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How did a world-famous dancer with no knowledge of the stock market, or of finance in general, make 2 million dollars in the stock market in 18 months starting with only $10,000? Darvas is legendary, and with good reason. Find out why.
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General principle still works but technical approach is timed.
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The strength of this book is that Darvas was able to adjust his approach with every failure until he met success and this is still important to success in today's market. His first losing streak taught him not to listen to brokers, rumors, financial advisors or wall street sayings. His second string of losses taught him that trading on your perceived value of a company based on studying financial information is not likely to work since this tells you the past and has little predictive power.
In the recent Bear market going long would have been a losing game. This was also the situation when the stocks Darvas was trading hit their stop losses during the mini bear market then, stressing the importance of trading with the general trend as is the case today.
His technical approach is based on the theory that stocks trade in boxes. Once the boundaries of a box are established the move past the upper boundary three times indicates the establishment of a new box. This indicates that a new trend is established which a trader should get into. While this approach may work for few blue chip stocks today, it is not likely to work for the majority of stocks. The reasons are: (1) the quick flow of information results in much higher volatility and in many cases frequent break in and out of "Boxes", while in several others stocks move quickly without such boxes even being established. (2) Decimalization, which was intended to reduce bid - ask spreads to provide a better deal for individual traders, facilitated manipulation of stock movements by market makers by making it easier for them to hide the trend due to small spreads. This in term resulted in much higher percentage of false breakout from boxes, even in many cases occurring on heavy volume.
If you are interested in using Darvas box method it is advisable to confirm the breakout using other technical signals.The book deserves 4 stars for the good general principles that are still useful today and for Darvas ability to even come up with the box method then.
Rating: 
(4
out of 5) @ 2009-01-01
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Wall St Fairytale
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As a participant in the financial markets for the past 3-4 years I have been keen to read as many books as I can about the industry (much like Darvas). This is a title that had come recommended to me by various co-workers and on a number of internet websites.
The book itself discusses the Darvas technique of using technical analysis combined with fundmental analysis to make investing decisions and how he stumbled across this method. This technique wasn't uncommon then and is still used today. That being said, I believe it still has more merit than using one or the other alone.
Although Darvas does not give away his secrets, it provides a rough blueprint for developing a trading style. It also acts as an inspirational story for those starting out in the markets that if you are willing to work towards becoming an exceptional trader, it is possible. I wouldn't call this a 'bible' of financial markets, but as far as fairytales on Wall St go, this would have to be the equivilent of a Brothers Grimm tale.
An enjoyable read which should inspire the Darvas in all of us that Wall St can still yield financial freedom.
Rating:
(4
out of 5) @ 2008-12-29
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Excellent insights from a classic trader - use of trading ranges and trailing stops explained
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Darvas' books on trading are excellent, and this first one is a "must read" classic for active traders everywhere.
What I liked best about it was his practical focus and explanation of how he traded "on the road" using faxes/phone calls decades ago, and managed to make $2M in his trades, using:
+ Trailing stops to lock in profits
+ Trading ranges ("Darvas Boxes") to make trading entry and exit decisions
+ Buying strong stocks getting stronger vs weak stocks for bounces
+ Hitting home runs and staying in winners vs selling out too fast
+ Taking small stops when wrong on entries
and much more.
What makes this especially valuable is his insights on how he got stopped out and recovered, how he subsequently fine tuned his trading approach, and his "lessons learned" from a trader as he turned the corner and emerged a successful trader.
Brilliantly written, engaging and interesting, it's on the short list of books I highly recommend to my 8100 traders (in addition to Steve Nison, Tony Oz, Toni Turner, Barry Rudd, Tim Sykes, and Kathy Lien).
His title "Wall Street: The Other Las Vegas" is my other favorite of his.
A "strong buy", much better than most trading books out there. Because it's a real traders' journal of how he actually made a lot of winning trades.
Ken Calhoun, Pres.
DaytradingUniversity
Rating:
(4
out of 5) @ 2008-12-21
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fun read on technical analysis
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if you know something about technical analysis you will probably find this a fun read. unfortunately it suffers from the poor formatting so common to e books which is particularly annoying in the tables of his stock purchases and sales. but the narrative is well written and it s a fun story. do not expect to make your own 2 000 000 in the market starting from 3 000 as he did however.
Rating: 
(3
out of 5) @ 2008-10-27
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Insightfull
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For some one who is interested in investing in the stock market using technical analysis, this is a great book. It clearly shows how following price and developing your own STRATEGY to invest around it, can be very profitable.
Rating: 
(5
out of 5) @ 2008-10-25
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