Customer Reviews

Digital Day Trading; Moving from One Winning Stock Position to the Next

5 star:		(73)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I have now read all the electronic day trading books that are on the market and believe based on my knowledge of Wall St.(20 years) and my day trading experience(since1994)this is by far the best book on the subject.I say this for the following reasons: 1.Abell offers a day trading approach that is sensible based on calculated money management principles and market discipline. 2.His technical analysis is well reasoned and is executeable.His risk/reward formulations are viable. 3.His explanation of the level 2 screens and windows(which are often complicated)provides a significant benefit to the trader. 4. His writing style regarding market philosophy though simply written is extremely sophisiticated in terms of his understanding of the operations of markets. 5.The trader interviews are the best by far--The traders interviewed are much bigger and experienced traders than the ones in the "secrets"book. 6.Abell's understanding of trader psychology alone justifies the importance of this book and makes it well worth rerading. 7.The so called "filler" is information that comes in in my copy in the appendix(listed trading stocks and in my opinion valuable trading screen description)-after 200 pages of significant trading information.Compare this with only 150 pages in The Electonic Trader.

In my judgement learning the lessons, techniques and understandings Abell has written about will certainly improve or fine tune anyones trading performance.

As a long time Wall street market maker I am most impressed with Mr. Abell's general approach to the market as well as his specific methods for short term moves and market "swings".Abell's approach is sound because it is based on well proven strategies of risk and money management.His patterns are well calculated and tested.

I found the overall organization of his book to be eminently readable as well as significantly infomative with knowledge that only a real professional could possess.In my opinion,based on 20 years of first-hand experience,this is the only book currently available that fully captures the psychological and methodological understandings of the professional trader.

The chapters on technical analysis,though very competent, are a mixed blessing:there is too much information for the novice and the seasoned pro will crave more detail about Mr. Abell's elegant technical approach to day trading.

The interviews with Kirchner,Jamail and Shallowitz--all seasoned pros-- are also highly infomative but in truth require some market knowledge to fully appreciate the subtlety of their thinking.Individuals with little or no experience may not realize how infomative these interviews are really as it relates to the imperatives of psychological considerations and risk calculation.

I believe almost any trader or would be investor will benefit from reading Abells fine book.

The best parts of this book are the psychological considerations and the three interviews. However, Abell doesn't really give you a daytrading method. His charts and examples are either difficult to follow or contradictory. You will need to buy another book for actual daytrading tactics and for money management.

I can't believe that Amazon doesn't show the table of contents so here it is: 1. The Day Trader's Advantage
2. The Psychology of Successful Day Trading
3. Strategy and the Overall Game Plan
4. Competing with the Market Makers
5.-7. Interviews with 3 daytraders
8. Technical Considerations
9. The Digital Day Trading "Method"
10. How Winning Traders Think
Appendix A: Major Stocks Traded: Nasdaq 100 and S&P 500
Appendix B: Electronic Trading Platform: TradeCast 3.0

I read about five books on trading techniques in the last four weeks before writing this review, and liked this one least of all. I never actually count pages in a book when writing a review, but I was so much surprised how such a (considerably) thick book can contain so little useful information that I made an exception. Judge by yourself: the structure of this book is as follows:

The first 35 pages (sec. 1-3) is a broad introduction into the psychology of successful day trading, which says all correct things but its style is so dry that you would rather skip to the next section than to read it carefully. Even if you do read every word, you will get such absolutely correct but next to useless statements as the following recipe for successful trading (p.33): "1) identify an opportunity, 2) take immediate action (buy or cell), and 3) feel good no matter the result as long as the trade is consistent with you specific method or technical bias and was based on probability".

The second part of the book (Sec. 4) uses another 50 pages for interviews with several successful traders. This section is not too bad, although one cannot expect to learn much about techniques of successful individuals (even assuming that they are willing to disclose all their secrets) from 6-10 page-long interviews.

The third part on technical analysis is the most useful part of the book. It discusses how to identify trends and select entry points. Unfortunately, the charts used to illustrate the text are too numerous and large, and the text itself tends to be somewhat on the side of general statements. It is sufficient to say that about 50 out of 80 pages in this section are charts, and in my opinion only about 10 pages contain really useful concrete practical wisdom. These 10 pages were very useful since they suggest analysis techniques which I have not seen anywhere else, but its only 10 pages out of 260!

The rest of the book, about another 100 pages, is essentially a large appendix with lists of all NASDAQ and S&P-500 stocks, long excerpts from the TradeCast 3.0 user manual (who needs this section? those who bought this program had presumably gotten the full manual, and those who do not own it do not need these excerpts), and a glossary.

My advice: don't waste your time and money, there is so many better books around than this one.

You need to have some experience to appreciate this book.Highly informed and well thought out trading plan. Also good interviews and trading psychology.

Definitely worth a read.The information may be best suited to experienced traders. I found the ideas very tradeable.

I know as little about day trading after reading this book as I did before. It didn't take long to read given its a small book made even smaller by being very repetitious.

It's also grossly overpriced considering a large chunk is a manual for TradeCast.

On the upside it does have some trading and money management advice which could be useful for longer term (position) trading.

But as a technical guide to day trading forget it. If he knows how he can't communicate it; he needs an editor.

Pages 3-50 of this book is dealing with some what useful information, for the novice invester. Pages 51-70 testimonials from professianal Traders is exciting and interesting. I found from pages 80-175 useful and worth my reading, I must mention that half those pages had charts. Pages 177-196 names and stock symbols, again probley for the novice. Pages 197-256 Appendix B Excerpts from the TradeCast 3.0 user manual, why I would want this unless I was going to buy the program and my hope would be that the manual would cover this, and then again maybe this book is the manual for the program and they just forgot to send the program?. Pages 257-267 Glossary, Further Reading, and the Index.

Summary-For $40.00 and 269 pages, I found 90 pages (half of those charts) dealing with the Authors title(Moving from One Winning Position to the Next) or as a very famous advertisment slogan goes..... WHERE'S THE BEEF

This is a very good book and I would definitely recommend buying it but I have some specific reservations. It is focused on trading issues that will best serve intermediate to advanced traders.Beginning traders will not appreciate the role of trading psychology and strategy rather they will crave a simple and exact turn-key system! Mr. Abell provides traders with a winning approach and method for day trading not a SYSTEM. The interviews with top traders provides the same.

The chapter on technical analysis while offering some very interesting ideas will also not be a use-in-all-market-conditions system.

This book is in my opinion appropriate then for traders with market experience or who are seriously commited to becoming real-time traders.

I bought Abell's book after I saw him speak on Power Lunch with Bill Griffeth on CNBC. I was impressed with his depth and experience. He was a profeesional market maker and NOT a broker or day trading house exec.I called him with a question I had about the market and found him very generous with his time.His method does work and I would strongly recommend it. The keys to his trading is discipline------------which he operationally defines and strategy and calculation when it comes to managing your money and trades. This book in no way is about hyping a get rich quick agenda. In fact, just the opposite. The strategies and approach are very conservative in theory -active in implementation like a grand master chess player! I thought the Tradecast user information was good and helped me choose the front end screen software.