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Jesse Livermore: Original Trend Follower and Great Trader

  
  Education
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The unofficial biography of Jesse Livermore was Reminiscences of a Stock Operator published 1923. Below are selected quotes:

  • Another lesson I learned early is that there is nothing new in Wall Street. There can’t be because speculation is as old as the hills. Whatever happens in the stock market today has happened before and will happen again.
  • I told you I had ten thousand dollars when I was twenty, and my margin on that Sugar deal was over ten thousand. But I didn’t always win. My plan of trading was sound enough and won oftener than it lost. If I had stuck to it I’d have been right perhaps as often as seven out of ten times. In fact, I have always made money when I was sure I was right before I began. What beat me was not having brains enough to stick to my own game- that is, to play the market only when I was satisfied that precedents favored my play. There is a time for all things, but I didn’t know it. And that is precisely what beats so many men in Wall Street who are very far from being in the main sucker class. There is the plain fool, who does the wrong thing at all times everywhere, but there is the Wall Street fool, who thinks he must trade all the time. No man can always have adequate reasons for buying or selling stocks daily- or sufficient knowledge to make his play an intelligent play.
  • It takes a man a long time to learn all the lessons of 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.
  • There is nothing like losing all you have in the world for teaching you what not to do. And when you know what not to do in order not to lose money, you begin to learn what to do in order to win. Did you get that? You begin to learn!
  • I think it was a long step forward in my trading education when I realized at last that when old Mr. Partridge kept on telling the other customers, Well, you know this is a bull market! he really meant to tell them that the big money was not in the individual fluctuations but in the main movements- that is, not in reading the tape but in sizing up the entire market and its trend.
  • The reason is that a man may see straight and clearly and yet become impatient or doubtful when the market takes its time about doing as he figured it must do. That is why so many men in Wall Street, who are not at all in the sucker class, not even in the third grade, nevertheless lose money. The market does not beat them. They beat themselves, because though they have brains they cannot sit tight. Old Turkey was dead right in doing and saying what he did. He had not only the courage of his convictions but the intelligent patience to sit tight.
  • ?the average man doesn’t wish to be told that it is a bull or bear market. What he desires is to be told specifically which particular stock to buy or sell. He wants to get something for nothing. He does not wish to work. He doesn’t even wish to have to think. It is too much bother to have to count the money that he picks up from the ground.
  • To tell you about the first of my million dollar mistakes I shall have to go back to this time when I first became a millionaire, right after the big break of October, 1907. As far as my trading went, having a million merely meant more reserves. Money does not give a trader more comfort, because, rich or poor, he can make mistakes and it is never comfortable to be wrong. And when a millionaire is right his money is merely one of his several servants. Losing money is the least of my troubles. A loss never bothers me after I take it. I forget it overnight. But being wrong- not taking the loss- that is what does damage to the pocketbook and to the soul.
  • What I have told you gives you the essence of my trading system as based on studying the tape. I merely learn the way prices are most probably going to move. I check up my own trading by additional tests, to determine the psychological moment. I do that by watching the way the price acts after I begin.
  • Of all speculative blunders there are few worse than trying to average a losing game. My cotton deal proved it to the hilt a little later. Always sell what shows you a loss and keep what shows you a profit. That was so obviously the wise thing to do and was so well known to me that even now I marvel at myself for doing the reverse.
  • The loss of the money didn’t bother me. Whenever I have lost money in the stock market I have always considered that I have learned something; that if I have lost money I have gained experience, so that the money really went for a tuition fee. A man has to have experience and he has to pay for it.
  • In booms, which is when the public is in the market in the greatest numbers, there is never any need of subtlety, so there is no sense of wasting time discussing either manipulation or speculation during such times; it would be like trying to find the difference in raindrops that are falling synchronously on the same roof across the street. The sucker has always tried to get something for nothing, and the appeal in all booms is always frankly to the gambling instinct aroused by cupidity and spurred by a pervasive prosperity. People who look for easy money invariably pay for the privelege of proving conclusively that it cannot be found on this sordid earth. At first, when I listened to the accounts of old-time deals and devices I used to think that people were more gullible in the 1860’s and 70’s than in the 1900’s. But I was sure to read in the newspapers that very day or the next something about the latest Ponzi or the bust-up of some bucketing broker and about the millions of sucker money gone to join the silent majority of vanished savings.
  • There are men whose gait is far quicker than the mob’s. They are bound to lead- no matter how much the mob changes.

