Comments for ETF Stock Trading

Comment on Trading Price Action Trading Ranges: Technical Analysis of Price Charts Bar by Bar for the Serious Trader (Wiley Trading) by Glen Bowman

Glen Bowman — Sun, 20 May 2012 14:37:04 +0000

19 of 28 people found the following review helpful

Very disappointing...sloppy piece of work, January 8, 2012

Glen Bowman (Elizabeth City, NC) -

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This review is from: Trading Price Action Trading Ranges: Technical Analysis of Price Charts Bar by Bar for the Serious Trader (Wiley Trading) (Hardcover)

In a nutshell: A major disappointment, a book that appeared rushed to press, complete with typos, missing words, and monotonous and muddled syntax.

This is even sloppier than his original book, which was panned for being a case study in obfuscation. The writing is undisciplined and needlessly wordy. Often there are several pages of text without one illustrating chart. That kind of approach does not help the reader, who may not be familiar with Brooks's approach. Thank goodness I bought the first book and read all of his articles in FUTURES first.

Some parts that should been updated--"MER over the last year has been respectful of break-even stops"--have not even been changed. That was in the book that came out close to three years ago. Are we to believe that MER was respectful of breakeven stops in 2009, but then stopped, until starting up again a year ago?

There are some highly embarrassing goofs. On one chart, the bar-by-bar commentary is about intraday trading (...into the close) and the chart is a DAILY EUR/USD chart!

The section on gaps is just a mess. The writing, the thinking, the confusing use of the word "gap". There may well be some useful ideas in this section, but the presentation was clearly not well thought out. Perhaps he should have used some new word like "pocket", instead of "gap".

Some of the advice given here just makes me shake my head. He notes correctly that most breakouts fail. He then says that every trend bar is a breakout; but then recommends using trend bars as the basis for with-trend trades (?!?). Or when he says, in the same paragraph, that one-legged pullbacks, two-legged pullbacks, and three-legged pullbacks are all "common". Way to go out on a limb, there, Al! He criticizes reversal patterns that have a great deal of overlap with the prior bar, and then goes out and recommends two-bar reversals as a good setup, which almost both bars totally overlap each other. Go figure.

One should be warned that there is not a shred of evidence--data, additional sources--backing up what he says. When Brooks says that certain setups have a 60% chance-or 70%, or 53%--of reaching the limit order target before reaching the stop, he has absolutely no evidence backing him up. He may well be right, or close enough to being right, but there is no way of knowing.

No one has written more on the intraday trading of futures than Al Brooks, so it goes without saying that anyone who trades bar by bar should get this. There are some intriguing concepts, and much of what he says is consistent with my own experiences. I recommend purchasing this disappointing, mess of a book, because it is clear Brooks has thought intensely about the subject. Unfortunately, he put significantly less effort in clearly communicating his thoughts to his readers.

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Comment on Trading Price Action Trading Ranges: Technical Analysis of Price Charts Bar by Bar for the Serious Trader (Wiley Trading) by Ashwin Ramphal

Ashwin Ramphal — Sun, 20 May 2012 13:56:22 +0000

20 of 25 people found the following review helpful

Stunning Work That Will Transform Your Trading...(Assuming You Have The Stomach For The Hard Work ), January 4, 2012

Ashwin Ramphal -

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This review is from: Trading Price Action Trading Ranges: Technical Analysis of Price Charts Bar by Bar for the Serious Trader (Wiley Trading) (Hardcover)

Firstly, I find the view of the reviewer who thought this book could be summed as the author `simply venting' laughable to say the least.
This book, as well as the other two, are not written for the weekend warrior trader. It is not written for the `I'll dabble a little with this technique or that'. It is not a book that you will be able to read leisurely and glean an arsenal full of easy money making strategies from, because that's not the trading world we live in....ask the slew of traders who are yet to produce a cent from their easy to make money, proprietary course material, the army of traders hopping from one room to the next hoping the next subscription will yield the holy grail of guru's, the one to take them to the land of above-water P&L's, with little work on their own.

This and the other two books are however written for the trader who intends to work through this material, not simply read it. We have all heard that the markets spend most of their time in trading ranges, yet the bulk of the material out there, does little to dig deep into both the subtle nuances as well as gaping wide messages from the market when it comes to `trading in the trenches', which is what I call trading range price action.

