Best Loser Wins: Why Normal Thinking Never Wins the Trading Game - written by a high-stake day trader

Great insights into trading psychology. We don't trade the markets. We trade our own psychology. I recommend this book. Super book.

I have been trading for decades. Until recently, mostly unsuccessfully. When I read this book, it became very clear my issues were the same ones everyone (70-80% of everyone who tries trading flames out more or less completely) who fails experiences. I had mostly turned my trading around in the last two years but this book spoke to me at a time when I backslid badly. If you have not traded before, don't waste your time with this book. Until you have been bloodied up some, it won't be very easy to understand. Once you HAVE been bloodied up some, it will prove invaluable. You need to have matured to a certain point in your own trading before this book can really help you get to the next level. What this book isn't: a primer on technique. The author and I share a pretty cynical view of charting. He has no patience for fundamentals, and I share that even though I swing trade while he day trades. There is no "here is how to make a huge pile of cash in two days" material here. While he shares what he trades, he encourages the reader to find their own trading space, and this is very wise. While most books on trading claim they can teach you to trade (mostly by following some technique that doesn't work outside the back-testing world), this author completely avoids that. Trading is completely individual, in my experience, so what you need is what you get from this book: an understanding of HOW to think, not a primer on WHAT to think. This is why I say you have to trade first before you read this book. Until you have faced the cold, hard reality of a position collapsing (and the euphoria of a position shooting up in value), you won't understand what the author is telling you. It literally will make no sense. In just the several weeks since I read this, my trading has improved quite noticeably. I sent the author a thank you note to the email he shares. I never heard back but I also never expected I would. This book will really help you if you have traded and lost, like most of us. If you have only traded and won (there must be at least one of you out there somewhere), keep going until you have experienced that first good hard butt kicking. Then read this and go back and do better. You will.

This is a great book for every day trader. His daily routine is worth the price of the whole book.

1. This book offers a unique blend of biography and investment philosophy, a departure from the typical advice or plan. It presents a fascinating summary of experience, more akin to Dr. Phil than the traditional approaches of Benjamin Graham or William O'Neil. 2. There are no important details, such as entry or exit points, lot sizes, timing, stop-loss percentages, or setups; you need Mark Minervini for these specifics. 3. Winning investments require significant capital, and the percentage of those who could go "all in" is about the same as those who may win big. Most of us are too chickens to lose retirement money and still smile at the dinner table. 4. The author, a seasoned trader, may not use a margin account, but he still switches from long to short at a rapid pace. He is not a quant, like Jim Simmons, but he is not Warren Buffett, either. He is a contrarian at best, challenging the status quo of traditional investment approaches with his wealth of experience. 5. The author often dismisses technical analysis, yet he refers to double tops, double bottoms, retracements, and trend lines. Due to his experience, he has a significant amount of "meta-knowledge." Facts, motifs, knowledge, and expertise descended into his subconscious and blended into a "feel." This is similar to the sixth sense that samurais needed decades to master. The influence of this cannot be dismissed. 6. The stock market is not a "Casino" (Darvas); there is a "Pattern to it" (Simmons). One cannot deny the presence of insider trading (stay away from biotech startups and admire some politicians' "investment successes") and ongoing information manipulation by market makers and investment banks. Do you remember the GameStop story? 7. When you think you got it, prepare for the ever-present danger of Black Swans. Overall, the book may be repetitive at times. However, it serves as a stark reminder of the significant influence our emotions have on our investment decision-making. It urges us to 'Know Thyself' and view investing as a perpetual quest for mastery, a realization that can be both enlightening and empowering.

