Amazon.ca:Customer reviews: The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings

Filtered by

1 starClear filter

33 total ratings, 23 with reviews

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From Canada

Michael Mitchell

Second Worst Book I've Read

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on February 20, 2022

Verified Purchase

From all of the trading books that I've read--and I've read every trading book you can think of--this one ranks as the second worst book I've read. The worst one was Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb. (You can read my review on that book.)

Do not waste your money on this book. You will learn nothing from it!

If you're looking for a good book from "The Little Book" series, buy The Little Book of Market Wizards by Jack D. Schwager. This book will teach you REALLY VALUABLE lessons. After interviewing the best traders/investors for his first 4 Market Wizards books, Schwager summarizes the lessons learned in this "little book." (You can read my review on that book.)

Schwager's little book is about twice the price of Covel's little book, but the first has many valuable lessons, and the latter has zero value.

NOTE: This review, including the title, is based on and reflects my own personal opinion.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

From other countries

Sound Opinion

Don't Waste Your Time

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 29, 2011

Verified Purchase

I am really disappointed that I read "The Little Book of Trading" by Michael Covel. I should have known better. A friend of mine read Covel's very recent book, 'Trend Commandments' and told me it was a complete waste of time, so I didn't buy that one. However, when "The Little Book of Trading" was released, I read that it was going to be INTERVIEWS of successful trend followers. So, I bought it.

It isn't a book of interviews at all. I feel ripped off. Chapters are arranged with a couple of lines about a trend follower followed up by paragraph after repetitive paragraph of Covel pontificating on the virtues of trend following. As a long term trend follower, myself, it is still obvious Michael Covel knows very little about trend following and how to trade. He merely skims the surface.

Covel does a disservice to the "The Little Book" collection. The content could be written on an index card rather than a 'little book'. I read the entire book hoping to learn one tiny morsel. I was left empty.

Mr Covel has this psychotic fixation with CNBC. Why? Who cares? He literally beats the topic to death. He has a fascination with Jim Cramer too. Again, why? Who cares?

Michael Covel acts like anyone that isn't a trend follower is the enemy and a fool. As a successful long term trend follower, I know very well there are a lot of ways to make money. This is very clear in the market wizards books of REAL interviews which were fantastic. I am a living example of someone who knows firsthand. I made a lot of money with distressed debt (50-95% CAGR on every deal), which had zero to do with trend following and everything to do with deep value, buy and hold. I just didn't like pushing and prodding lawyers all day and found trend following suited my personality and mathematical inclinations best.

His attacks on non-trend followers are an embarrassment to real trend followers. We have nothing against value investors, other fundamental investors, buy and hold investors, private equity, venture cap, index investors, etc... Unfortunately the loudest voice in the trend following community is Michael Covel, the Michael Moore of trend following.

Covel's writing style is abrasive and his points are all over the shop. The book is so disorganized it will annoy you, the reader.

I wasted my valuable time reading "The Little Book of Trading". Don't waste yours.

70 people found this helpful

Rich Feynman

A waste of time and money

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 28, 2011

Verified Purchase

I bought this book because I thought it might contain some ideas around trend trading systems, how they work and how one might go about testing and developing them to fit one's own biases and perwonality. This book does not contain any such information. Instead it is a book about certain trend traders, which does not give much idea about their methods, but comes across as a sycophantic ramble about them. The book is a long advertisement/propaganda document about trend following, with the author putting down other methods and claiming that they do not work. For this, he is dangerous, there are plenty of trading methods out there each of which is capable of providing reasonable returns, with trend following being just one, you have to find them and use the one you are most comfortable with. Each chapter covers one trader or a group of traders who work together in a fund, giving you mostly unimportant details about their life stories but without techniques and in most cases without using their own words. If you want to learn about traders and what makes them tick, you should read it in their own words. For that I would recommend Jack Schwager's fantastic Market Wizard books. There are plenty of tips there and things that would improve you as a trader. Please do not waste your money here.

8 people found this helpful

TomAmaz

The title is very misleading.

Reviewed in the Netherlands 🇳🇱 on August 4, 2022

Verified Purchase

I do not recommend buying this book. It is very poor and teaches you nothing. Read Alpha Trader by Brent Donnelly if you're serious about improving

RRM

This is poorly written and has basically no content

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 27, 2011

Verified Purchase

I've read probably 50 trading books. I've been trading on and off for 20 years now.

This book was unfortunate. There was hardly ANY real information in it and absolutely nothing new or even remotely helpful. In addition, it's written horribly and does not flow at all. You will think you skipped pages a few times in this book because more than a few times the last paragraph on a page had nothing to do with the first one on the next.

The author jumps all over the place. At times trying to be funny, other times trying to sound authoritative, and all the time shoving trend trading down your throat, like it's THE ONLY way to trade a market successfully.

He also regularly "writes down" to the reader, overusing the (explanation) after a sentence. Why he didn't just say what he meant in the sentence, I have no idea (as in do not understand).

