Customer Reviews

How to Take Money from Wall Street: Learn to Profit in Bull and Bear Markets

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I always find it amusing when someone publishes a book detailing a specific trading strategy. Why, because although certain behaviors never change in the markets (fear and greed), the market internals are always changing and evolving. What this means is that virtually all trading strategies become useless over time. This is the most recent of Oz's three trading books, and although published in 2002, it was written mid-year 2001.

Oz started trading during the Roaring Nineties, and in all of his books he states that his trades are always based on support and resistance levels. Support and resistance levels are self-fulfilling prophecies, in that if a critical mass of enough traders believe in such levels, they will cause these levels to materialize by entering and exiting trades at such levels. This works great in powerful markets when such a critical mass of traders are present. However, the 2000-2002 bear market effectively purged the markets of this critical mass of traders, and hence I no longer see consistently tradable support and resistance levels in the major indexes, and also in individual stocks.

Traders are always searching for non-randomness, that is any pattern that repeats itself enough of the time that it can be profitably traded. I have reviewed Oz's system of support and resistance trading, and also his use of scans to find breakouts, reversals and gaps, and have not found them to be viable in today's market. I also note that his website does not appear to have been updated since 2002, which makes me wonder if he is still able to trade profitably using this system. I doubt it.

This book is worthwhile as an introduction to using scans to find specific stocks to trade, if one is interested in trading stocks rather than indexes, which are inherently more risky (for example, Oz mentions that he once was long in a stock at 13 when it was halted for trading; it opened several days later at around 5). Also, his practice of seeking a minimum 3 to 1 return on every trade is important, because it allows you to be profitable even when only 50 percent of your trades are successful. I would not, however, pay the inflated price of the book.

Hi, I am an international student from Japan. So there will be alot of grammer mistakes. sorry for in advance.

First, I really like Mr. Tony Oz system because it is really simple. In most of the books which I've ever read (approximately 15 books.) somewhat made me weight on indicators. On the other hand, this book never talks about even an indicator.(besides Moving Averages, Bollinger Bands and Volume.)

On this book, he concentrates on Support and Resistance lines, trend lines, and Volume. He also talks about money management in very simple form and his actual setups.

I think this book is not for those who have already built thier own trading system and constantly making money in stock market, but I strongly recommend this books for beginners who want to build fundamental just like me.

And I wish I had read this book before 15 books I bought.
I could have skip 5 , 10 or even 14 books. (I would still want to read "the Master Swing Trader" by Mr Alan S Farley)

Forgot to mention, his strategy is a swing trading method holding stocks for a day to weeks.

Thank you for viewing my review.

NORI

This is the best of the three Tony Oz books. I own all three.
I have read this book twice and referred to it numerous other times.

It covers the material in his first book, Stock Trading Wizard, but has updated the material more in tune to the current market conditions. For example, in his first book he recommends stocks based on RSI (relative strength), but seems to have backed off of this approach. His approach now is based on support and resistance. And who could argue? He really does a good job reinforcing the importance of finding support and resistance levels.

He also does a nice job talking about the mental part of trading. The author seems to have outstanding self-discipline when it comes to taking losses and setting stops, and this attitude becomes contagious throughout the book.

There are a couple of things I would've liked to see. The first is the formulas for the calculator he refers to throughout the book. It is suggested that readers download the calculator and use it, but I want to see how it calculates what it does before I will just blindly trust it.

Secondly, 30% of the book is spent on realtime stock scan formulas for which the formulas can't be published "due to copyright restrictions". He says to refer to his earlier book for the formulas. I went to his second book, which says to refer to the first book. Finally, the formulas are there in the first book. But not all of them. I was lucky that I own his other books. People who do not own his other books and are interested in his formulas will not be so lucky.

All in all, I have to give a strong recommendation to this book. It is well worth the money, and absolutely essential if you are a Tony Oz believer.

I have just finished reading "How To Take Money From Wall Street", and I can say without question that this book has helped my trading more than any other book I have read. I was reluctant to buy this book at first because the price is so high, but I know now that it is worth every penny. This book excels precisely because it is different from most other "trading" books in three important respects. First, it is written by a professional trader; second, it provides very specific setups; and third, it tells you how to manage a trade after you have entered it.

I have read several books on trading, and some of them have been very helpful. But I cannot say that any of the other books actually improved my trading results. Trading books tend to be written by people who act as advisers, or observers, of the market. These people make their living observing the market in a detached fashion. By contrast, Tony Oz is a professional trader. He knows what it is like to face the market day in and day out, and has proven that he can take money out of the market on a regular basis. He does not just throw out a bunch of trading "rules", he tells you exactly why they must be followed, based on his own trading experience. This book is also packed with advice on how to deal with losses, how to think about a situation where you made a small profit but "left more profits on the table", and what frame of mind you have to be in to trade. In short, Oz addresses things that traders deal with every day, but that other books don't talk about.

But what makes this book invaluable is the actual trading setups and the specificity with which they are described. Oz walks the reader through his setups, providing precise entry points and numerous examples. These setups provide profitable opportunities in the market day in and day out. I have not found another book that is so clear about its trading setups, or where the setups have been so consistently successful.

Once you are in the trade, Oz does not just leave you to fend for yourself. I have read books which provided great entry setups, but once I was in the trade I was left to my own emotions and I never knew when to sell. But in this book Oz has incorporated a sophisticated money management system, which tells you how to set your first stop loss point, how to determine your target price, and how to adjust your stop loss as the stock moves in the anticipated direction. This money management system is truly unique and it makes the book more complete than any other I have read. When you study the book and execute trades according to his setups, you almost feel as though he is right there, walking you through your trade every step of the way.

