Customer Reviews

Amazing Life of Jesse Livermore: World's Greatest Stock Trader

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book provides an excellent biographical portrait of one of the greatest Wall Street speculators that ever lived. This book is well researched and well written. In fact, as Livermore's life story unfolds in the book, the reader begins to feel as though they are eyewitnesses to the time. The reader gets to experience Livermore's triumphs and defeats. In the end, the reader will find that Livermore's life mirrored the stockmarket more than the life itself. This man's life ran with the bulls and the bears culminating in one big crash. Ultimately, Jesse Livermore died of lead poisoning, a fatal gunshot wound to the head.

If it is one's intention to garner the "Livermore Key" to profits in the stockmarket then this is definitely not the book. While the author briefly touches on Livermore's tactics and attempts to tie it into current stocks, the information provided is rather general and somewhat vague. The reader would be better off looking elsewhere for investment advice. However, if you are truly interested in Livermore himself then you might consider it. In the final analysis, while this book is a good one it really does pale in comparison to Edward LeFevre's classic book "Reminiscence of a Stock Operator." LeFevre's book speaks to the reader while Richard Smitten's new book is more of a third person account leaving the reader as more of an observer.

The Story of his life and the description of his methods are very worthwhile to get familiar with if you are into the markets. Jesse was a repressed and brainy kind of guy who related to every aspect of his life with dollars. It was his way of controlling things. But it led from one catastrophe to another. I don't think he saw people as people. I guess what I am saying is that money has limited power and Jesse's story is an excellent demonstration of this. If you make a pile, you gotta read this. It may save you a ton of grief. Author's style is lively and to the point. As a book, it's certainly no waste of time. Enjoy!

I can't think of a more important subject to learn then the emotional side of the individual trader if ever I want to become a successful trader myself. Emotions are what makes or breaks a short-term speculator every time. You can have all the technical abilities in the world, but add some cash to the equation and trade it in the market, and the emotions will throw everything you know out of whack... Jesse Livermore is considered one of the best if not "The Best" trader that has ever lived. Dollar for dollar out pacing Mr. Buffet by a long shot... calling the market first, scaling in his trades, trading his plan... and walking away from 2 of the biggest market crashes in history a winner, and the last one in 1929 a $100,000,000 richer. And remember, thats back when Beverly Hills estates were pricey at $25,000. Have a Plan... Trade a Plan! He had some major emotional issues to deal with... and the time he lost it, he was trading in a BAD emotional state... (A good time for a trading break in my opinion). So there is much to learn here... a fantastically written book and fun to read... A MUST READ along with the "REMINISCES OF A STOCK OPERATOR". I would suggest reading this book first to get a background and "Reminisces" next. Happy Trading!

This book is perfect except I feel that the author is using Jesse Livermores original book to make money. How can you use someone like that. Stupid to me. Though it is informative and the first 7 chapters are of Jesse Livermores words, I can not feel proper hearing someone else who is not even part of being a financial wizard try to interpret a famouse traders technique. You can read the inexperience words from Smitten when re iterating Jesse's teachings. Even the charts are not explained properly unless you know what your looking for. Jesse never needed charts. I just feel like Smitten offers his side of what he feels Jesse is teaching and it sounds redundant and useless. It sounds like Smitten trys to offer some of his ideas as well and I feel it is a stumbling block of knowledge. It would of been great if Smitten just wrote an introduction, maybe a forward or some personal words and leave the book untouched with Jesse's own words. But he sounds like he wanted ride on Jesse's success and sound like a perfessional himself. I didn't buy it.

In the last chapters of the book Smitten just re-writes the book and trys to explain in "now a-day" terms what Jesse use to do years ago. And I would of preferred to just hear Jesse's own words of then, because everything he has done applies now.

Get the book because the original is no where to be found any more, but be very deserning of what you read after the 7th Chapter.

One of the poignant aspects of Livermore's life was that he was a loner who rose to great heights in business, friend to many of the industrial barons of an earlier era, but he left a sad, diminished legacy.

Smitten's book doesn't cover the tragic biography very well. He deserves some credit for teasing out secret details, but his writing is poor, repetitive and full of conjecture. He admits to inventing conversations to ease the telling of the story, which is not all bad, but he exhibits little skill. He does manage to convey a heavy down-draft of tragedy, with fortunes, marriages and kids' lives imploding, but Smitten had spent little ink discussing Livermore's contribution to all this, so that this seems to come out of the blue. "Seabiscuit" captured its characters and the wheeling and dealing of its time, but this book never rises to that level. Only someone interested in trading would slog through this muck.

So Smitten is not a natural storyteller, nor does he cover Livermore's trading particularly well. Smitten reveals the true identities of some characters from "Reminiscences of a Stock Operator," but never lets the reader know why, for instance, Ed Hutton should be interesting to us. Of course a trader over 30 would know, but there is more of a story here that needs a more competent researcher and writer.

If you are interested in a tragic tale, this book remains unsatisfying. If you are interested in learning something of trading, skip this book altogether and go to LeFevre's "Reminiscences," one of the most revered books on trading ever written.

This book goes beyond fiction, it's pure fantasy. If you like fiction, there are many other authors who do a much better job. Just make up your own fantasy about Livermore and save yourself the cost of the book. I hope to find a good use for it before I die, but I'm not optimistic. This book will in no way help you in your trading endeavors. Honestly, look someplace else...or donate the money you would spend on this book to charity.

A very good read for any age. Not filled with technical trading details. It is the story about the life of a very successful person and his sad ending.

Jesse Livermore is considered by many on Wall Street to be one of the greatest stock market traders who ever lived. This book is about Jesse Livermore's life. It was written after interviews with Livermore survivors and witnesses to the events which took place during his life. A Wall Street classic.

David Colletti
Founder
StockTradersHQ.com

Livermore is considered one of the greatest stock traders who lived: his trading secrets, techniques and stock market analysis methods are revealed here for the first time in a title which covers his astonishing financial savvy and achievements. It's worth reading about the techniques and logic of a man who entered the depression with 100 million in cash!

ROSO, of course, is the short form of the Reminiscences of a stock operator. This book had answered some, but not all, questions you might ask whilst reading ROSO. Copied from Zweig, one must finish both before working/fighting with me.