Trading in trading range price action is far different from the mono-directional trending market price action. It is as different in reaction time and size of signals, as cage-fighting is from archery. Quick recognition of entry opportunities, identifying high probability targets, and assessing in real-time, the market's ability to hit those targets define the define the required skill sets for elite scalping and shorter-term swing trades that are to be found in trading ranges. This book gets into the heart of those very skills, and delivers on teaching the trader these coveted skills.
The book has a plethora of very insightful and implementable lists, helping the trader to assimilate the information into their trading plans. I'll mention but a few examples, of which, again there are literally dozens....

1. Characteristics of strong trends
2. Characteristics of string breakouts
3. Signs of breakouts that will fail
4. etc, etc, etc

Extremely insightful, you bet, but, equally important to knowing how to spot strong entry environments, is knowing how not to be squeezed out on a pullback which for example the author provides on pg 101, "Areas that are often tested by the pullback". This not only guides traders to avoid missing out of the bigger part of the move, but also helps in the intelligent placement of stops. Again, this prior example is just mentioned to illustrate the point I made above of the author getting into practical, highly implementable details.
This is the most practical treatment of the concept of Measured Moves that I have encountered. The authors' approach avoids the pitfalls of over-extending the information provided by Fibonacci Extensions/Retracements, Elliott Waves etc, and presents it in a manner that works. One only has to watch the deadly precision with which the author draws trend lines and sets targets, to which moves accelerate and then reverse, which he does constantly during his live trading if you need more proof of the efficacy of the material in this section, as well as the section on Magnets.
His clinical handling of the concept around Trading Math, and the advanced trading approach of entering `against the short-term market' on limit orders is worth this books' weight in gold alone.
I could go on, but hopefully you get the point. This is a handbook of techniques, a syllabus of hand-to-hand combat of the elite scalpers, the Seal Team 6 of traders. You don't read this book any more than you would watch a workout video and expect to become an elite warrior. You bleed though the bootcamp, and come out hardened, and ready for anything the institutions, quants and HFT programs can throw at you. You don't read this book, you print the charts (Wiley makes the pdf's available, refer to pg Pg 54) get a pencil in your hand and you go to work, its trading boot camp boys and girls and its not for the `feint of effort' traders.

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Comment on Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies and How I’ve Used Them to Profit in Any Market by Lee Patrick "Bard"

Lee Patrick "Bard" — Sun, 06 May 2012 14:57:32 +0000

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful

Excellent resource for option traders., April 27, 2009

Lee Patrick "Bard" (Upland) -

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This review is from: Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies And How I've Used Them To Profit In Any Market (Paperback)

I found this book to be an excellent source for my everyday trading activities. I especially like the actual trades represented in the book. Too often trading resources tend to be too theoretical and not demonstrate actual trading practices.

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Comment on Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies and How I’ve Used Them to Profit in Any Market by elmtree "elm"

elmtree "elm" — Sun, 06 May 2012 14:15:57 +0000

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful

Trading Stock Optionsw, June 10, 2009

elmtree "elm" (Alma, CO United States) -

This review is from: Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies And How I've Used Them To Profit In Any Market (Paperback)

An excellent overview of trading options, especially well written especially for those who have been intimidated by the concept of options trading. Examples are clear and reflect objectivity by the author, including those trades that didn't go so well -- lessons learned. Have been trading options for a few years and have done okay, but can enhance future trades with what I have learned from this book.

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Comment on Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies and How I’ve Used Them to Profit in Any Market by J. Crist

J. Crist — Sun, 06 May 2012 14:00:44 +0000

29 of 34 people found the following review helpful

Very BASIC, July 19, 2009

J. Crist (USA) -

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This review is from: Trading Stock Options: Basic Option Trading Strategies And How I've Used Them To Profit In Any Market (Paperback)

I read this book and agree is it clear and concise - well written. Options are one of the more complex investment vehicles to understand. After signing up with my broker, ThinkOrSwim, and looking at all the features for options trading, and signing up for a trial of some of the option trade recommentations [...] and read some of the recommendations, I quickly realized how basic this book is. If you really get into options trading you will realize this book only scratches the surface of all the strategies out there.

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