Trend Following: How Great Traders Make Millions in Up or Down Markets [Hardcover]

The book is a Market Wizards of sorts. It covers major 'trend followers' and provides the background
of these players. Although each trader is not interviewed personally the author covers their backgrounds
and more importantly their successes over the years.

Read this book with an open mind - take a chance and let the material sink in. I hope you will find a
calming sensation and a feeling of ease. I hope you will find your outlook on the financial markets will benefit
from the no non-sense approach to this technique. Mine did.

Great read, put in on the self next to your copy of Market Wizards.

This book serves a great purpose; it gives an insight into who is winning in the markets. We have all been lead to believe that Buffett, Soros and others are the big players in the market. There are others who are silently making money for customers without the fan fare of Buffett or the political bias of Soros. The book tells you who the major players are (Dunn for instance) and how much money they make over time.

The author does make a good point--trend following is a valid and underestimated methodology. It is the method that discretionary traders like Edwards and Magee would advocate.

Trend following is based on events that the market underestimates. Price action does not follow the normal distribution, as the statisticians would have it. Events that are statistically improbable are much more frequent than chance would allow. Trend following technical analysis attempts to catch these moves.

The author underestimates the drawbacks of a strict trend-following methodology--large draw-downs, with a large percentage of losing trades. This drawback--low reliability is also a strength--most market participants are not interested in profitable system with a large number of losers. A more severe drawback--a large amount of capital is needed to trade such a system to handle the inevitable drawdowns.

He fails to address this issue by simply suggesting that if you take enough trades, eventually one will go your way and make up for your losses. Maybe so. But who would be willing to suffer draw-downs in the range of 30% or more, waiting for one or 2 big trades to come? Not many. Increased market volatility makes trend following systems profitable, but more risky.

If you examine _The Encyclopedia of Trading Strategies_ you will see that most mechanical systems degrade over time. Volatility breakout systems used to be very popular. But with increased volatility, simple breakout systems give more frequent losing trades, rendering them unprofitable for the test period.

The author overestimates the performance of mechanical systems, most of which are trend following. Historical testing tells you what has happened, not what is going to happen. This was the mistake of Long Term Capital Management. Trading, like poker, is a people game played with money. It isn't a number's game (like blackjack) the quants would have you believe it is.

Trading requires you to anticipate changes in investor expectations. Technical AND fundamental analysis helps you understand the forces that are influencing market participants. Understanding fundamentals can help you filter out the frequent false signals from technical models, while technical analysis serves as an excellent risk management and timing tool.

There are many ways of profiting in the market. Trend following is one. It isn't the best one, nor is it the only one. I'd argue traders would be better served focusing on classical technical analysis (chart patterns), and then spending most of their time learning how to manage risk. You can still make money with these "old" concepts, and gain practical experience with the psychology of trading.