Long-Term Secrets to Short-Term Trading (Hardcover)

~ Larry Williams (Author) "If what I have written so far has meshed with your speculative goals, it is time to learn how markets operate..." (more)
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Having known Larry for 25 years, I can truly say that this is his 'magnum opus'; the culmination of a brilliant career; must reading for anyone who trades futures with success as their goal!" -- Jake Bernstein, President, MBH Commodity Advisors, Northbrook, Illinois

"Larry Williams' contributions to the study of technical analysis are well documented and indisputable. I have learned more from Larry than all other traders combined. His techniques are original, clever, and fresh. The depth and breadth of his knowledge is mind-boggling. I highly recommend it." -- Tom DeMark, author of New Market Timing Techniques and The New Science of Technical Analysis

"Larry is the only person I know who can mix systems and rules with confessions of his soul. This book should have universal appeal to not only the trading world but to all who apply themselves to the laws of the universe. This is a study of the self, the markets, and the interfacing of the two." -- Linda Raschke, President, LBR Group, Inc., CTA

"Larry is the only person I know who can mix systems and rules with confessions of his soul. This book should have universal appeal to not only the trading world but to all who apply themselves to the laws of the universe. This is a study of the self, the markets, and the interfacing of the two." -Linda Raschke, President, LBR Group, Inc., CTA

"Larry Williams' contributions to the study of technical analysis are well documented and indisputable. I have learned more from Larry than all other traders combined. His techniques are original, clever, and fresh. The depth and breadth of his knowledge is mind-boggling. I highly recommend it." -Tom DeMark, author of New Market Timing Techniques and The New Science of Technical Analysis

"Having known Larry for 25 years, I can truly say that this is his 'magnum opus'; the culmination of a brilliant career; must reading for anyone who trades futures with success as their goal!"-Jake Bernstein, President, MBH Commodity Advisors, Northbrook, Illinois

Product Description

"The public thinks speculation is a game of knowing the future, of knowing that which cannot be known. They are wrong. It is a game of developing strategies with winning advantages, of getting the odds on your side, and then working those odds. Here's how I've done just that for the past 35 years.—Larry Williams.

Short-term trading is how most traders and would-be traders play the markets. While it offers the greatest financial payoffs, it also presents the greatest challenge, requiring constant attention and vigilance, as well as a very strict plan. Written by Larry Williams, the most recognized and popular technical analyst for the past three decades, this groundbreaking book—his first in almost a decade—provides the blueprint necessary for sound and profitable short-term trading, highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of what can be a fruitful, yet potentially dangerous venture.

Sharing his years of experience as a seasoned and successful trader, Williams offers his market wisdom on a wide range of topics, from chaos and speculation to volatility breakouts and profit patterns. With his expert guidance, you'll learn about such fundamentals as how the market moves, what are the three most dominant cycles, when to exit a trade, and how to hold on to winners until the end of your chosen time frame.

Along with in-depth analysis of the most effective short-term trading strategies and details on the best theory and implementation of money management, Long-Term Secrets to Short-Term Trading features Williams's winning technical indicators, as well as his thoughts on a broad range of topics. A sampling:

• "A short-term trader has one objective; to catch the current trend of the market. That's it. That's all you should try to do!"
• "The shorter your time frame of trading the less money you'll make." "You will never make big money until you learn to hold on to your winners, and the longer you hold the more potential you have for profiteering. . . . It takes time to make money regardless of the activity."
• "Wealth is not amassed with just good market calls. It also requires correct money management."
• "I think you need to fear the market and fear yourself. . . . Without fear there is no respect, if you do not respect the markets and fear yourself you will become one more dead body on the long trail of commodity market casualties scattered across the land." Filled with invaluable insight, precise rules and formulas, and helpful advice from one of today's most respected market players, this comprehensive and practical resource will serve as the basis for, if not indeed become, your short-term trading "gospel."