New Review: I was pretty upset as I would find myself consistently posting some wins, then making huge counter-market bets and blew threw account after account, a very important sum of money to me. I was a terrible loser, and I found that the more I lost, I would do something dumber the next time around. I knew nothing about trading except that if I bought some calls and some puts, if I made money on the in between, I would do okay. I really messed myself up when, in misinterpreting Tom's message from the book, and finding myself never being able to hit that magic homerun, to try my hand at potentially turning a five figure some into a six figure sum in one trade, and blew accounts up several times. Digging deeper into it, I have found that Tom's message is incredibly useful for all aspiring day traders. Maybe I missed it here but there is a technique to what he is suggesting. It is not to mean, make 2k, then add another 10k or 20k of risk on the trade, to potentially make even more, when your risk tolerance was originally 1k or 2k. Here I am humbled and my risk per trade is much smaller than that, for now. What he suggests is to keep adding to the trade without actually incurring more risk at all. There is certainly some skill and understanding and practice to do this, but it is in fact the only way to compound an original trade that might turn out to be a runner rather than forcing yourself to be perfect on just one trade trying to catch a low and a high, which is incredibly stressful and easy to beat yourself up over. Tom has some amazing content on his YouTube website which will provide some detail to this book. I would not take the title literally and to keep adding like crazy with no restraint to your position sizing and risk the farm to try to win back a horse. That is what I was essentially doing in my frustrations with the market, and that is not the way to approach it at all. At least, however, all people if they can pick something up from Tom is learning how to compound those winners without adding more and more risk, and he does go into some details about that. If I personally can adopt this and not risk half of my account which is a meaningful sum of money to me, or my entire account on one trade, I know I will be in a better place as a trader especially if all I am risking is more profits. Old Review: Tom has an interesting idea. If you have profit, keep adding. Then he has charts of mistakes of his trades. Well, adding without a max loss is exactly how people blow up their accounts, statistically on that manner. Build a huge position by adding to it and be wrong. It only takes one time. I wouldn’t be surprised if he started at that baseline to attract a client base then advise to do something completely different.

Good reading about the mindset of a trader! This was a recomendation from a friend and it was a good one. I pass along the recommendation to other people with this review!

It was one of the most accurate book on trading habbits such as loosing with proper mindset to become profitable and win at long term trading.

I never leave reviews, EVER, but I cannot believe people gave this book less than 5 stars. I guarantee those people who did leave 1 stars reviews will not make it in trading, but I wish them the best. This book is absolutely AMAZING, I just ordered a copy for my brother and I am now re-reading the book for a second time, and I never re-read books except for "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". Tom touched on so many amazing points...there is no magic indicator or strategy, the answer to winning at trading lies within, on the other side of fear. Everyone knows RSI,VWAP,EMA,SMA,head and shoulders pattern, bull flag pattern etc. BUT WHY does everyone lose? Why are you losing? The answer to winning doesn't lie in more indicators or paying for some "secret" strategy that a fake guru sells on YouTube. All you need to know is how to read price action on a naked chart, but more importantly you need to know yourself. You need to add to winning trades and cut your loses quickly without emotion. You need to do everything the masses does not. You need to not think normal. You need to laugh at the saying, "buy low, sell high", "can't go broke taking profit." All that is normal loser talk. Thank you Tom for writing this book, I loved it and I have already been holding winning trades longer and now I am working on adding to winning trades instead of cutting profit short.

Many trading books are worthless, this one is not!

Tom Hougaards book is a must-have for the trader that feels hen is currently in "no mans land" on their trading journey towards profitability, or for the experienced trader that wants to take it to the next level. This is not a book filled with bs chart indicators, patterns and all the other technical analysis information that every other trading book is offering. Briefly speaking: This book is about what "The Ideal Trading Mindset" looks like and is all about, and how we as traders need to really dig in deeper into ourselves to find the issues that keeps us from being the true traders that we know we are - and how to solve these issues. Simply put: It's about how to develop the psychology needed to operate as a high stake day trader on a consistent basis - like a professional. It's a book that will be read many times over. Worth every single penny. I can recommend this book whole-heartedly and want to thank Tom Hougaard for his wisdom, and his time to write this book.

Muito muito muito bom esse livro aqui cara, recomendo mesmo. Mas já tem que ter experiência em day trading

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El mejor regalo! En verdad es un súper libro para negocios, vida personal y profesional!!