[.ca] Generate Thousands in Cash on Your Stocks without ... (ISBN 1585971162)

Combining stocks with simple options to make money:
In my quest to become a profitable trader I have read many books on both stock and option trading. This book is unique in that it combines trading stocks with practical option strategies to reduce risk and increase profits. Most books exclusive to stock trading tend to reduce risk using stop loss points. In addition to offering insights on how to place stops so you are not a victim of "stops running" and `Front running" traps by market makers (explained in the book); the author shows you how to use options to enhance profits and minimize losses when trading stocks. A chapter entitled "risk control and money management" discusses how to strategically place stops and how to use options as a risk reduction tool applicable to most trades in the book. On the other hand most books dedicated to trading options tend to discuss esoteric and theoretical aspects of option trading such as greeks and implied volatility etc . Rather than rehashing what is present in most books, the author focuses on simple option strategies that can be effectively used by the small stock trader to improve results. To me this was a breath of fresh air, since almost in every options book each author goes through the same things (greeks, implied volatility etc) in a different way. This book offered me what I was looking for. Strategies that are simple and practical and help me make money. There are many firsts in this book. It is the first to offer a practical and simple method to manage long term holdings as represented by convergence/divergence charts. Having heard about the potential explosive profits reaped from short squeezes, this is the first book I have seen offer a stepwise procedure to identify stocks with the potential of a short squeeze . The author also discusses a scan to find stocks reversing from a bottom that he uses to identify low risk trades. He then goes through the process step by step to show you how to narrow down candidates to find profitable trades. My favorite Chapter is the one entitled "Tricks of the Trade" where the author discusses how to play different trading strategies based on his practical experience in the market. As another reviewer mentions this book deserves multiple readings and constant reference due to the practical and innovative concepts it offers.

Fantsastic!!!:
This probably has to be the most valuable book I've bought to date on share/options trading. Maybe not a lot of new info for the "experienced" options trader, although it may be a reminder even to them of how truly effective certain strategies can be... especially with relatively little risk. But I would say a MUST-HAVE book for anybody else and especially for those considering a start in options trading. It's a book that gets the point across of ensuring you're getting paid FIRST, when entering a trade, and not just hoping that you make money later. Here is a book that goes beyond just the theory and ideas repeatedly covered in other books. The tools and methods suggested may not be new, but the concepts are certainly eye-opening, well described, and certainly achievable. It's more a book on how to EARN AN INCOME (more than capital growth) and how to TIME your trade/adjustments-to-trade to achieve this most profitably. The greatest benefit I gained from this book was that it gave plenty of suggestions and ideas on how to salvage a bad trade, using strategies such as covered-calls, writing puts, and collars (to name the main strategies). He also does a great job describing how to "fine tune" his techniques, by using certain indicators to better time entry and exit points, as well as going through how to deal with the number of possibilities of a position nearing option-expiration dates or if a position was to adversely/unexpectedly move against you before then. His techniques though are not all about salvaging any "bad" positions still held, but also useful in entering a new trade and maximising profits and reducing risk, through the use of selling options... and insights on how to monitor and profitably ADJUST those positions so as to maximise your returns by the time you exit the trades. The best thing though about the book is that he uses real examples and goes through how to handle a number of possibilities (negative outcomes as well as positive). One truly begins to understand a trader's thought process and mentality before and after entering a position, by going through his detailed examples.... and it's reassuring that the results claimed can truly be achieved using strategies and means that are readily understandable and available. The only negative(s) I have about this book, is that Samir doesn't go into the "finer" points about short-selling options and money management and could make somebody feel too overconfident and not appreciate ALL the risks involved. He eludes to them towards the end of the book but these very important points can easily be glossed over by the unwary reader. A lot of the examples he provides are stock/option positions in the tens of thousands... not so risky if you have an even larger starting capital, but potentially very risky if it's smaller and brokerage also begins to have en effect too. For example one would need to: clarify how much option collateral is necessary to open a particular position, take into account brokerage, take into account "slippage" between ask/bid prices, be prepared for and have a plan to deal with an increase in implied-volatility (something not touched on at all). All these and more, will determine one's starting-off capital and how much risk one is prepared to take per position.... Determining individual risk isn't covered very well in this book, thereby making these strategies and returns, to appear deceitfully "easy". Finally remember it's a percentage game, and it's very easy while reading his book, to get too carried away with the "tens of thousands" of profits one can make through his strategies... these returns are only possible on large initial positions... the percentage returns though will remain almost constant. Despite this negative feedback, I still think that the book deserves 5 stars, purely on the excellent information provided. Strategies, their execution, and profit returns, are truly realistic and within the means of most people... provided one has an adequate starting capital and sound concepts of money management

Great and very helpfull book:
I had began studying this book aside my trading courses and it has been very helpful filling some gaps, especially on technical analysis. The technical analysis part is very well done and worth the price of the book alone. This book will teach you also how to get out of trouble when things will not works as planned. When followed to the letter, the methods in this book are very reliable and successful. You need to be patient of learning very well what it is written and be sure you are really executing the trades with very good attention to detail. Probably you will need to study this book as you would do it at school. Do not rush in to trade just because it seems very doable, wait until you are sure you are executing precisely what is written on the book and that the stock you are going to trade, has the fundamental and technical requirement to apply the strategies of this book. that is very important. The only difficult part is to find the stock that meet the requirement, But once you find the right stock or wait for the right conditions on your preferred stock before placing the trade, it will work as planned. Some trades are pretty aggressive, and I advise to do them only when you have developed some experience. In any case a great book with great technical and sentiment analysis, some very interesting strategies and a lot of examples of real trades. It will teach you how to pick your stocks, how to find good entry and exit points, especially how to anticipate downturns in the market and your stocks and how to protect your gains. again, I suggest of being very carefully on following instructions in detail and picking the stock and the market trend that meet all the requirement described in the book. Of course, try of getting the third edition of this book because it is the most up to date. In any case, for those that are not fluent with "options" trading, I suggest you to read some other books or take courses that teach you the options instrument and its implications, in order to understand your obligations and risks in using options. another important thing that you need to get familiar with, and this book does not cover completely is, what i would call: "options behavior" (for not being technical), which sometimes may be quite unsettling to the inexperienced trader and scare him/her out of a trade even when nothing is wrong, but to the inexperienced trader may look like things are not working as they should. hard to explain in few words... you need to take your time learning.