  "Having known Larry for 25 years, I can truly say that this is his 'magnum opus'; the culmination of a brilliant career; must reading for anyone who trades futures with success as their goal!—Jake Bernstein, President, MBH Commodity Advisors, Northbrook, Illinois.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (March 11, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471297224
• ISBN-13: 978-0471297222
• Product Dimensions: 10.1 x 7.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #136,615 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A reflections after trading and larry williams book, October 24, 2000

By	Vijoy Amritraji (tampa, TN United States) - See all my reviews

I bought the book and enjoyed reading it. I have also attended several of his seminars (total cost around 6000 $. I like to think of myself as an independent thinker. I am an active and profitable trader. Not as proftable as I would like so I keep reading/evaluating digesting new books. Here;s the scoop

Tihs book offers a first class springboard into successful trading. There are no assured success in trading because we basically trade people psychology which is difficult to predict at best ! This book offers ideas strategies which you should modify to your taste and liking. I have taken some of his concepts and programmed a system that i have strated to trade successfully in the s&p futures markets. It has a valid premise, tests well on backtesting and walk foward testing. So I got my moneys worth from the book. This book is much better than the average trading book since it provides specifics. There is no subastitute to back testing, it does not assure success but it reduces the chances of using a flawed strategy. I don't agree with williams in terms of stops. He uses a money management stop but appears to vary it every year. I believe that the stop should be adaptive based on market parameters. Hope this review helps.

I believe that larry williams is a genuinely successful trader but we should not expect him or anyone else to divulge their best system in a book that costs < $ 100.

34 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Source for System Ideas, April 21, 2000

By	Mark M. Moore "M M Moore" (Hoffman Estates, Il USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I have traded for almost 7 years and have read over 120 trading books. Out of all of those books only about 6 are worth anything. This book by Larry Williams is one of the good ones. No book is going to hand you a great trading system, but this book gives you a number of very solid ideas upon which to build a good system. As Larry says in his book, take his basic ideas and put in hours of work to figure out how to get them to work for you. If you are looking for a way to read a book and then start making tons of money, that book does not exist as far as I know. This book plus a lot of work can get you there. The only question I still have about Larry Williams is why did he sell books in the past that claimed to show you his million dollar methods (mid to long term) when it was obvious that he was using completely different methods for his own account (short term). Account statements printed in his pamphlets and books clearly proved that.

68 of 84 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Might as well flip a coin..., September 17, 2000

By	Martian Bachelor (Feminacentric America) - See all my reviews

This book is an excellent example of why non-statisticians should be prohibited from writing books on statistical subjects.

With some computer program and a bunch of historical data on the futures markets, Williams is able to find dozens upon dozen of trading systems which *would have* produced spectacular results if they had been followed. A fool will no doubt believe that this is the real deal, but the law of averages guarantees that future results applying the same rules to the same markets will produce equally spectacular losses. Markets change. Duh.

More importantly, Williams breaks every law in the book regarding the design and testing of trading systems. He massively overfits his data to "profit spikes" and doesn't bother to forward-test any of his systems on data which they haven't yet seen. These alone are fatal flaws and guarantee the invalidity of the systems. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing... Even worse, the concept of statistical significance seems to be beyond Mr. Williams, who is even proud of his lack of mathematical ability. If enough systems are tested with enough data, one is bound to turn up cases where 80% or 90% of the trades would have been winners.

If all that wasn't a big enough disaster, this book is littered with typos and inconsistencies -- places where one thing is said in one paragraph and then another thing is said in another, or appears to be the actual case in a related diagram. This makes the actual rules being profferrd difficult to discern at times. These flaws are simply inexcusable in a book costing this much and pretending to be of a professional caliber. It's also aggravating that the technical terms (about two dozen of them) in the computer printouts with which the results of the numerous models are presented are never adequately explained. And Williams is inconsistent in his rules: at one point in the text he's advocating following the trend, at another point trading against the trend is the way to riches. On top of all that, one has to endure endless silly platitudes and the recounting of numerous trading war stories. Ugh. I couldn't get through it fast enough.

Given thousands of traders in the markets, it's a statistical certainty that a handful will be outrageously successful. That they think it was because of something they did, and then go and write basically worthless books about it, is little more than hubris. If Williams has done anything right which is quantifiable, it's my guess that it's the fact that he's used stops to prevent taking the big loss. This is hardly news. Save your money and hope that maybe the local library was dumb enough to buy this book.