For anyone that is interested (isn't aware), here is a record of Livermores achievements. All monetary values have been converted into inflation adjusted terms for 2009 to show how much he made/lost was worth in todays money.
July 26, 1877: Jesse Livermore is born in West Acton, Massachusetts.
Age 14: Begins work in Paine Weber & Co's Boston stockbroking offices, transferring prices from ticker-tape to quotation board.
Age 15: Makes a $69.10 profit on this first trade - in Burlington stock. Accumulates his first $22,149 by trading stocks and commodities in bucket shops.
Age 16: Paine Weber & Co instruct Jesse Livermore that he must either quit speculating in bucket shops or quit his job. He quits the job.
Age 20: Accumulates his first $221,490 by trading in bucket shops.
Age 21: Moves to New York to trade on the NYSE through legitimate stockbrokers. His fortune has been reduced to $55,372.
Age 22: Loses all funds via unsuccessful trading on NYSE - he attributes this to slow execution of his trades. Borrows $11,074 and goes to St. Louis to trade in bucket shops. He returns to New York with $55,372, repays the loan and resumes trading on both the Exchange and in bucket shops. According to Livermore: "I was not quite twenty-three, all alone in New York with easy money in my pockets and the belief in my heart that I was beginning to understand the new machine. I was making allowances for the actual execution of my orders on the floor of the Exchange, and moving more cautiously. But I was still sticking to the tape - that is, I was still ignoring general principles; and as long as I did that I could not spot the exact trouble with my game."
Age 23: At the beginning of the day, Livermore's fortune stands at over 1 million dollars ($1,182,950). At the end of a frantic day's trading, Livermore is broke. "The ticker beat me by lagging so far behind the market. The divergence between the printed and the actual prices undid me."
Age 24: Livermore returns to the bucket shops and wire houses. He intends gettings a stake together to trade the Stock Exchange again. He is back to dealing in sums of just thousands of dollars. He wins consistently. The wire houses try to swindle Livermore and he responds with several sting operations in which he manipulates prices of thinly traded stocks on the NYSE in order to take large amounts from the wire houses. After a year of successfully trading the wire houses, Livermore has accumulated enough money to buy an automobile and take on an expensive lifestyle. He returns to New York for the third time with a "fair sized roll."
Age 28: Makes a profit of 5.5 million dollars ($5,537,250) shorting stocks on a hunch that preceded the San Francisco earthquake.
Age 29: Loses $885,960 acting on a tip from Ed Harding.
Age 30: Livermore shorts the market during a crash and makes 21 million ($21,245,000). Buys a yacht then loses over 4 million dollars ($4,249,000) trading cotton.
Age 30 / 31: Livermore breaks his own trading rules - he takes advice from commodities expert Percy Thomas. Things go badly. Breaks his own trading rules again - increases his losing position in cotton and sells his winning position in wheat. Goes broke. Leaves New York and goes to Chicago where a trading house, aware of his ability, offers him limited finance for trading. Livermore is then summoned back to New York by Dan Williamson, owner of a Stock Exchange trading house. Williamson gives Livermore just over half a million dollars ($531,125) to resume trading. After three weeks trading, Livermore has made a profit of 2 million dollars ($2,379,440). Williamson interferes with his trading, buying and selling on Livermore's behalf, and runs up losses. Livermore walks away from the relationship.
Age 36: In several years of a flat market, with "no money to be made," Livermore's debts have grown to well over 20 million ($20,820,000) He declares bankruptcy. Of this, he later said, "My mind now being free to take up trading with some prospect of success, the next step was to get another stake."
Age 37: Livermore asks Dan Williamson for help. Williamson offers Livermore the (very small) facility to trade 500 shares. Livermore reads the tape for six weeks before making a trade - he needs to be 100 percent sure the trade will be profitable. Livermore buys Bethlehem Steel on high margin at $98. Steel is rising because of demand from World War I. The price moves upward as he expects and, as the stock rises, he buys more at $115. The following day he sells at $145. He has achieved what he set out to achieve - he has a sizeable stake again.
Age 38: After several months of successful trading, Livermore's balance stands at almost 3 million dollars ($2,989,030)
Age 38 / 39: Livermore plays the market perfectly - he is long when the market is strongly bullish and then goes short when it turns bearish. He makes over 57 million dollars ($57,303,000) profit and goes to Palm Beach for the winter.
Age 40: Livermore makes another 24 million dollars ($24,398,999) profit and pays back all his debts from 1914. He buys 13 million dollars ($13,012,799) worth of annuities to ensure his family has a secure income should he ever be wiped out in the markets again. He also puts money into trusts for his wife and son.
Age 44 / 45: Gives interviews to Edwin Lefèvre for a series of newspaper articles. The articles are then compiled into a book - Reminiscences of a Stock Operator - now regarded as a classic.
Age 46: Moves to custom-designed offices in the Hecksher Building, Fifth Avenue. Livermore wishes to be further removed from Wall Street gossip and to enjoy more secrecy for his trading operations.
Age 48: In the 1925 wheat market Livermore buys grain in 5 million bushel lots while the market is rising, turns bear at the top and sells 50 million bushels short for a profit of 118 million dollars ($118,970,000)
Age 52: Jesse Livermore's greatest moment as a trader. He goes short in the great crash of 1929 and makes a profit of around 1.2 billion dollars ($1,217,500,000)
Age 56: The police are called when Jesse Livermore apparently goes missing. One day after disappearing he returns home, walking unsteadily. He says he spent the night in a hotel and awoke with a blank mind. Reading newspaper headlines about his disappearance brought him to his senses. His doctor's verdict: "Amnesia nervous breakdown." Later in the year, Jesse Livermore is bankrupt. He has lost his entire trading fortune. How he did this is unknown. He is not destitute - his family annuities save the day. He and his wife sail to Europe. "I hope to relieve my mind of some of my troubles."
Age 62: Jesse Livermore writes How to Trade in Stocks - a book for people wishing to learn stock trading. The book is published.
Age 63: Jesse Livermore dies by his own hand, via a revolver bullet through the brain. He had been suffering from depression and in his suicide note he describes his life as a "failure".
