Leading financial thinker and successful funds manager Bruce I. Jacobs reveals how markets crash as the result of investment strategies that purport to reduce risk but that ultimately backfire. Are financial crises really perfect storms or are they the result of investment strategies that create an illusion of safety? Too Smart for Our Own Good reveals how investors invariably fall for investment strategies that offer illusory promises of higher returns and protection from losses, but end in greater risk for markets and the economy. The book examines the influence of such strategies on the 1987 stock market crash, the 1998 collapse of hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management, and the 2007-2008 credit crisis. Investors who are aware of the common threads that connect these market disruptions can avoid the mistakes of the past and anticipate future market crises. The book provides a behind the curtain look at the investment approaches and instruments that caused several recent financial crises.