What books do professional traders read?

rodolfo49

rodolfo49

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So everywhere I look I see the same recommended books: "reminiscences of a stock operator", "market wizards', "new market wizards", "trading in the zone", "trade your way to financial freedom", "trading for a living", etc etc etc, you all know the rest...

...but I was wondering what books do professionals read?

Now, either...

1. Before becoming a professional you were a newbie and thus you started with these books(like most people do) and later moved to other 'more-in-depth' and advanced books.

or...

2. You had no prior trading experience and you started working for a prop firm or a big institution(I'm assuming they said they'd train you) and they tell u what books to read and study from and which ones should u familiarize yourself with.

I'm asking these for various reasons. First of all, ALL websites and everywhere you see the same books being recommended(note: everybody's reading the same books yet still 80%-%90 of traders fail) and secondly, professional traders go against the herd mentality and fade what amateurs(newbie retail traders reading the same books) do.

I guess I'm trying to learn more of how a professional trader thinks, and what exactly does he know, or what's his mindset, what kind of literature does he fill his mind with? What books? What analysis? How does he analyze the market differently from the retail traders or newbies?

I hope the way I explained myself makes sense. :whistling

Are there any professional traders around here? I haven't yet had the pleasure of meeting any.

Warning: I don't mean to imply that a professional trader is only one that works for big institutions. I just gave that example for the sake of an example.:!:

In any case...I was lately wondering what on earth these guys read after they've read all the recommended and classic trading books. :p
 
rodolfo49 said:
So everywhere I look I see the same recommended books: "reminiscences of a stock operator", "market wizards', "new market wizards", "trading in the zone", "trade your way to financial freedom", "trading for a living", etc etc etc, you all know the rest...

...but I was wondering what books do professionals read?

Now, either...

1. Before becoming a professional you were a newbie and thus you started with these books(like most people do) and later moved to other 'more-in-depth' and advanced books.

or...

2. You had no prior trading experience and you started working for a prop firm or a big institution(I'm assuming they said they'd train you) and they tell u what books to read and study from and which ones should u familiarize yourself with.

I'm asking these for various reasons. First of all, ALL websites and everywhere you see the same books being recommended(note: everybody's reading the same books yet still 80%-%90 of traders fail) and secondly, professional traders go against the herd mentality and fade what amateurs(newbie retail traders reading the same books) do.

I guess I'm trying to learn more of how a professional trader thinks, and what exactly does he know, or what's his mindset, what kind of literature does he fill his mind with? What books? What analysis? How does he analyze the market differently from the retail traders or newbies?

I hope the way I explained myself makes sense. :whistling

Are there any professional traders around here? I haven't yet had the pleasure of meeting any.

Warning: I don't mean to imply that a professional trader is only one that works for big institutions. I just gave that example for the sake of an example.:!:

In any case...I was lately wondering what on earth these guys read after they've read all the recommended and classic trading books. :p
Click to expand...

You would be surprised to know that "some" huge traders from "some" prop firm making a big number of K's week in and week out didn't ever read any trading book....
Of course this is not the case for all, but this is a fact.... :)
 
These 3 books really helped me in my trading and it will help you as well.
1. Mastering The Trade (by John Carter)
2. Technical Analysis of the Financial Markets (by John J. Murphy)
3. Trading In The Zone (by Mark Douglas)
 
rodolfo49 said:
I guess I'm trying to learn more of how a professional trader thinks, and what exactly does he know, or what's his mindset, what kind of literature does he fill his mind with? What books? What analysis? How does he analyze the market differently from the retail traders or newbies?
Click to expand...

If that's what you're after, then you should read the Market Wizards books which you noted before. They are all about getting in the minds of professionals.

As for what the pros read, think about what sort of things you read in your own profession. I'd venture to say the vast majority of your development at this stage is about experience and keeping up with developments in your field (usually news and other periodical type publications), not about reading books. This isn't to say you shouldn't read. It's just that at a certain point any given book might only have one or two little bits in it that might be of specific use to you because of your stage of development. Books are not generally written for the "masters".
 
the majority of the valuable information you need to know/learn about trading comes predominantly from experience, and a firm understanding of the fundamentals and the tools.
 
It's an interesting question. and it's a truth that you can not find may great books for this amazing market. you should learn more through experience. as to trading basics, you can learn from everywhere.
 
I agree. I just started "Market Wizards" so I'm really excited about learning from their experiences. HenriettaBrett, thank you for those, I already have them on my book list, so I'll devour them as soon as I get a hold of them. :)

Everyday I learn more through experience too, screen time cannot be replaced by book reading, theory doesn't make u money, but action. Although u need the theory to know what to act upon. haha

Thank you all for your input. xD
 
rodolfo49 said:
everybody's reading the same books yet still 80%-%90 of traders fail) and secondly, professional traders go against the herd mentality and fade what amateurs(newbie retail traders reading the same books) do.
Click to expand...

this is "key" and you won't find anything about it in many technical analysis books...
 
