returns to take another critical look at the mutual fund industry and help investors navigate their way through the staggering array of investment alternatives that are available to them.

Written in a straightforward and accessible style, this reliable resource examines the fundamentals of mutual fund investing in today’s turbulent market environment and offers timeless advice in building an investment portfolio.

Along the way, Bogle shows you how simplicity and common sense invariably trump costly complexity, and how a low-cost, broadly diversified portfolio is virtually assured of outperforming the vast majority of Wall Street professionals over the long term.

  • Written by respected mutual fund industry legend John C. Bogle
  • Discusses the timeless fundamentals of investing that apply in any type of market
  • Reflects on the structural and regulatory changes in the mutual fund industry
  • Other titles by Bogle: The Little Book of Common Sense Investing and Enough.

Securing your financial future has never seemed more difficult, but you’ll be a better investor for having read the Second Edition of Common Sense on Mutual Funds.

6. You Can Be Rich Too: With Goal Based Investing by P V Subramanyam and M Pattabiraman (Pattu-Freefincal.com) (Indian Authors)

You Can Be Rich Too With Goal Based Investing by P V Subramanyam and M Pattabiraman (Pattu-Freefincal.com)

Investing is simple but it’s not easy. This is usually because the right questions are not asked.

In the world of investing, where honest and common-sense advice is scarce, here is a book that simplifies key concepts in money management and guides you to invest with a specific goal in mind.

You can be rich –With Goal-Based Investing’ arms you with the relevant questions to ask. It also gives you access to a bouquet of practical yet enlightening calculators that enable you to develop personalized investment solutions.

If used regularly, these mirror the progress of your investment plans and help you gauge if are going in the intended direction.

Investors who have the discipline to follow the simple steps suggested in this book could attain results that are vastly superior to even those achieved by professionals.

Most importantly, successfully securing goals due to appropriate investing delivers an improved life with more time to spend on what is really important for you and your loved ones…

If you are in the process of creating wealth – irrespective of whether you are a beginner, mid-way through your journey or almost there – you can find nuggets of simple, practical wisdom in the pages of this book.

7. Stocks to Riches: Insights on Investor Behaviour by Parag Parikh (Indian Author)

Stock to Riches By Parag Parikh

Investing in the stock market is challenging, as the market dynamics are unpredictable. Analysts, brokers and retail investors realize to their dismay that ‘investments do well, but investors don’t do well.

What could be the reasons behind this? What goes on in an investor’s mind? What makes a stock market bubble? How does it burst? How does one find the right strategy for investing?

Intrigued by these pertinent questions, Parag Parikh, a seasoned broker and expert, took up this daunting task of understanding and demystifying investing in the stock market. Stocks to Riches is a distillate of his experience.

It simplifies investing in stocks and provides key perspectives for a lay investor venturing into the market.

At the end of the day, Stocks to Riches helps the retail investor make money by following the time-tested and proven guidelines provided in the book. A must-read for brokers, analysts and retail investors.

8. Coffee Can Investing: The Low-Risk Road to Stupendous Wealth by Saurabh Mukherjea, Rakshit Ranjan and Pranab Uniyal (Indian Authors)

Coffee Can Investing by Saurabh Mukherjea

Most people invest in the usual assets: real estate, gold, mutual funds, fixed deposits and stock markets. It’s always the same four or five instruments.

All they end up making is a measly 8 to 12 per cent per annum. Those who are exceptionally unfortunate get stuck in the middle of a crash and end up losing a lot of money.

What if there was another way? What if you could make not 10 not 15 but 20 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) on your investments?

What if there was a way to grow your money four to five times whilst taking half the risk compared to the overall market?

Bestselling author of Gurus of Chaos and The Unusual Billionaires, Saurabh Mukherjea puts his money where his mouth is.

Saurabh follows the Coffee Can approach to high-quality, low-risk investing. His firm, Ambit Capital, is one of the largest wealth managers in India which invests with this approach and delivers stupendous returns.

In Coffee Can Investing, Saurabh will show you how to go about low-risk investments that generate great returns.

9. A Wealth of Common Sense: Why Simplicity Trumps Complexity in Any Investment Plan by Ben Carlson

A wealth of common sense by Ben Carlson

A simple guide to a smarter strategy for the individual investor

A Wealth of Common Sense sheds a refreshing light on investing and shows you how a simplicity-based framework can lead to better investment decisions.

The financial market is a complex system, but that doesn’t mean it requires a complex strategy; in fact, this false premise is the driving force behind many investors’ market “mistakes.” Information is important, but understanding and perspective are the keys to better decision-making.

This book describes the proper way to view the markets and your portfolio and shows you the simple strategies that make investing more profitable, less confusing, and less time-consuming.

Without the burden of short-term performance benchmarks, individual investors have the advantage of focusing on the long view, and the freedom to construct the kind of portfolio that will serve their investment goals best.

This book proves how complex strategies essentially waste these advantages and provides an alternative game plan for those ready to simplify.

