Much Too Advanced for Beginners! Good for Intermediates

Experts can make the mistake of forgetting how little people know when they first get started. That is clearly the case with this book to-earth, nondoctrinaire explanation. But I wouldn't have made it past the first five chapters when I was just getting started with technical analysis.I graded the book as a one star for beginners and as a five star for intermediates, and that averaged to three stars. Judge accordingly!Most investors argue strongly in favor of or against price-based analysis. Those who trade a lot usually swear term investors usually ignore charts. The classic debate is between the "random walkers" who say there ae no patterns in the markets and the chartists. No one has ever proven definitively that charting does or doesn't work for investing. The key problem is nicely stated following systems can be developed (a fairly conservative use of charting), and provides some useful trading guidelines. These last could have saved many on-line traders a fortune. So who should learn this material? I would argue that almost no one should. Long-term investors would rarely use it, and can probably rely on fundamental analysis adequately for making entry point decisions. Those who have limited skill in investing should probably be in stock index funds, and do not need this knowledge. Perhaps the best reason to be interested is simply to have a better understanding of the thinking processes that traders use. But that's a human interest application, rather than a financial one.Some people have compared technical analysis to astrology. After reading the book, you might want to think about that comparison to come to your own conclusions. Certainly, there is no proof offered in this book that these patterns do foretell the future. At least in that element, technical analysis and astrology are similar. May you always buy low and sell high!

Crucial for beginners

This book is dense with information and cannot be approached lightly. I read "New Market Wizards" in one week but this book took two months. As usual, the effort expended is proportional to the benefit received. In particular, the chapter on "Real Life Chart Analysis" is worth the price, and should be three times longer. There, Mr. Schwager shares two dozen of his own real-life trades, accompanied guess the author. Only on flip pages are the actual trade results shown, annotated with ruminations on what, if anything, should have been done differently. Examples of both successful and unsuccessful trades are given. Approximately half of the book explains technical analysis, and the other half explains basic trading techniques such as money management, system testing, and the psychological (emotional) pitfalls to avoid. In my humble opinion, no one should trade until understanding the principles presented here. My one criticism is that the book would be easier to follow if the charts were on the same page as their related commentary, but it is only fair to mention that most technical analysis books suffer the same shortcoming. Overall it does a decent job presenting crucially important information for beginners.

Not Necessarily a Beginner's Book.

It was a little difficult to read and took a couple of months to finish. It's not what I expected from a "Getting Started In...." book. I have read other books in this series like "Getting Started In Options Trading" and that book was utterly great. (Highly recommended by the way.) But "Getting Started In Technical Analysis" was a disappointment. For one thing, some of the concepts weren't thoroughly explained. In other aspects, he talks about a figure of a chart that most of the time is at least 2 pages away. You catch yourself flipping around the pages like crazy, and he doesn't do a very good job explaning the charts either. He does do a good job of laying out all the different aspects of technical analysis but I am not sure how helpful they were in actually getting a feel for them. If you decide to buy this book, don't hesitate to return it. I kind of wish I did.