It doesn't matter. Even if he fails, you can still learn things from him. Lean from his mistakes. Why did a successful trader could lose all his fortunes many times? Realised this and you may be able not to follow his footsteps in future.
thats all i'm looking for. i thought it'd be an interesting discussion, since some people think he's the greatest trader ever while others have a complete opposite view.
Jesse Livermore did not have brain cancer and he did not die broke. He was bi-polar. He was in his 60's and just lost his desire to live. He said if he ever lost interest in trading, he had no reason to go on living and he lost interest. At the time of his death, he left an estate worth about 100k in 1941 dollars. I would say that would be worth a little over a million in today's dollars. Certainly not the 100 million he had at one point, but not exactly poverty either. He also left no debts when he died. I think this is probably the most least talked about attribute of this man and trading in general. This man lived by the old gentleman's code, always honor your word and your debts. And he did just that. In today's world of traders blowing out their families fortunes, blowing up hedge funds only to start new ones and borrowing money from friends only never to re-pay them, this man went bankrupt several times in his life and always, always paid back his debtors in full. Even when they told him he didn't have to, he did it anyway. I think everyone on ET could learn from this man. He may have killed himself, but he died with his dignity and character in tact.
People on here need to understand that $100,000,000 in 1929 dollars is worth $1,080,470,299.11 today. How can you have no respect for a person that made 1 Billion dollars trading, that started with almost nothing on Wall Street. OK, so he operated some pools here and there. But he also had to compete against them a lot of the time and operating those pool takes a lot of skill as well. Also consider how hard it must have been foe him to make his first millions he had to compete against pools, huge spreads, high commissions, slow executions, insider trading and multitude of other hardships. All you guys pissing on a dead guy who made 1 Billion dollars from scratch will probably never even get close to making 500, 000 in 2005 dollars, if you ever become profitable at all.
Great post....couldn't have said it better myself. The fact is, if these guys ever succeed, there it is very likely that they will blow there account at least once.
You would get a differing opinion on the color of the sky or the sun rising tomorrow. Understand this - a lot of people on ET associate trading success with a sports car and some fast woman. They have no clue of true achievement and personal honor. The lack of classical education and commercial advertising made their brain's mush. While Livermore failed as a husband and a father he definitely is the man when trading concerned.
If a person in a stage of his life gets a mental illness like depression, the fact does not discredit his previous trading success. There are not many people capable of earning hundreds of million of dollars from trading. Regards
I admire the way he made that money but not the way he then lost all of it. Having lost a fortune once, he then lost an even bigger fortune again. So does this make him a great trader or a gambler? I also read that he married a woman whose previous 4 husbands had all committed suicide. If that is true, then I don't think his decision making was of the highest caliber http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Livermore
============= Those J.L Livermore books are more up to date than ever despite thier old age. Full of good business hints applicable to any business; especially trading, like saving/using free business envelopes. Bad losing habits included emotional averageing losers; not to be confused with scaling in. Also though liking the bear/short side; made more overall long.You read it right ,made more $$ long side. Wish his parents had taught him more about saving accounts; safety rules on guns. Jesee had brillant EARLY age math skills !!!!!!! Also you could divide men/women in 2 camps; savers , spenders, he was a big spender, even when he couldn't afford it.He envied ,he admitted ''savers'' Cool
Anyone who reads Reminiscences of a Stock Operator and does not end up with a deep sense of love and respect for Jesse Livermore needs to take the silver spoon out of their mouth, stop sheltering under their mother's bosom, and take a close look at themselves. The man left home with nothing as a naive teenager to make his way in the world and achieved a level of success that people would only ever have in their wildest dreams, and he did it all with dignity. Sure he made mistakes, but he was a pioneer, and unlike us, he did not have a Jessie Livermore to learn from.