So true. :(

Now that I think about it, maybe a book on Behavioral Economics would be an interesting read. :D
 
http://www.trade2win.com/boards/trading-home/150652-good-books-trading.html#post1860740

you ever heard the phrase "the market is at the point of recognition" ?

i think that most books people commend are precisely points of recognition and utterly useless to a newbie......in other words, you'll read a book and either grin or chagrin at the moment you recognise a concept or event summary in a book.......so the books are, really, recognition references, afterall, without the actualised, personal, experiences summarised within, how can an individual know, see, acknowledge or recall anything from within the confines of the book and if they say they do, then, that's most likely a recall of a (reference) they've read in a previous text simply due to their previous searches, they've stumbled across stuff that's become familiar and theyre not sure where or when or how they came across the work(s) and they've taken enough in to at least feel they understand the current book they're ensconced in......and this is the challenge (see link above) because this familiarity is a rouge, of itself, that comes from everyday laziness of how we see ourselves and determines the level of effort we'll go to for absolute result......the effort rarely departs from the result......the effort rarely departs from self esteem......they are circular....each transaction is an absolute result, the price you enter, the price you exit, you recieve an absolute result and to avoid the absolute traders will die in a position rather than take on the absolute, they'd rather be in a romantic notion drawn from books than do the work that is required.......the participation in an auction process is so distinct from any other activity yet most people want to participate as though they are armed from a few books, as though, this is nothing from the ordinary, yet, we are talking about making and losing money from......well......money.......so how familiar and exactly-like anything else can trading be?

i've read on T2W trading described likened to a carpenter making furniture.....very funny.......and i've likened trading to rugby where i'm facing a huge forward who's coming at me at speed, who drops the left shoulder and fakes right and i'm left stranded, or worse still, he fends me off with a palm to the face.....while that's conceptual in how you've taken in that idea it's true in it's description of the dynamism i'm involved in.......a book cannot convey that to you in context.....a person, a mentor, a tutor can!

there's a cupla books i've read that are ideal to specific auctions, one for stocks and the other for futures, two distinctive different beasts......i would not suggest them to anyone without first knowing that person can articulate the basis of an auction......very few people can clearly articulate the auction process without drifting off into into a specific event which results in an out-of context point of view....most people have no idea how a car engine works they just want to turn the key and make the car go.....most people cannot summarise an auction, any auction, even after hours of reading famous trading books and as a trader youre the driver and the mechanic

take any of the most accepted, most read, most loved texts on trading and then search to see who has paraphrased the parts that are actionable or have been moulded into a regime of process......these people are likely to be harder to find than the actionable parts themselves.......there is a good reason for that and i'm guessing you've already realised the reason as you're reading this post.......

a pro trader who no longer frequents this site once enlightened me to this idea:

Question: "What kind of book should i read?"

Answer: "That's the wrong question"
Click to expand...

just ideas
 
mingbao said:
throw away your books and learn from others, this is a connected world.
Click to expand...

Ummm....Learning from books IS learning from others. And the structure of a well-done book facilitates more efficient information exchange than learning from forums, etc.
 
Joules MM1, thank you for your in depth comment. What I'll do is soak in and absorb what the literature I'm reading is teaching and record it down on paper so I don't forget them. Review them every now and then, if not everyday pre-market, so it's fresh on my mind. We gotta find a way to purposefully turn into action what we learn from reading those books, or any kind of trading literature we read.
 
rodolfo49 said:
Joules MM1, thank you for your in depth comment. What I'll do is soak in and absorb what the literature I'm reading is teaching and record it down on paper so I don't forget them. Review them every now and then, if not everyday pre-market, so it's fresh on my mind. We gotta find a way to purposefully turn into action what we learn from reading those books, or any kind of trading literature we read.
Click to expand...

i commend you make notes within the book, eg, where does this action occur, where can i see it, when does this occur, how come only at this time of the day, week, quarter, is this group of traders only active here and what is their purpose for being only active in this region, how come these measures work in this price extent yet the following signal failed even though price travelled further

you must respect that any book is a promise of things to come.....that's all.....the work that needs to be done is your own construction of application.......getting a licence and keys to the car does not guarantee someone won't immediately crash into you and a book cannot tell you when/how to be defensive in that moment as it happens......you cannot trade live with a book, you may trade live with a tutor, on skype, on the phone, on live video, whatever......it's live, active, in the present......

i agree that reading a book is learning from others as long as it is done with a pre-organised criteria such as how to approach recording the ideas from the book and what correspondence is req'd with the author.......if most people who attempt to teach themselves to play the piano from a book are, at best, clumsy then how may someone trade from a static book?

eventually all authors will succumb to the task of backing themselves with live answers or video replies, simply writing a book won't be enough as is the nature of competition and technology and the written word is very old technology and clearly has limitations

the structure of a well-done book facilitates more efficient information exchange than learning from forums, etc.
Click to expand...