You may be wondering, if this book is so good, why it is being offered for $50 by this master trader. You may be thinking that this book is just 200 pages of snake oil. I wondered the same thing before I mustered the courage to buy it. After all, alot of professional traders are very secretive about their setups and would never publish a book so clear and explicit as this one. I think the answer is that Tony Oz has a passion for teaching, and that, as a person, he is a class act. Believe me when I say that with the trading setups he invented, it's not like he really needs your $50. If you want to become a successful trader, you should take advantage of this opportunity and get the education of a lifetime.

From some of the negative reviews I was kind of expecting a book that was probably useless except for maybe a few helpful tips. Boy was I wrong. This book is right up there with Alexander Elder's books as far as giving you a widespread view of trading, along with detailed views of Oz's preferred methods. Excellent coverage of money management and risk evaluation. He includes a link to a free download of his risk calculator.

Oz even takes you into his daily world, both psychologically and technically, and has a ton of examples of real trades with detailed explanations of why he made them, why he entered them when he did, and why he exited them when he did. He even includes some of his failed trades. There is plenty of coverage of chart patterns, including candelsticks, and what Oz considers to be the most important indicators.

I found this to be an honest and detailed look into the mind and procedures of a trader. I know he pushes some of his other services, but you really don't feel that too much from the book, although his screening parameters might make you want to subscribe to the Oz Screener if you use Real Tick. He also mentions that the screening formulas are available in his earlier books, but for some legal reason he can't print them in this one (maybe some kind of agreement with Real Tick, since the other books are out of print). He goes into detail about his screens and why he uses them. You could probably figure out the formulas without too much effort just by understanding what he's screening for.

The other thing I really enjoyed about this book was its concise nature. Oz is an excellent author. There is no filler here. He writes simply and to the point. Unlike many other authors he seems to understand that clear communication and not showing off his IQ is the goal of writing a book. For those who have read a lot of trading books you know how rare that is. Oz is a relaxing read, not a tension-filled one.

I've read a lot of trading books, but along with Elder's books this is probably the only book I've read that by itself has enough to get you started on the right track in trading.

33% of this book is a review of the Tony Oz stock scanner. This section is available free on his web site.

33% of this book is his personal story

33% of this book explains his trading stratey and money management.

For the price I think it is a rip off though you will pick up some good points

This is an amazing book - in fact it is one of the better trading books that I have ever read.

If you're a novice trader, however, I would recommend you read one of the many introductory books and then a more advanced book on technical analysis before reading this one.

This is a marvelous piece of work by someone that can convey the message to his readers in a very clear way. The book is an easy one to read, it's well put together in simple English. It has a lot of charts and well classified.

Its a Great book for beinners. To start, You wont need anything eles. I build my own system (trading rules and money management) based on this book and keep trying fine-tune.

Contents are
Money management
Technical Analysis (really basic)
Trading Strategy
Mind control.

Also I think that it is good for mid-beginners who are confused because they have got too much infomation about trading.

His method is simple yet practical. You can first try his method and fine-tune the trading style with what you have learned so far. That is what I have done and still I am doing so.

Thank you

This was the first book I ever read on trading stocks, and it almost turned me off of technical analysis forever. It suffers from a sort of catch-22-the book contains information that is pretty basic (support/resistance trading) and straightforward, and thus should be suitable for a beginner, and yet at the same time Oz's teaching jumps around so much and leaves such holes in the teaching of his techniques that one would almost need to already know what he's teaching before reading the book (which would, of course, defeat the purpose).

This brings me to another point about the clarity of the book. Oz's writing is, well, awful. I wish there was a more delicate way to put it--there isn't. I found myself reading and rereading almost every sentence, searching for a meaning and trying to follow every non-sequitur and piece of faulty logic through to Oz's disconnected conclusions. I recognize that the man is not a professional writer and that some allowance should be made, but I think its enough to have to understand the technique being taught without trying to figure out what he means by every misused word that comes out of context. Of course this criticism is coming from someone who studied literature and history in college, so I guess my judgment can be taken for what it's worth.

As a previous reviewer has pointed out, one of the problems inherent in a system like Oz's is that it depends on the participation of enough people (who also use support and resistance) to make the system viable; otherwise, it fails. I believe his system is too oversimplified for today's market, and I for one only started to make any money to speak of when I moved away from his technique and used it only as an afterthought.

In all fairness to Tony Oz his section on psychology is pretty good, and his risk/reward calculator can be useful (though the formula is so simple and obvious that it could be done easily with a calculator). These points, however, would not be sufficient reason to read the book, let alone buy it at such a high price. There are much better books out there on technical analysis that are easier to get and are much more thorough and straightforward. I'd recommend looking for something more readily available (and published by a major publisher)-I really don't think you'll miss out.

This book is great for anyone who wants to seriously trade stocks for a living. It covers all aspects of a systematic approach by a successful trader to todays stock market. What is so nice about this book is that it takes you step by step teacing you how to do things based on the actual trading experiece of the author. It is all laid out in an easy to follow and understand manner.

I have read the reviews here and it seems that for some reason many of the reviews are from west chicago as pointed out by a couple of reviewers here. I thought that was strange, but when I saw the review by John L. Pinkowski, M.D, I realized that there must be some mistake. I have met Dr.Pinkowski in a trading seminar and he lives in Ohio. I do not know why his review is classified as "reader from west chicago." Maybe amazon.com can explain that. I doubt that anyone that would think of faking reviews would use the same location.

Anyhow, here is a five star review for an excellent book coming to you from Florida. I am in Miami, just in case it gets printed here as a different location.