Archives of “JESSE LIVERMORE” tag

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20 Thoughts from -Richard Love’s “Superperformance Stocks”

  
  Education
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If you read Jesse Livermore’s “How to Trade in Stocks” from 1940, Nicolas Darvas’s ‘How I made 2M in the stock market” from 1960, Richard Love’s “Superperformance Stocks” from 1977, William O’Neil’s early version of “How to make money in stocks” from the 1990s or Howard Lindzon’s “The Wallstrip Edge” from 2008, you will realize that after so many years, the main thing that has changed in the market is the names of the winning stocks. Everything else important – the catalysts, the cyclicality in sentiment, has remained the same.

Here are some incredible insights from Richard Love’s book ‘Superperformance Stocks’. In his eyes, a superperformance stock is one that has at least tripled within a two-year period.

1. The first consideration in buying stock is safety.

Safety is derived more from the good timing of the purchase and less from the financial strength of the company. The stocks of the nation’s largest and strongest corporations have dropped drastically during general stock market declines.

The best time to buy most stocks is when the market looks like a disaster. It is then that the risk is lowest and the potential rewards are highest.

2. All stocks are price-cyclical

For many years certain stocks have been considered to be cyclical; that is, the business of those companies rose and fell with the business cycle. It was also assumed that some industries and certain companies were noncyclical— little affected by the changes in business conditions. The attitude developed among investors that cyclical industries were to be avoided and that others, such as established growth companies, were to be favored. To a  certain extent this artificial division of companies into cyclical and noncyclical has been deceptive because although the earnings of some companies might be little affected by the business cycle the price of the stock is often as cyclical as that of companies strongly affected by the business cycle. Virtually all stocks are price-cyclical. Stocks that are not earnings-cyclical often have higher price/earnings ratios, and thus are susceptible to reactions when the primary trend of the market begins to decline. This can occur even during a period of increasing earnings. (more…)

Beating The Game

  
  Education
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3575My satisfaction always came from beating the market, solving the puzzle. The money was the reward, but it was not the main reason I loved the market. The stock market is the greatest, most complex puzzle ever invented – and it pays the biggest jackpot….it was never the money that drove me. It was the game, solving the puzzle, beating the market that had confused and confounded the greatest minds in history. For me, that passion, the juice, the exhilaration was in beating the game, a game that was a living dynamic riddle, a conundrum to everyone who speculated on Wall Street. Jesse Livermore

11 Trading Thoughts

  
  Education
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  • Buy from the scared, sell to the greedy.
  • Buy their pain, not their gain.
  • Successful traders are quick to change their minds and have little pride of opinion.
  • I made my money because I always got out too soon. (Bernard Baruch)
  • Don’t try to buy at the bottom and sell at the top. It can’t be done except by liars. (Bernard Baruch)
  • Throughout all my years of investing I’ve found that the big money was never made in the buying or the selling. The big money was made in the waiting. (Jesse Livermore)
  • The faster a stock has climbed, the quicker it will fall.
  • The more certain the crowd is, the surer it is to be wrong. (Menschel)
  • Bear markets begin in good times. Bull markets begin in bad times
  • Never confuse genius with a bull market.
  • Always sell what shows you a loss and keep what shows you a profit

A Lesson on the "As if " Principle

  
  Education
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clip_image002In the 1880s, the psychologist William James developed and began teaching his “As If” principle of life. This might not make any sense to some of you, but it works. For example, if you want to be courageous, try to act courageously. If you want to be a nice guy, start putting a smile on your face and be friendly. If you want to be a great trader, then think like the great traders before us. You cannot be a great trader without first thinking that you are one. You get it?

A person that constantly thinks that he or she will fail in trading, cannot learn how to trade, or just simply has feelings that he or she will “never make it”, will inevitably fail. Think, act, and be like Jesse Livermore, Bernard Baruch, Nicolas Darvas, Gerald Loeb, Richard Wyckoff, William O’Neil, Jim Roppel, Steve Cohen, and many, many others. They play (played) to win and that’s how you should play: play to win. (more…)

The Mind of the Greatest Trader-Livermore

  
  Education
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As revolutionary as this early-day stock guru’s approach to trading was for his time, in truth, Jesse’s stock trading “secrets” just came down to good, sound basics. His success stands as a testament to the fact that the further we wander away from trading breakout stocks and a simple, disciplined approach to trading stocks, the less success we’re inclined to have. Just how unconventional was Jesse Livermore? Take a look:

  • He believed in trading top quality stocks, not “weaker sister” stocks.
  • A stock hitting new highs was a signal of a stock’s strength to Livermore, and meant the stock had broken through its overhead supply of sellers. Today, we call this a “breakout stock”.
  • He was one of the first stock traders to realize that stocks tend to move in industry groups not in isolation.
  • Unlike today’s self-appointed stock pick gurus, Jesse Livermore was a humble student of the market, and never considered himself a master.

Livermore was ever conscious of the part one’s psychology played in achieving stock trading success, so he never spoke about what he was doing to anybody, and actually was known to ask people to keep their stock tips to themselves! He was so protective of his trading psychology that he would not even use the words “bullish” or “bearish,” thinking they would create an emotional mindset that he wanted to avoid. (more…)

Thoughts from Legendary Investors

  
  Education
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On Waiting…..

Wait for the fat pitch. – Warren Buffett: comparing investing to a baseball game where you can wait endlessly for the perfect pitch before you swing.