a "well-done" book is a wide open and loose term to describe information that the reader has to know in how to interpret for what comes before, during and after the written word when transposed onto a live price

Forums are good for communication if the conversation has guidelines and there's early agreement on discipline(s) as at least there is flexibility and contiguous visuals can be used, unlike a book.......getting inflection, subtle cues or insights that come from a conversation of understanding with a live set of figures are not readily available from either a book or forums.....the less static and linear a conversation is the higher the likelyhood a student can interpret and understand provided the tutor is committed

books are a beginning, most treat them as the end until a hurdle is hit then another book
 
anything that i want done at home, such as plumming, power installation, put in a fireplace.....i'm not interested in picking up a book even though i can do that and notwithstanding that these activities may only come back and bite me in set ways, electricution, drowning or smoke suffocation (as an extreme example) .......yet people are satisfied to read a cupla books and be ignorant to the missing parts of their education, afterall, how could they know, they're ignorant, right? The dynamisms involved, the when-and-where of the people on the other side of your trade is not the same education received from a book the way it is conveyed and interpreted to you by a person at the time it happens and a book cannot assist in forming the correct questions to ask......the job of a good tutor is to know how to assist a student in forming the right questions.....as a student, if you cannot form the right questions HTF can you expect to receive the appropriate answers and exactly how do you know you've received them from a book ? What exactly the student attempts to do, if memory serves, is to match what the screen shows to what's been read.........hello! ......that's what i call educated failure........
 
rodolfo49 said:
... gotta find a way to purposefully turn into action .... learn from reading those books, or any kind of trading literature....
Click to expand...

Dan Gilbert on our mistaken expectations | Video on TED.com

trading is like no other activity.......people have likened it to many things, yet, it's unique in the original sense of unique, singular.......i am, of course, speaking from my own pov.....there many things that occur in the auction process that do occur in everyday life, yet, in toto the conduct of trade auctions is a centric operation that requires people agree on one specific thing: price ......how they then go about determining price is such a wide open subject matter that you'll find comes from a sublime mathematic for one group to simple skulduggery for another group.......this is my pov when i trade........

yes, you can use a linear marine-corp approach that has no interest in understanding the auction process or you can use flavour of the month EA squiggly bits that require more maintenance than they reward or you can subscribe to timing, opines, editorials.....all of those are ok of themselves, they have their immediacy, for the iNow crowd

another point that is lost with books.....we are not equal.....my iq is pretty average.....i need to understand.......show me a sub one minute of the dax, preplanning in hand, i'm at it......show me an equity curve integer visualizer with red divergence bands that trigger off an 8 and 15 period waffle and my eyes glaze over or i simply pyss myself laughing

you see, one size does not fit all.......and as a student, how would you know?

A book cannot ascertain your response time/rate, a book cannot determin levels of insight or experience or basic knowledge required with figures....if a book cannot tell you have these things, cannot, in some way, measure the person, how do you know yourself? For some this maybe irrelevant line of thought, for most, i suspect, this is on call.......some of the biggest losses come from the most basic of functions such as lack of sleep, wrong nutrition and all way before intellect kicks in

i came across this video recently, pure accident, looking for something else.....as the video went on, i thought, jeez i wish i had seen this years ago or could encapsulate the ideas within.....this is a recognition video....many futures traders will recognise the functions within the video and while the video is not a trading video the way you might think a coffee-n-biscuits seminar might be, there are ideas within that i see everyday in active price charts in that how you are as a person, the propensities you have, your weaknesses, youre need to be right, your reflexive nature to things that you suppose maybe true, all these things are known by people who trade bigger size than you, bigger size than me....

my day starts with basic planning, yet proceeds with the idea that the person on the other side of my trade whom i'm trading with, not against, is smarter than me and has a better strategy.....that trader may have opposing numbers to mine, obviously, yet i look to know the strategy, not be better at the strategy, know the likely plan of that traders day, that groups day, that groups target, that traders zone of play, when that trader might finish his/her business for the day, which new group is now predominant, what their new targets are......people determin price even if they do so by automation/algos, whatever, price extent and regions of activity, that is, the when-and-where still originates, still comes from, a persons ideas ......there is no possibility that i can be aware of all strategies and deal with them competently, however, i read flow extremely well when i read it extremely well of my own volition and recognise when i'm allowed to read price well and when i've been set up to read price well.....the subtle distinctions are unique......these are individual moments......if you do not think this is true then i offer the most well-worn tried and true method of distributing stock at tops to people who have to buy and buying stocks at lows when people have to sell.......you see, there is no have to at the start, yet, the start is the foundation that creates the "have-to" moments......

this post does not suit many people, thus, many books do not suit many people, a book cannot necessarily play to your strengths........the auction process does not suit many people because of the life muck they bring with them.....

weekend television
Dan Gilbert on our mistaken expectations | Video on TED.com
 
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