A good point. The OP should be aware of the true nature of trading which is that it is a negative sum game (hopefully the trolls don't get triggered with me saying this). By definition anything that is widely known or widely accepted that is written in a book is likely to be self defeating unless you can use the information to your advantage.
The ES is probably not where you want to start. It is like looking for books on how to win a NASCAR race before you got your driver license.
%% LOL; exactly. One female trader said a trader is like an airline test pilot; except a trader has to live with the results.
I don't agree. There is no magical instrument out there which is super easy to trade and they give away free money, and let you get into a move very late, and never try to stop you out, etc. All trading is simply a matter of stats and risk and reward. The ES moves slow enough that its easy to get in without too much whipsawing back and forth. Something like the NQ tends to have many spikes. If you trade the CL, you can cough and be down $200. From a money perspective, the ES may be stuck in an RTH range of less than 10 points on many days, but this is actually good. Everyone thinks it limits your win potential, but for a new trader who will surely lose, it limits how much he will be losing. Sure perhaps you can say its hard to make your money back in the ES if you're down a few points because those few points take hours to extract, but it at least won't stop you out in seconds, like the NQ can do when it blows through levels and such. If you think stocks are easier, now you're having to learn all about the different exchanges and dark pools and all that jazz. The futures at least have a central exchange where, other than spoofing, ensures that things fill accordingly, no matter if you're a big player or small player. In my opinion, learning to trade on the ES can be just as easy or just as hard as you make it, but no one instrument out there is perfect. Some fit different personality types better, but if you're new, you have no idea yet what's best for you.
I am not going to argue with you. Anyone that makes a living by pulling money out of "the market" whatever market that may be has my respect. I have found it easier to make money trading other instruments. Just one data point based on one trader's past experiences.
I do agree and it would be silly for me to argue as well. I did find it interesting that most of the old timers here who are successful trade stocks, at least that's my feeling when I go through the old time threads. There really aren't that many cases of profitable futures traders who post regularly and shared their results. Not enough data points though to make any conclusions.
I agree with that. You need to learn the instrument you want to trade, how it behaves, how it moves. That's why it may be too hard or impossible to trade many markets. For the last 10 months I have been watching (and trading) ES daily for hours and learned a lot. And there is much more to learn once this market breaks out of low volatility.
Al Brooks' book (I read the 3 volume edition) is a very intelligent book about the trading. At times it is very hard to read, but it covers most of the aspects of trading. I don't know why others like the book, I'm afraid that some people look too much for ready setups and Al Brooks provides some. But it is not where the book and it contents shine. You really need to let the book sink in and work out a method that works for you, a method that is ultimately based on common sense and Brooks provides a lot of that. One could even argue, that much of what Brooks writes about is obvious but that's the point. As far as the setups this is actually the part they could get rid off in the book, including the charts that show how Brooks' setups work so beautifully. I would add one more thing though: I have come across an opinion that (after watching ES for almost a year seems to be correct) index futures like ES are not something that should be trend traded intraday most of the time. Therefore applying Brooks' setups might be tricky and yet another reason why you should focus more on the knowledge the book provides as opposed to setups that you should find yourself.
LOL there are very few successful (discretionary or systematic) traders ..... period. I would recommend most any of the books written by Larry Williams, Connie Brown or others that have talked the talk and walked the walk - actually traded for a living, and not just written books about doing so. But as has been said already hours, many many hours watching the markets is also required.