I only go to work on the days that make sense to go to work…And I really do something on that day. But you go to work and you do something every day and you don’t realize when it’s a special day. – George Soros talking to Byron Wien

His first conclusion was that he won when all the factors were in his favor, when he was patient and waited for all the ducks to line up in a row. – from Jesse Livermore, Worlds Greatest Stock Trader

Profits can be made safely only when the opportunity is available and not just because they happen to be desired or needed. …Willingness and ability to hold funds uninvested while awaiting real opportunities is a key to success in the battle for investment survival.- Gerald Loeb

You make money on wall street by being very selective and being patient, waiting for those opportunities that are irresistible, where the percentages are very heavily in your favor.- Seth Glickenhaus

Unless, however, we see a very high probability of at least 10 percent pretax returns (which translate to 6 percent to 7 percent after corporate tax), we will sit on the sidelines. With short-term money returning less than 1 percent after-tax, sitting it out is no fun. But occasionally successful investing requires inactivity.- Warren Buffett

Many equity investors feel compelled to remain 100% invested in equities at all times. Bond investors are often similarly constrained.  We strongly believe that this mentality leads to pursuit of relative rather than absolute investment returns, a direction we certainly want to avoid…A smaller pool of funds seeking to avoid meaningful declines in market value at every point in time and seeking more aggressive return objectives cannot afford to be fully invested in the absence of attractive opportunities. – Seth Klarman

On Mistakes….

…if anything, I make as many mistakes as the next guy. But where I do think that I excel is in recognizing my mistakes, you see. And that is the secret to my success. The key insight that I have reached is recognition of the inherent fallibility of human thought. –George Soros

The only way you get a real education in the market is to invest cash, track your trade, and study your mistakes! – Jesse Livermore

On Psychology… (more…)

The Right Side

  
  Education
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A quote from one the best traders of our time, Jesse Livermore: “It takes a man a long time to learn all the lessons of all his mistakes. They say there are two sides to everything. But there is only one side to the stock market; and it is not the bull side or the bear side, but the right side. It took me longer to get that general principle fixed firmly in my mind than it did most of the more technical phases of the game of stock speculation.”

Being a bull or a bear alone is meaningless out of the crucial context of the current market conditions. All that really matters for the great game of speculation is being on the “right side”, knowing when the markets are in a bull or a bear trend and deploying your speculative capital accordingly.

Once again Livermore ties speculation back into the speculator’s own internal emotions. He points out that it makes no sense to be bullish or bearish as a rule, but to carefully watch the market conditions in order to be on “the right side” at any given moment. Most speculators are burdened with an innate emotional bias to be bullish that is dangerous and must be eradicated if they wish to succeed in speculation.

A speculator must not foolishly try to bend the markets to his will, but instead prudently bend his will to the markets! If a bull trend is evident, be long. If a bear trend dominates, be short. An elite speculator doesn’t care at all which way the markets are moving, he just wants to be “right” and recognize the trend early enough to prudently deploy his own capital and be blessed to harvest profitable trades.

Forget the endless bull and bear arguments and don’t let any other speculators try to pigeonhole you into one of the two warring camps. Instead of being a perma-bull or perma-bear, instead strive to listen to the rhythm of the markets and simply be “right” about what is coming to pass next and trade accordingly.

Paul Tudor Jones on Jesse Livermore

  
  Education
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One of the greatest trading books ever written is Reminiscences of a Stock Operator. The original book was published in 1923, but in 2010, an Annotated Edition was produced by Jon Markman. This edition reveals the truth about Jesse Livermore and provides colorful, historically accurate commentary on the characters, places, and events that have made Reminiscences such an enjoyable and educational read for generations.

The foreward to the Annotated Edition is written by legendary trader Paul Tudor Jones. At the end of the book, Jones answers a few questions about his relationship with the book and its themes. Here is one of the insightful questions that was asked to Jones. I found a profound meaning in his response. I hope you discover it as well.

Question: Part of the appeal of the book is Livermore’s journey of self-discovery as a person and as a trader. Have you had the same experience as a trader and portfolio manager, or was your path easier or harder?

Jones: Probably the best lessons to be learned from this book come from his repeated failures and how he dealt with them. In the book I think he lost his entire fortune four or five times. I did the same thing but was fortunate enough to do it all in my early twenties on very small stakes of capital. I think I lost $10,000 when I was 22, and when I was 25 I lost about $50,000, which was all I had to my name. It felt like a fortune at the time. It was then that my father flew up from Memphis and sat me down in my New York City apartment and began lecturing me as lawyers do. He commanded, “Leave the gambling den behind. Come home and get a real job in a safe profession like real estate.” Of course, I did not, and the rest is history. And real estate these past few years has been about as safe as shooting craps to pay the rent, so I was twice blessed. If I’d have taken my father’s advice, I might have lost all of my money again these past few years in my fifties. (more…)

Fear

  
  Education
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  fear-daytrading
 

One of my favorite bits of trading advice was given 85 years ago by Jesse Livermore in Reminiscences of a Stock Operator: 

“The speculator’s chief enemies are always boring from within.

“It is inseparable from human nature to hope and to fear. In speculation when the market goes against you, you hope that every day will be the last day and you lose more than you should had you not listened to hope… to the same ally that is so potent a success-bringer to empire builders and pioneers, big and little. And when the market goes your way you become fearful that the next day will take away your profit, and you get out too soon. Fear keeps you from making as much money as you ought to.

The successful trader has to fight these two deep-seated instincts. He has to reverse what you might call his natural impulses. Instead of hoping he must fear; instead of fearing he must hope. He must fear that his loss may develop into a much bigger loss, and hope that his profit may become a big profit. It is absolutely wrong to gamble in stocks the way the average man does.” (more…)

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