Hello stepan7,
I disagree with this statement from Reminiscences Of A Stock Operator book.
If all a trader had to do was to enter the trade and sit tight, we all be rich right?
SimpleMeLike, I agree with you.
ROSO is an inspirational story. I’ve read it several times. During the down periods in my life I found it uplifting to read about the comeback after comeback the protagonist made after losing everything.
Well, in truth he didn’t lose everything. He still had his mind and will. He only lost all his money which he proved can easily be regained.
Of course his real life is more tragic. Livermore ran out of comebacks after his final time losing it all and he gave up, literally and figuratively.
As far as specific trading advice goes, such as the referenced passage about sitting tight, you have to know the context or else it can be very misleading. I’ve seen that passage quoted a few times on this site.
Anyone who has traded knows that sitting tight in a winning trade isn’t always a good idea. In a market like stock index futures, most of the time, sitting tight just means giving back all or a substantial portion of your profit. Certainly, Larry Livingston (Livermore) didn’t sit tight in the bucket shops where he was a trading god.
So, as you know, sometimes sitting tight is the right play and sometimes it is not. There is no way around the same old problem of knowing when to do one thing or the other.
If the bucket shop Livermore were alive and trading today, I’m not sure we would hear about him. No doubt he would be very rich though.