Jack Schwager - Interviews With Top Traders

Trading is often about how to take the appropriate risk without exposing yourself to very human flaws.
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northbound
Posts: 737
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 11:22 pm

Stumbled on this ebook, which someone has put entirely online in PDF format:
http://optionboost.com/Market_Wizards.pdf

It's almost 30 years old and the traders interviewed are financial traders rather than betting exchange's, but I found inspiration in plenty of things they say about mental approach, dedication, starting out, making mistakes, etc.
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marksmeets302
Posts: 527
Joined: Thu Dec 10, 2009 4:37 pm

The books have been a great inspiration for me as well, but once you're longer in the game you can't help thinking a lot of these market wizards made money just by sheer luck. Do take into consideration that many of them eventually went broke :-)

I can definitely recommend reading more about Marty Schwartz, one of the original market wizards. His book Pitbull is somewhat of a classic.
And while he isn't featured as a market wizard, Larry Williams is a great one too.
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workpeter
Posts: 165
Joined: Sat Jul 30, 2016 8:29 pm

page 101, the question/answer most hard hitting for me.

Relatively speaking, how important is the bias of the right market direction versus stock
selection as a contributing factor to your overall superior performance?

As I look back on the past twenty-one years, there is no set pattern of successful activity. In some
years, we did particularly well on the strength of a few well-chosen stocks. In other years, we did
exceptionally well because we were on the right side of the market. For example, in 1973-1974,
when the market went down enormously, we were up substantially, largely because we were net
short. There were other periods when the bulk of our money was made in bonds. I think there is a
message in the fact that there is no real pattern: Anyone who thinks he can formulate success in this
racket is deluding himself, because it changes too quickly. As soon as a formula is right for any
length of time, its own success carries the weight of its inevitable failure.
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northbound
Posts: 737
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 11:22 pm

marksmeets302 wrote:
Fri Sep 08, 2017 4:49 pm
The books have been a great inspiration for me as well, but once you're longer in the game you can't help thinking a lot of these market wizards made money just by sheer luck. Do take into consideration that many of them eventually went broke :-)
Good point. Perhaps there's a lesson in there about adaptability to changes. Or perhaps about boredom kicking in after being successful for a while, leading the trader to take more unnecessary risks and turning into a gambler 😀
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