Complexity is often used as a mechanism for talking investors into unnecessary purchases when all most need is a deeper understanding of conventional options. This book explains which issues you actually should pay attention to, and which ones are simply used for an illusion of intelligence and control.

  • Keep up with—or beat—professional money managers
  • Exploit stock market volatility to your utmost advantage
  • Learn where advisors and consultants fit into smart strategy
  • Build a portfolio that makes sense for your particular situation

You don’t have to outsmart the market if you can simply outperform it. Cut through the confusion and noise and focus on what actually matters.

A Wealth of Common Sense clears the air and gives you the insight you need to become a smarter, more successful investor.

10. Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioural Economics by Richard H Thaler

Misbehaving by Richard H. Thaler

From the renowned and entertaining behavioural economist and co-author of the seminal work Nudge, Misbehaving is an irreverent and enlightening look into human foibles.

Traditional economics assumes that rational forces shape everything. Behavioural economics knows better.

Richard Thaler has spent his career studying the notion that humans are central to the economy – and that we’re error-prone individuals, not Spock-like automatons.

Now behavioural economics is hugely influential, changing the way we think not just about money, but about ourselves, our world and all kinds of everyday decisions.

Whether buying an alarm clock, selling football tickets, or applying for a mortgage, we all succumb to biases and make decisions that deviate from the standards of rationality assumed by economists. In other words, we misbehave.

Dismissed at first by economists as an amusing sideshow, the study of human miscalculations and their effects on markets now drives efforts to make better decisions in our lives, our businesses, and our governments.

Coupling recent discoveries in human psychology with a practical understanding of incentives and market behaviour, Thaler enlightens readers about how to make smarter decisions in an increasingly mystifying world.

He reveals how behavioural economic analysis opens up new ways to look at everything from household finance to assigning faculty offices in a new building, to TV quiz shows, sports transfer seasons, and businesses like Uber.

When economics meets psychology, the implications for individuals, managers and policymakers are both profound and entertaining.

11. The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable Paperback by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Black Swan By Nicholas Taleb

The Black Swan: The Impact of The Highly Improbable is a book that focuses on what has now come to be known as the Black Swan Theory.

Through a number of examples, the author aims to show his readers how rare and unpredictable events have a deep and lasting impact on a person’s life.

Human beings tend to try and rationalize such happenings almost immediately after they happen. This is an almost impossible task since such events are based on chance.

A number of other topics, which relate to aesthetics, ways of life, knowledge and much more, have been discussed in this book.

The book shows you what the Wall Street crash, the invention of the wheel and Pompeii have in common. It also shows you what Catherine the Great’s lovers can show you about the concept of probability.

This book is all about black swans, which are random incidents in our lives, irrespective of how big or small they might be.

This book has been written with the intent of showing you the kind of impression events like these can have on a life.

It also stresses the fact that instead of trying to predict everything that happens in our life, we should embrace uncertainty and make the most of it.

Key Features

  1. The book gives its readers new insight into handling life’s uncertain nature.
  2. It includes a number of real-life happenings that help prove the author’s point.

12. Value Investing and Behavioral Finance: Insights into Indian Stock Market Realities by Parag Parikh (Indian Author)

Value Investing and Behavioral Finance_ Insights into Indian Stock Market Realities by Parag Parikh

“When others are greedy be fearful and when others are fearful be greedy”-ill-timed bouts of greed and fear among investors make stock markets volatile.

Successful investing is all about restraining and channelizing these emotions and understanding behavioural finance, not market sentiments, crowd behaviour or company performances.

At a time when market upheavals are eroding investors’ confidence, dooming life’s earnings and corporate fortunes, and shipping up mass hysteria-Value Investing and Behavioral Finance come as an antidote to investor anxiety and a guide to sane and safe investment decisions.

Using investing trends in Indian capital markets over the last three decades shows how collective behavioural biases affect investment decisions, returns and market vagaries.

As a corrective, it spells out the long-term value and contrarian investing strategies based on the principles of behavioural finance.

Further, it advises on how to spot investment opportunities and pitfalls in commodity stocks, growth stocks, PSUs, IPOs, sectors and index stocks. It also alerts the reader to a ‘bubble’ or crisis situation, and ways to identify and insure against it.

Value Investing and Behavioral Finance, a timely offering from a seasoned investment strategist, is a must-read for stock-brokers, bankers, lay investors, portfolio managers, fund managers, and students of finance

13. Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler, Cass R Sunstein

Nudge_ Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler, Cass R Sunstein

Every day we make decisions: about the things that we buy or the meals we eat; about the investments we make or our children’s health and education; even the causes that we champion or the planet itself. Unfortunately, we often choose poorly.

We are all susceptible to biases that can lead us to make bad decisions that make us poorer, less healthy and less happy. And, as Thaler and Sunstein show, no choice is ever presented to us in a neutral way.

By knowing how people think, we can make it easier for them to choose what is best for them, their families and society. Using dozens of eye-opening examples, the authors demonstrate how to nudge us in the right direction, without restricting our freedom of choice.

Nudge offers a unique new way of looking at the world for individuals and governments alike.

This is one of the most engaging, provocative and important books you will ever read.


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