Customer Reviews

Intermarket Technical Analysis: Trading Strategies for the Global Stock, Bond, Commodity, and Currency Markets (Wiley Finance)

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There is very little information out there on Intermarket analysis (see Martin Pring's "All Season Investor" and Murray Ruggiero "Cybernetic Trading Strategies" among the few to offer info in this niche). Turns out the Intermarket form of technical analysis is among the most important in analyzing the economy and the various links between financial sectors. It's a key to deciphering the intermediate and longer term trends (& with Ruggiero, possibly short term trends). Amazingly, nearly all high paid economists and many financial market analysts get it wrong, but the markets collectively don't by definition. (You can't trade an economist, there is no "economic futures index", and the economists generally aren't traders since they don't know how.) Once you have the basics of technical analysis under your belt, this book is a pivotal and necessary step forward in an education towards deciphering the increasingly interrelated worldwide financial markets. A must read, but only for the serious investor. Too complicated and difficult to use for the dilettante. I wish John would do a "year 2000" update just to freshen up the charts, but the basic relationships haven't changed much and the lessons are still totally valid.

In this book John Murphy explains the interactions of the four major market sectors mentioned in the book's title. He structures his analyses around the concept of the business cycle, the recurring boom and bust loop which the economy has gone through over the past two centuries. Showing how the four major sectors (as well as other economic factors) interact in feedback loops to drive the business cycle, he gives us the information we need to see what stage of the cycle we're currently experiencing and where we're headed. Knowing this we can better decide where to park our assets in the short and medium-term future. His outline of the various stages of the business cycle is very helpful, even though it's a rough guide. For instance, although gold does not seem to have played its assigned role in this scheme, it is clear that commodities did bottom in the third quarter of last year, signaling that a market top would follow in the not-too-distant future. Thus, even though the stock market is a dynamic system and cannot be exactly predicted, there are patterns that take a huge amount of guesswork out of charting one's way through it. This book thoroughly explores those patterns and provides the investor/trader a solid support for making financial decisions.

This is the best book you can find in advanced technical analisys. Together with John's book "Technical analisys of futures markets" and the Schwager on Futures series is a "must" for whoever wants to start in Futures Trading. This book is so logical that it is incredible! Reading it and testing its theory you will discover the way the markets work. As a Futures trader is the book that has helped more than any other one my way of trading (That seems quite succesfully at the moment!). As a Member of IFTA (International Federation of Technical Analisys) is the book that I find more logical, because IT HAS A REAL LINK WITH THE MACROECONOMIC ENVIRONMENT, AND EXPLAIN IT IN A SIMPLER AND FUNNIER WAY! The book is not supereasy to understand, even if it has been written in a very good way. Buon Trading!

This book is old (1991) and does not cover the important
facet of sector rotation or how to intrepret this book into a meaningful stock play. Murphy in this book does not even hint at it, thus allot of this information is not truly useful. The concept is superb but the execution quite flawed.

Instead get the other Murphy book:Technical Analysis of the Financial Markets: A Comprehensive Guide to Trading Methods and Applications OR Martin Pring's new edition to his updated Complete Technical Analysis. Which one you get really depends on how much you already know or your personal preference. Funnily his video on this topic DOES update the book and cover Sector Rotation so Murphy obviously is aware of the oversight.

This book is boring with no payoff. Murphy writes better elsewhere and this topic is covered better elsewhere too.

I've read a lot of books on technical analysis, and this book is on the top of the pile. The relationship between other markets and other exchanges is explored. The intermarket theory is so simple, that's it's ingenious. Buy the book if your into trading. Period.

Those who were reluctant to accept the benefits of intermarket analysis after reading Intermarket Technical Analysis (1991) will find making the paradigm shift much easier after reading his latest book published in February 2004 called Intermarket Analysis. Murphy has the benefit of some monumental market events in the last three decades to demonstrate his case and he uses them to great effect.

As John pointed out in an interview for Stocks & Commodities magazine I did with him in December 2003, it was his original goal to write the quintessential intermarket book but then found the topic so involved that each chapter could have become a book. There is just so much to discuss. Attempting to cover anything but a small snippet in a review is sheer folly. It is also impossible to do the book justice.

Markets have become so interdependent in the last decade, a correlation that continues to strengthen with time. If those who suffered financial ruin between 2000 and 2002 had read Intermarket Technical Analysis, how many of them could have avoided huge losses and even profited from what occurred? We will never know for sure but is it a risk they anyone can afford to take, especially when considering that the cost of avoidance (cost of the book) is less than $50? For those serious about making money in the market and keeping it, his new book, Intermarket Analysis is an absolute must!

Matt Blackman - Technical writer/review and regular contributor to Technical Analysis of Stocks & Commodities Mag, Traders Mag (Europe), Working Money, Traders.com Advantage, SFO Magazine

Which way is the market headed? Before reading this book, I never really had a firm clue. I would usually just wind up agreeing with the concensus of so-called "experts". Now, Murphy has shown me (through visual analysis) how signs of major market turning points can be easily perceived by anyone. I can now make up my own mind as to the direction of the markets just as I already pick my own investments. A true classic!

Forget about all the talking heads on the news channels about which way the market will trend. Read this book. Don't waste your time listening to those self-proclaimed "experts."
If I'm asked to name two books that have completely changed the way I looked at the markets and trading, they are Steve Nison's "Beyond Candlesticks" and this one.

You'll learn a lot from this book. Most investors sit obsessively focused on the market averages. They'll cut on their TV and see the ticker on CNBC be in the green and feel elated or else they'll see it red and get worried. Murphy's book will show you how a study of the bond, currency, and commodities markets along with an analysis of the stock market will help you see the big picture and get a better feel for where the economy and all of the markets are going. The past 3 years has proven to us that just because the stock market has a rally doesn't mean we are on the verge of a big economic boom or a new bull market.

Murphy demonstrates how each of these four sectors interact with one another and the business cycles and if you can grasp the lessons he teaches you then you'll have a clearer understanding of what drives the financial markets. Once you understand these cycles you will be able to forecast the intermediate term trend of the markets. It really isn't that complicated.

The only negative about this book is that it reads like a textbook. It takes a theory of how these markets rotate with one another and demonstrates it with example after example. It takes work to get through the book, but the payoff is well worth it. In fact the lessons in this book are critical to anyone who wants to become a successful investor. In today's environment of rapid boom and bust in which market timing is critical they are more important than ever. Even though it is 10 years old, this is the best book on the subject.

this book is the best for a market system for market studies if you truly want to know the market. This is the book