All the while, he makes it to the very last page of the book without giving you even ONE example of a real trend trading rule set - what one looks like.

All you end up with is what you already figured - see a chart moving up and to the right, and jump on. All the while mysteriously "managing your money" to make it all work.

I also bought his other Trend Trading book, the one with the horse on the front, (Trend Following) but it's written so badly that I stopped reading it in the first chapter and decided to start with this little one.

Covel may be a good trader but he's no author. I basically could not wait for it to end. By the time I got half way I was ticked because of the time invested, but I had to finish, just in case there was just ONE thing I could learn in there somewhere.

Stick with the Jack D. Schwager books, those are well written, full of real usable information and amazing reads.

24 people found this helpful

Amazon Customer

no technical trading information in this book

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 5, 2011

Verified Purchase

this is a book if you want to read some superficial stories about people who became successful using trend trading without getting any more info than this information: 1.come up with some rules. 2. follow your rules. 3. expect drawdowns, sometimes significant, but still follow your rules. This is no market wizards book. The tone of the book is similar to his other books which is as if you, the reader, somehow bought a book on trend trading but don't believe it works, and would like to be convinced it works by reading some anecdotal stories. Google "Trend trading" and you will get more practical information to get you started. I think the author is correct in what he says, trending works, but he has a scam going by publishing the same "convince me about trend trading" book with different titles. I bought this kindle book because the "little book" series is usually excellent. I also think the rave reviews posted here are a scam of sorts. I would encourage anyone else foolish enough to buy this book to post their honest review here to combat the dishonest reviews. Good luck in your trading.
PS-I dont expect a book to reveal trade secrets but this book's emptiness ticked me off enough to write this review.

33 people found this helpful

Kindle Customer

"The Little Book about ... well, Very Little"

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 17, 2012

Verified Purchase

If you're already a successful "trend trader" and would enjoy reading a book that agrees that success is a good thing, then Covel's book is the right book for you. However, if you're looking to find a system or learn how to spot trends or trend reversals, look elsewhere because this book basically wastes your time telling you about a handful of people who have made loads of money using "trend following" ... without telling you anything worthwhile about their systems, indicators, rules, or methods--the book is simply a "map" (and I use that word loosely because the book couldn't be used to find your way out of a phone booth) to nowhere. After reading the book, I can guarantee you one way to have more money at the end of the year related to trading than you'd otherwise have--just keep a tight grip on your wallet and don't buy Covel's book. I have no idea of whether his other books are any good and have no plans to find out.

13 people found this helpful

Gretsch Country Gentleman

Nothing to Really Sink Your Teeth Into

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on October 16, 2011

Verified Purchase

I read the book in two sittings and found myself wondering where the real substance is. Fine, you can interview all of the Trend Following Strategy originators and successful traders , but there really is no blueprint for how one might devise a system, or even the most basic semblance of how one might go about formulating one. The book does not deliver , IMO and may be intended to rope you into buying some of the author's related products to this theme , as it moves along and piques curiosity. Felt it was empty of any value relative to getting started in Trend Following Strategies and I do not recommend it. Money down the tubes for this purchase, as far as I'm concerned.

30 people found this helpful

Nathan

Misleading Title and Tagline

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 20, 2011

Verified Purchase

This book was a total waste. I was even more disappointed that THE LITTLE BOOK brand would publish this. It told me nothing about trading that little common sense would take care of if one were to begin trading. It does not give any technical or certain setups or specifics of successful systems. All it does is give names of successful trend traders who made millions and billions but nothing specific about their systems they used. What stupid advice Covel gives by saying develop your own system and then stick with it and that's it ~ I mean no guidance, no point of departure to setup your system for trend trading. The book just rambles on and on to fill up pages. I am not usually this harsh but this was a waste of money.

57 people found this helpful

Long Time Trader

The Little Book of Trading: trend Following Strayegy for Big Winners

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 25, 2011

Verified Purchase

Don't waste your money on this book. The book contains no specifics to actually use in your trading. Lots of stories of successful traders who say they made their fortunes by trend following- but not one mention of how they actually entered and exited a trade. Obviously if you catch a trend you will make money- might have just told us to but low and sell high. One of the worst books of the Little Book series if you are an experienced investor.

19 people found this helpful

Need customer service? Click here

‹ See all details for The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings

5 star		51%
4 star		13%
3 star		15%
2 star		7%
1 star		14%

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers	Amazon Business Everything for your business	Amazon Drive Cloud storage from Amazon	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	Amazon Photos Unlimited Photo Storage Free With Prime	Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands

Warehouse Deals Open-Box Discounts	Whole Foods Market We Believe in Real Food	Amazon Renewed Like-new products you can trust	Blink Smart Security for Every Home

The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings

›

Customer reviews

Customer reviews

The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings

Filtered by

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From Canada

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

From other countries

The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings › Customer reviews

Customer reviews

The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings

Filtered by

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From Canada

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

From other countries

The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings

›

Customer reviews