The books are very overpriced. I think they are somewhat useful for newbies, in that they get you to focus on individual bar patterns, rather than the red line crosses the blue line approach so common in that type of book. I haven't backtested the set-ups, but I am not surprised with dottom's results. I did test his profit-taking approach and found it was very suboptimal.
Yes, Let's start one. i guess it should be started under "futures". I was also on the www.mrci.com site but was completely overloaded With information. Markus, if you don't mind listing them. Thanks a bunch that would be great. It narrows things down abit and lends focus. The Ross book has me curious. I have been snooping around online looking for a used edition. Buy weakness/sell the strength. Thanks
The feeling I got from those books, and even more recently when I perused through them, is that they are simply outdated...The examples of "set ups" or simple line breakouts, etc...That works sometimes in some markets IF you have sufficient liquidity and enough larger commercials or institutions who generally trade in the same manner...But what happens when liquidity disappears... What happens when you have enough institutions willing to go long as go short?...In fact, these are some of the very same things that took a chunk out of the turtles...Enough trend and counter-trend players in the same markets and all of those neat little Ross set-ups are a recipe for disaster... Not all of Ross's material is generic though..He has some interesting insights, some decent concepts that one could work with, but the books are cheaply produced and sold for a pretty penny...At least if the guy were going to charge $150, put in some decent fonts, some decent charts and get rid of the typos...The quality or lack thereof speaks more about his character than anything, imo...
J-Law, I started a new threat about spread trading: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10113 CU, Markus
Yeah, they were $150 when the first book came out around 1991. Over a decade later they are still overpriced at $150! This entire spread trading thing that Ross is preaching is for traders who have never heard of it. Anyone who has been around awhile knows the pros/cons of spread trading using sesonalities. Heck, Bernstein published tons of stuff on it before Ross published his first book. Ross even has the audacity to call his spread trading techniques "a whole new way to trade" when it has been around as long as commodities has been traded. I feel like he's doing to relatively new traders what Ken Roberts does to the total newbie the way he markets his spread trading and sells seminars and subscriptions on such basic principles. I've been trying to hold back on the Ross issue b/c there's so much crap in the past 10 years that surfaced regarding his questionable trading backgrounds, poor fax newsletter performance, poor managed funds performance, and a multitude of lawsuit threats on the real Joe Ross story.... but I have to quote at least this one paragraph from the master trader Joe Ross just 11 years ago: "Seasonal trading is not the most reliable as far as timing is concerned. Seasons just refuse to come on time. There are seasonal tendencies in commodities. But these tendencies change periodically and I don't care to lose a few thousand dollars while I find out that this has happened." - Joe Ross, 1991 And don't try to tell me that in the last few yeras he's changed his view on seasonal trading. I mean this is an expert trader who claimed over 40 years of trading experience when he made the above statement. What did he discover in the last couple years since he started selling "spread trading" techniques based on seasonals that he didn't know the 40+ years prior? My best guess is he found he could sell seminars and newsletters on this "niche" area of futures knowledge.
Markus, Do you know of a good brokers offering good rates on spreads for pit-traded contracts and whether there are data feeds for the actual pit-traded spreads (e,g, nov/july beans) as opposed to a feed that calcs based on last trades? Thanks. O.
I pay $18 RT incl. commissions and fees for pit traded contracts. Maybe that's not the cheapest rate, but I receive good fills and I do not have to explain my broker, what a spread is. I don't know, if you usually do any broker recommendations in this forum, therefore please e-mail me and I will tell you the brokers name. BTW: We opened a spread threat in the Futures Forum: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=10113
Please dont take this as an insult, but anyone who tries to mechanically program Ross hooks must not know the first thing on what the Ross hook market structure is. Thats like trying to program Elliot Wave mechanically. Good luck and if you get it, I'll put money on you that you lose money quicker than Ross hooks. As far as his seasonals... Joe is a marketer, just like any other teacher. Of course he has to find new ways to sell or market products. What do you think this website is all about? I've seen more crap on this website than any other concerning trading products, opinions and such... so if that is your complaint, then I guess you must include every other marketer including the modern Cramers, Farleys, Oz's, etc..... I don't trade Ross hooks, nor do I subscribe to many of Joe's methods, I have since evolved. But I can tell you his Life Index and Moving Average on Equity may not be original, but damn if I have ever found it printed in the 2000 or so trading books in my library. Those two ideas alone are worth 1000 times his $150 price on the books. As far as Joe The Trader, Manager, or whatever, I have no opinion or knowledge of such. I do know if you are going to mention losses with his name, I remind you of the 400 million dollar interest rate fund that just went kaput.... Let's talk about Long Term Capital, or even on a smaller scale, let's talk about Larry Wiliams. Everyone has lost money in their time, had streaks of bad luck, or even bad luck in life. To condemn him for those, you must condemn all, except maybe a Tudor Jones or Warren Buffett. We are in a land of profit and losses, and I dont judge a man by gains or losses, but by his wisdom, experience, honesty, and forthrighteousness.... That is Joe... He has taught and still teaches his students more about trading, things like self reliance, confidence, honesty, hard work, simplicity, and spirituality... That is A+ to me. I'm still chuckling on the programming ross hooks thing.
what's that got to do with anything? the market action knowledge he claims is either accurate or it's not. whatever else he has an opinion on or is teaching is totally irrelevant. QuietButMisguided...
It's got everything to do with trading and life. I would venture to say you have not yet gone through the self discovery process of trading. Joe as a mentor certainly puts one on the right path of self discovery. You think all those quotes and passages in the back of his books regarding honesty, patience, integrity, etc are placed back there because of opinion? They are there for a reason. Every trader will at sometime during his career evaluate every metric of his personality and character according to the passages he carefully chooses to place at the back of his books. Every and I mean every successful trader that I speak to, will speak about character way before methodology. Your equity line is a function of the way you think, behave and believe. It has everything to do with trading and that is why Joe has placed so many thoughtful passages in his books. He understands the character of a successful trader. Unfortunately, too many people here on this board think its the damn methodology.