On Trading Psychology

  
  Education
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From “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator” by Edwin Lefevre, the 1923 classic pseudo-autobiography of legendary trader Jesse Livermore:

… I didn’t always win. My plan of trading was sound enough and won oftener than it lost. If I had stuck to it I’d have been right perhaps as often as seven out of ten times. In fact, I always made money when I was sure I was right before I began. What beat me was not having brains enough to stick to my own game — that is, to play the market only when I was satisfied that precedents favored my play. There is a time for all things, but I didn’t know it. And that is precisely what beats so many men in Wall Street who are very far from being in the main sucker class. There is the plain fool, who does the wrong thing at all times everywhere, but there is the Wall Street fool, who thinks he must trade all the time. No man can always have adequate reasons for buying or selling stocks daily — or sufficient knowledge to make his play an intelligent play.

Sometimes the best play is to not play at all. When playing the market, you have to let the opportunities come to you, and take advantage of them when the odds are in your favor. If you don’t, you’ll get very frustrated — and you’ll lose money.

The Four Principles of Trading

  
  Education
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  1. The price has the final say. You may have an opinion on the market, but it is dangerous to marry it to your positions, as famous trader Richard Dennis explained, “You don’t get any profits from fundamental analysis; you get profit from buying and selling. So why stick with the appearance when you can go right to the reality of price and analyze it better?”

  2. Follow instead of forecast. Legendary trader Paul Tudor Jones once declared that he would never hire fundamental traders who frequently tried to outwit the market and got burned, because by the time the fundamentals become clear, the trend is over. You can never know if the next trade wins or not, so simply follow your rules and see.

  3. Preserve your capital. Since the market is impossible to forecast, all great traders agree that you must limit your losses before it gets out of hand, since they have seen a lot of intelligent traders got bruised in a market crash simply because they held on to the losers or even averaged down on the way as the price became “fundamentally” attractive.

  4. Let your winners ride. The other side of the coin is not to cut the profit too soon before it can grow large. Jesse Livermore explained, “I’ve known many men who… began buying or selling stocks when prices were at the very level which should show the greatest profit. And … they made no real money out of it.” Why? They sold too soon.

9 Things-Jesse Livermore said regarding excessive trading

  
  Education
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“Money is made by sitting, not trading.”

2. “It takes time to make money.”

3. “It was never my thinking that made the big money for me, it always was sitting.”

4. “Nobody can catch all the fluctuations.”

5. “The desire for constant action irrespective of underlying conditions is responsible for many losses in Wall Street even among the professionals, who feel that they must take home some money everyday, as though they were working for regular wages.”

6. “Buy right, sit tight.”

7. “Men who can both be right and sit tight are uncommon.”

8. “Don’t give me timing, give me time.”

and finally, the most important thing:

9. “There is a time for all things, but I didn’t know it. And that is precisely what beats so many men in Wall Street who are very far from being in the main sucker class. There is the plain fool, who does the wrong thing at all times everywhere, but there is the Wall Street fool, who thinks he must trade all the time. Not many can always have adequate reasons for buying and selling stocks daily – or sufficient knowledge to make his play an intelligent play.” (more…)

legendary speculator Jesse Livermore

  
  Education
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legendary speculator Jesse Livermore on LETTING YOUR WINNERS RUN

(Chapter V) … “I think it was a long step forward in my trading education when I realized at last that when old Mr. Partridge kept on telling the other customers, “Well, you know this is a bull market!” he really meant to tell them that the big money was not in the individual fluctuations but in the main movements – that is, not in reading the tape but in sizing up the entire market and its trend.”

