Smiling to myself .............. It's Saturday night and I'm sitting here with the latest Barron's reading the stock tables, line by line. So just for kicks I put Darvas in the ET search and see this thread still going. There's a few threads on here about Darvas, and at least one other about the Lefkowitz investigation. Here's some things that need to be cleared up about that: 1. Lefkowitz's investigation found that Darvas made $210,000 that was VERIFIABLE. That was in Darvas' US brokerage account. So Lefkowitz's allegation was that the book was not true, NOT that Darvas LOST money. 2. Lefkowitz was later forced to admit that he did not have access to Darvas' foreign accounts, and also, of course, had to admit he didn't know what gains or losses Darvas had in those accounts. 3. Lefkowitz had to drop his investigation, there was never any proof that Darvas lied in his book. My own opinion is that most of Darvas' gains came in his foreign accounts, (one was in Panama), and that his claim of $2M is reasonably accurate, could even possibly be 100% accurate. He was probably trying to avoid taxation, even though in his book he said he opened other accounts to keep his trading secret after he started trading on a large scale. My own opinion on Lefkowitz - He was a typical New York lawyer with grand ambitions, (nothing ever changes, does it?), and got shot down when he went after Darvas.
While Darvas was on tour, he had his broker air mail him a copy of Barron's every week. However, when Darvas was in the US, he would read the stock tables in a daily newspaper. So even if you wanted to, you could not emulate Darvas today, daily papers don't have stock tables anymore. The WSJ only lists 1000 stocks, and the tables give very little info. The USA Today has the most complete stock tables, but even it doesn't have the info that Darvas was looking at back then. The WSJ eliminates more and more market data every year. I have no doubt that there will be no stock tables at all in the WSJ within a few years. They've even eliminated other types of stock market data, such as the "delving down to the top stocks" section and they don't have the widely held in the "Keeping Score" section. I enjoyed reading them. That goes to show you how dedicated Darvas was to the market. What we all need computers for, Darvas was doing in his head with a newspaper. BTW, I recommend reading the stock tables, what little of them there are. It helps you with getting another view of the market. I'm sitting here right now with my glass of wine and the Barron's stock tables and I'm having a great time, much better than if I was at a thump-thump bar wasting time and money.
I think you are right, but maybe Nicolas Darvas "forgot" to tell about a loss or two in his book? PS. Do you trade like Darvas? Some Darvas traders: http://www.darvastrades.com/darvasmillionaires.htm
Given that Darvas toured the world with his dancing outfit, it's entirely credible that many of his trades were placed abroad. Typical dickhead NY government lawyer, looks like an earlier version of Spitzer and Giuliani.
Maybe - but according to this link Darvas was forbidden to trade stocks in the United States: http://www.uglychart.com/2007/04/11/nicolas-darvas-how-he-made-2000000-writing-a-book/ But I could like to hear more about the story of Darvas' life - it's strange that there's not written a book about him.