Peter Lynch managed the Fidelity Magellan Fund from 1977 to 1990, achieving average annual returns of 29.2% — one of the best long-term track records in mutual fund history. In this accessible and entertaining guide, he argues that individual investors have a structural advantage over professional fund managers that most people fail to exploit. Because everyday people encounter products, services, and local businesses before Wall Street analysts do, they are often positioned to identify compelling investment opportunities months or years before institutional money arrives. Lynch walks readers through his process of categorizing stocks into six types — slow growers, stalwarts, fast growers, cyclicals, turnarounds, and asset plays — and describes the financial metrics and qualitative factors he uses to evaluate each. He demystifies the research process, showing how studying a company's products, competitors, and financials is genuinely within reach of a motivated individual investor. Lynch also addresses position sizing, when to sell, and the behavioral discipline required to hold through volatility. Witty, practical, and refreshingly humble about the limits of forecasting, this book has introduced more people to stock analysis than perhaps any other.