A Lifesaver in The Recent Down Market:
I do not usually write reviews but I felt compelled to write one on this book since it proved to be invaluable in the recent down market. There is one chapter I found extremely useful for long term holders , namely chapter 14 titled "Do This Every Week and Never Lose Money in The Market". At first I felt that this is too much of a blanket statement, however, after I studied the real examples the author gives I decided to apply it to my long term holdings. This technique requires that you perform a couple of simple calculations each week on every stock. The final value is then plotted as one data point for each stock on a specific chart paper then the weekly data points are connected. To my surprise the negative divergence between the C/D indicator described in the book and price alerted me to the potential collapse of two of the financial stocks I hold. My first inclination was to ignore the warning especially considering the apparent name brand and stability of these companies .After reading the examples again in the chapter and remembering how companies like Enron and others collapsed I decided to get out. Within few weeks those stocks with many other financials literally fell off a cliff. In this sense this one chapter saved me thousands of dollars and the little time and effort I spent plotting data every week was certainly worth it. Although the author explains step by step the calculation procedure, as well as normalizing and plotting the data on the chart, I recommend, if he happens to read this, to put out a CD with a program that can automatically plot such data. Doing this will allow investors to back test data and see with their own eyes the utility of this concept and thus will be more likely to use it. Another valuable insight is presented in the parameters used to assess market trend. The author combines volatility, short interest and a timing indicator to determine whether the market is likely to go higher or lower. The past few months these indicators pointed to a weak and deteriorating market with rallies likely to be short lived. I am in agreement with other reviewers that the unique combinations of technical indicators used and trading concepts in this book are easy to follow especially since they are supported by real stock examples. A word of caution, however in regards to expecting to use this book to trade complex option instruments such as butterflies, condors etc.. The author says in the introduction on page xvii that the book is not intended as a comprehensive options trading book detailing the many complex option strategies. His goal as he states it is "to use simple but effective options strategies in combination with stocks to enhance profits and control losses". I strongly recommend this book to anyone looking to learn effective and practical money making and income generating tools.

Made a lot of $$$ with this book.:
I was able to triple my trading account in the past 18 months with this book. Although, I did own the first and second editions, it is the third edition that gave me these remarkable results. How did I do this? I followed the stepwise procedure below: (1) I programmed the scan suggested by the author on pages 357-383 into my stock scanning software to find long trades reversing from a bottom. I also adapted the scan to search for short trades reversing from a top. This is quite easy to do by reversing the stated conditions. (2) I used the market timing indicator discussed on pages 179-185 to asses whether the general market is turning up or down. The indicators in the book are best used to detect an inflection point in the market which is critical to catch moves early in the trend. A down signal was given by this indicator in Nov 2007. (3) When the general market is turning up I run the scan that searches for long trades. I focused only on two high profit setups discussed in the book: VPV reversal and the highly profitable falling rectangle. My reason for focusing on these setups is that not only they have high profit potential, they get you in early in the trend thus reducing the possibility of being stopped out of the trade and keeping drawdown at a minimum. While VPV reversals are not hard to find, the highly explosive falling rectangles do not come by more than few times a year , but once you find them you can get profits upwards of 50% in a short time. (4) If the general market is turning down I ran the scan that searched for stocks to short. In this case, however I looked for a rising rectangle pattern which is essentially the opposite of afalling rectangle. I also required that the break below the rectangle be accompanied by a volume spike. Knowing that markets and stocks fall much faster than they rise I would buy puts on the stock at the next strike below the current price. Once that strike price is reached and if the downtrend is still intact I will sell the puts I hold and buy puts at a lower strike and so on. To show the explosive profits you can get using this technique, I will give a specific example: On 8/21/08 my short search program identified JDSU as a stock falling with a heavy volume spike. On examining the chart a break below a rising rectangle was evident. By buying $7.5 puts when the stock was at $10+ and then selling them when the stock hit $7.5 and buying $5 strike puts and so on until the stock hit $2.5 , my small investment grew by 20 times. I have taken the advice of the author in my trading "to specialize in specific setups and get good at them to the point where they can be recognized by a glance at the chart". I waited this long before writing the review since I had read many reviews and even written reviews myself on books without addressing the critical question: did the reviewer make money with ideas in the book. In most cases it is difficult to answer that question, however is this case it was possible since I followed a specific approach suggested in the book and it worked. My actual rating for the book though is slightly shy of 5 (around 4.75) stars mainly because the author does not discuss record keeping in detail. He touches on psychology and does discuss money management and risk control by setting stops out of congestion areas, so you do not get run over by market makers and using specific option strategies to control risk. I do not believe this is a major drawback since there are many books that discuss trading psychology and record keeping. A personal note regarding trading psychology: When I was not doing so well trading I started reading books that focus mainly on trading psychology , record keeping , followed their advice and got little improvements. However , a successful trading system changed my psychology by making me more confident, and thus willing to pull the trigger when I see a setup that falls within my specialty. Since most trades were profitable it was easy to cut losses on the ones that were not, thus following the saying cut your losses and let profits run was much easier to do.