It’s not easy to be ahead of Jim Rogers when it comes to selling books, but for the moment Trend Following (#219) is ranked ahead of Jim Rogers’ Hot Commodities (#234) on Amazon in their sales ranking of all books.

A column in a Japanese daily newspaper that I am writing.

Additionally, the translated Japanese version of Trend Following is now available.

A recent interview with Bloomberg Radio (6.5 MB MP3 audio file) and Mike Covel about trend following.

Here is a sample of some stock market marketing aimed at kids. Dollar cost averaging, as pointed out in Trend Following, is also known as losers average losers.

Amazon book ranks for Trend Following across categories today:

#510 > All Books
#77 > All Books > Business & Investing
#12 > All Books > Business & Investing > Investing
#2 > All Books > Business & Investing > Investing > Stocks
#2 > All Books > Business & Investing > Investing > Futures
#1 > All Books > Business & Investing > Investing > Options

June 2005 Cover

Nearly 13 months after release Trend Following continues to reach a wide audience. Amazon sells millions of different books and today Trend Following was ranked #764 of all books available. Thanks for the continued support. As always your feedback and comments, both positive and negative, are welcomed.

I interviewed a Miami area trend follower in his office this past Friday. While a younger man in terms of age, he has a track record exceeding 20% per year dating back to the early 1990s. He manages nearly $500M USD for clients.

In a surprising way, he quickly jumped into the philosophical elements of trend trading. All he could do was shake his head when I mentioned that some people still feel his kind of trading is bogus. “Do they not add up the profits” was his paraphrased response back.

He did drive home a crucial point about diversification from his perspective. Essentially he said, “what is the point of diversification if you can simply ride the big trenders each year while excluding the losers from your portfolio?” Of course this really would be the Holy Grail of trading, but perhaps as this trader hinted “some” are headed there as we speak.

My front cover interview with Technical Analysis of Stocks & Commodities Magazine is currently out in the June 2005 issue: read the interview now.

Woody Dorsey in his book “Behavioral Trading” speaks to what he calls the Seven Stages of a Bear Market:

1. Mania – Peak of Dot-com Bubble, December 1999.
2. Denial – After falling sharply, the market rallied in summer-fall 2000.
3. Hope – Though the market fell again, it rallied back in summer 2002.
4. Recognition – The market plunged after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York.
5. Reprieve – The market rallies steeply (forecast).
6. Liquidation – The market sells off and slides definitively (forecast).
7. Capitulation – The market bottoms (forecast).

In an after the fact analysis, these points hit home and provide great food for thought. Just remember though, to trade in the present will require a strategy that answers the following 5 questions:

1. How do you determine what market to buy or sell at any time?
2. How do you determine how much of a market to buy or sell at any time?
3. How do you determine when you buy or sell a market?
4. How do you determine when you get out of a losing position?
5. How do you determine when you get out of a winning position?

I caught a brief story today about ‘exits’. The following excerpt is right from the trend following play book:

“It’s a common enough saying that people use in various situations in everyday life. But when you’re a stock investor, the phrase “cut your losses” takes on a special meaning. Investors are tempted to hang onto a stock that’s begun to tank. It’s easy to think, “Well, this stock can’t go any lower,” or “It’s a good company; the stock will come back.” But you don’t get ahead in the market by hoping and wishing and guessing. A better plan is to apply a strong set of rules that have worked. While your stock-buying rules are your offense, your sell rules are your defense. It’s inevitable that you’ll make mistakes or you’ll buy a stock at exactly the right point, but the breakout fizzles. You want a Plan B ready for those situations. Here’s what that Plan B looks like: Say you bought a stock at the proper entry point. But the breakout goes awry, and the stock moves lower. Keep an eye on it. If it falls 7% to 8% below your buy point, sell it.”
Investor’s Business Daily
Katharine Stalter

The publishing business is a mine field. My book Trend Following has finally had its price reduced back to a normal roughly $20 a book at Amazon. Unfortunately, over the last 10 weeks my publisher and Amazon had disputed “pricing” which resulted in a temporary raise of my book price on Amazon to nearly $30 a book.

If anyone ever desires insights on publishing a book today, drop me a line.