Are Trading Books Useless ?
- Thread starter Fundlord
- Start date
"I have found all the psycho books to be useless for me, in order for anything to help, you have to believe and I simple don't or won't believe in some concepts." - Handle 123
Agreed. Snake oil salesmen love to talk endlessly about psychology. I kinda have to believe that if you size your position to your account, and make adjustments according to your risk tolerance for that particular day, you "won't go there." If you go there, if you show no restraint and take your trading off roading, no amount of discipline or rules, or psycho babble is going to save your skin. Discipline is the total body of rules we follow when, and only when, we trade where rules can be followed. Restraint is never taking your discipline where you won't follow the rules.
I like the following books. The first two concern instinct and behavior. The second two question the usefulness of technical analsysis as a predictive edge, and point out TA's strengths and weaknesses. The last two are classics on trading.
The Crowd, Gustuve LeBonn
Your Money and Your Brain , Jason Zweig
Time Compression Trading, Jason Alan Jankovsky
Confessions of a Commodities Trader, Peter Brandt
Reminisences of a Stock Operator, Edwin LeFevre
One Good Trade, Mike Bellafiore
Last edited:
Thank you for reminding me that I have both of Hill's books that I read in the late '70's or so.
I'm sure I'm still using some of what he taught, and will now reread them as I feel his type of analysis may be quite useful in my tick charts also. As you, I also started out with Magee's book, and it is still the center of my analysis today. I saw in one of your postings that you also started out by, and highly value, drawing charts by hand. It really is the only way to truly 'feel' price movement, isn't it? I updated about 300 charts by hand each day. Took time but was well worth it.
Last edited:
You and I have same beginnings then, I remember in late 70s/early 80s going down into basement of library and each Saturday spending on microfilm getting highs/lows in Wallstreet journal to update Dow 30, I continued drawing by hand well after PCs came out till early 2000s, between self satisfaction, brain to hand one seems to learn after awhile what you can expect and develop methods much better than new guys of today. I reread Hill's stuff min of once a year and still learn something each time.
I also liked Confessions of a Commodities Trader, Peter Brandt and took his newsletter several years, he really loves very long term patterns, I use to laugh at his duration and now mine is even so much longer as in years of rollovers in commodities.
it takes time in trading...before a light bulb will go off in your head -- that makes you profitable. it won't just happen overnight, or over the course of a book. or class.
Good luck on your long journey, may the farce be with you
Good luck on your long journey, may the farce be with you
Some books are tremendously helpful to a newbie. How else are you going to understand where to even begin? They key is separating pragmatic and realistic approaches to trading from fanciful marketing hype.
Read everything by Euan Sinclair aka Filthy.
Read everything by Allen Jan Baird.
Then read everything by Dr. Ernie Chan.
And finish off with Trading and Exchanges by Harris.
Learn how to use excel to model data and then get a subscription to CXOadvisory.
Read everything by Euan Sinclair aka Filthy.
Read everything by Allen Jan Baird.
Then read everything by Dr. Ernie Chan.
And finish off with Trading and Exchanges by Harris.
Learn how to use excel to model data and then get a subscription to CXOadvisory.
If your looking for a step by step guide for how to get rich then they will be useless but if you spend time firstly selecting "good" book and whilst reading it frequently stopping to think about how it can apply and is relevant to your own trading then you can learn a great deal.
Most trading books are pretty useless, but some are actually really good. These include Reminisces of a Stock Operator, Hedge Fund Market Wizards, and the market wizards series in general
I have to agree with Troy, you can only get something out of these books if you put effort into them. This isn't an occupation you get better by doing, you get better by thinking about what you do when you trade. Repetition is a lousy teacher when it comes to trading, so why should trading books be any different? Some of the greatest trading books I've ever read got lambasted in Amazon reviews, primarily by people obsessed with indicators and systems.
My actual trading didn't teach me much more about trading than it has taught the run of the mill trader. In fact, repetition can make you a worse trader than when you started. You either give it the work/thought you need or you don't, but continuing to pull the arm on the slot machine never helped anyone's trading.
I tend to like the interview based sources, the Market Wizards types of books, and the internet interviews. Listen to enough quotes from winners and things we take for granted like prediction, technical analysis, money management, and leakage, they move to center stage and the things we used to value, like developing a heavy hitting offense, move down in the batting order.
My actual trading didn't teach me much more about trading than it has taught the run of the mill trader. In fact, repetition can make you a worse trader than when you started. You either give it the work/thought you need or you don't, but continuing to pull the arm on the slot machine never helped anyone's trading.
I tend to like the interview based sources, the Market Wizards types of books, and the internet interviews. Listen to enough quotes from winners and things we take for granted like prediction, technical analysis, money management, and leakage, they move to center stage and the things we used to value, like developing a heavy hitting offense, move down in the batting order.