Nicolas Darvas rode the trend as long as it lasted so, in most cases, he held onto his stocks as long as it took so, he would have paid at the long term capital gains rates. He was minimizing his taxes on his gains from the stockmarket although, I doubt that was his intent. It was just incidental that it happened that way! He wrote in his book that avoiding capital gains just for the heck of it was stupid. There was an investor who did not sell his stock and lost his huge gains! He wanted to avoid the capital gains taxes. Stop losses took him out of his trades. Since, he had huge gains, he could offset all his losses!