In all of “Reminiscences” this crucial idea that the Really Big Money is always earned by prudently riding the large trends over time and not in day trading every minute fluctuation is one of the central themes of the book.

“be right and sit tight”

(Chapter V) … “And right here let me say one thing: After spending many years in Wall Street and after making and losing millions of dollars I want to tell you this: It never was my thinking that made the big money for me. It always was my sitting. Got that? My sitting tight! It is no trick at all to be right on the market. You always find lots of early bulls in bull markets and early bears in bear markets. I’ve known many men who were right at exactly the right time, and began buying and selling stocks when prices were at the very level which should show the greatest profit. And their experience invariably matched mine – that is, they made no real money out of it. Men who can both be right and sit tight are uncommon. I found it one of the hardest things to learn. But it is only after a stock operator has firmly grasped this that he can make big money. It is literally true that millions come easier to a trader after he knows how to trade than hundreds did in the days of his ignorance.” (more…)

Gems of Jesse Livermore

  
  Education
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Jesse Livermore

What beat me was not having brains enough to stick to my own game — that is, to play the market only when I was satisfied that precedents favored my play. There is a time for all things, but I didn’t know it. And that is precisely what beats so many men in Wall Street who are very far from being in the main sucker class. There is the plain fool, who does the wrong thing at all times everywhere, but there is the Wall Street fool, who thinks he must trade all the time. No man can always have adequate reasons for buying or selling stocks daily — or sufficient knowledge to make his play an intelligent play.

The desire for constant action irrespective of underlying conditions is responsible for many losses in Wall Street even among the professionals, who feel that they must take home some money every day, as though they were working for regular wages.

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.

Nobody offered to point out the essential differences or set me right. If somebody had told me my method would not work I nevertheless would have tried it out to make sure for myself, for when I am wrong only one thing convinces me of it, and that is, to lose money. And I am only right when I make money. That is speculating.

On Trading Psychology

  
  Education
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From “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator” by Edwin Lefevre, the 1923 classic pseudo-autobiography of legendary trader Jesse Livermore:

… I didn’t always win. My plan of trading was sound enough and won oftener than it lost. If I had stuck to it I’d have been right perhaps as often as seven out of ten times. In fact, I always made money when I was sure I was right before I began. What beat me was not having brains enough to stick to my own game — that is, to play the market only when I was satisfied that precedents favored my play. There is a time for all things, but I didn’t know it. And that is precisely what beats so many men in Wall Street who are very far from being in the main sucker class. There is the plain fool, who does the wrong thing at all times everywhere, but there is the Wall Street fool, who thinks he must trade all the time. No man can always have adequate reasons for buying or selling stocks daily — or sufficient knowledge to make his play an intelligent play.

Sometimes the best play is to not play at all. When playing the market, you have to let the opportunities come to you, and take advantage of them when the odds are in your favor. If you don’t, you’ll get very frustrated — and you’ll lose money.

On Trading Psychology

  
  Education
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From “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator” by Edwin Lefevre, the 1923 classic pseudo-autobiography of legendary trader Jesse Livermore:

… I didn’t always win. My plan of trading was sound enough and won oftener than it lost. If I had stuck to it I’d have been right perhaps as often as seven out of ten times. In fact, I always made money when I was sure I was right before I began. What beat me was not having brains enough to stick to my own game — that is, to play the market only when I was satisfied that precedents favored my play. There is a time for all things, but I didn’t know it. And that is precisely what beats so many men in Wall Street who are very far from being in the main sucker class. There is the plain fool, who does the wrong thing at all times everywhere, but there is the Wall Street fool, who thinks he must trade all the time. No man can always have adequate reasons for buying or selling stocks daily — or sufficient knowledge to make his play an intelligent play.

Sometimes the best play is to not play at all. When playing the market, you have to let the opportunities come to you, and take advantage of them when the odds are in your favor. If you don’t, you’ll get very frustrated — and you’ll lose money.

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