Books Review

Professional Stock Trading - Mark Conway & Aaron Behle

2006-03-29T09:49:00.000+02:00

This is a technical book for those of you who believe in technical analysis (stocks, futures, options, etc.) and are looking for a book that will give you a good guidance and jumpstart.
Many code samples are included in the book, making it a real valued resource for those that are using the TradeStation platform and would like to make some shortcuts in understanding technical methods, technical analysis, programming and research aspects that will probably save you lot of time.
The book describes in details technical methods for designing a trading system using the TradeStation platform, including lot of snippest codes that helps to generate various signals on the analyzed stock.
The book should be used side-by-side with a trading platform, otherwise it will be too difficult to follow, interpret and to make a full use of it. A basic knowledge of EasyLanguage (TradeStation programming language) is also required for better understanding the samples and in order to be able to make them work for you, since the provided samples might require some adaptations to the latest version of TradeStation.
Although I have not made money from that book yet (still reading, sorry, and hey I'm calling it "yet" meaning I beliebe it will come) - I believe it to be a great resource for anyone who is going to use automatic trading.

Fishman: The Enigma - Arie Avneri

2006-03-01T22:05:00.000+02:00

This is a biography about one of the most active business managers and owners in Israel - Eliezer Fishman. The book tells the stories of E.Fishman from a young boy and until 2005, how he started, the big failure during 1983 and the collapse of the stock exchange in Israel, the way he re-generate his success and leveraged his abilities by using connections, massive bank loans, lot of business sense and accounting capabilities and much more.
An interesting book for those who familiar with the Israeli business community.

The Little Book That Beats The Market - Joel Greenblatt

2006-03-01T21:30:00.000+02:00

I recieved that book a week ago from a friend who trades for a living. The book deals with a strategy for a long term investment with an above average yield and this by using the suggested "Magic Formula" that described in it.
The book (actually a booklet) is written for non-professional investors (or investors to be) using an easy language that mixed rightly with cynical humor, making the reading a real fun.
At the end of the book (which comes very quickly) the characteristics of the "Magic Formula" are known and can be implemented by anyone who is willing to gain a yield of at least 15%+ a year in the next decade - looking forward to a wealthy pension.
In short, the "Magic Formula" gives a realistic method for selecting stocks for investments based on economical ratios that are well known for each one of the stocks by using regular and standard means. Each of such stock is than added to the portfolio for one year. The portfolio contains 30 stocks on average and the overall investment "system" was checked with real data by using the historical values of the last 17 years - Interesting.

The Art of Deception - Kevin Mitnick

2006-02-11T22:26:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I read that Kevin Mitnick is coming to Israel on Feb-18 to give some lectures in a security forum meeting. Kevin Mitnick is famously known as the 1st computer hacker that has been captured and sentenced to jail. Kevin uses what is known now as social engineering for getting information from the most vulnerable part in the security chain - human - in order to recieve delicate information such as user names, passwords, entry codes, etc. In his book "The art of deception" Kevin describes his story from a young boy to a grown up information criminal. I believe that many stories are still missing due to the fact that Kevin is now free and go figure what else he knows and keep for himslef for a "rainy day".
I have read Kevin's book two years ago and labeled it as a must-read for anyone who deals with computer networks and willing to keep them out of reach for external users. The book also exposes a briliant manipulative and criminal mind, I must confess that in some way I feel guilty just for reading such a book, but don't worry - I'm from the good guys ;) and I don't know nor like hacking.

Get The Edge - Tony Robins

2006-01-28T17:48:00.000+02:00

The 'Get The Edge' is an audio series that spans 7 days out of which you devote an hour a day for hearing. The series describes several aspects of life that should help anyone to get better chances and better fulfillment via better understanding and having more sensitivity to the actual needs in work, relationships, health, money management and in general.
Tony Robins claim to have more than 30 years of experience in lecturing on the subject. The series is well organized and Tony Robins well delivers. I know there are more audio series programs by Tony Robins and I will now look for them. I think it might be of interest for anyone who looks for change and need some guidance.

Leadership - Rudolph Giuliani

2006-01-13T23:46:00.000+02:00

Lately I had a conversation about this book with a friend who happened to read it too not long ago. I found that I'm not the only one that like, and actually I'm not surprise since this is really an interesting book. I almost didn't leave it until I read it all. There are several issues that caught me in the book:
1. The high achievement standards demonstrated by RG.
2. The broken windows theory.
3. The self example.
4. The morning meetings that helped to move things up.

Well, actually there are lot more and these are only the labels of a much wider stories, however, I would like to concentrate today on the broken windows theory,
and this because I find it to be so useful to think at that way and I think everyone should be familiar with it in order to better understand how simple it might be to get to higher standards when you just follow the rules of consistency and showing an example.
The "broken windows" theory says in short that in places where the windows are broken, it might be common to assume that one more broken window will not be a disaster (on the contrary). This saw might be deduced to many fields such as:
[1] If you are shouting at me, it is ok to shout.
[2] If a politician is a liar, his surrounding might be built of lies (and is it ok?).
[3] If there is already a garbage on the floor, it is ok to drop some more garbage on that floor....
So, in short, the theory says - "fix the broken windows unless you want to see all the others broken too..."

Reminiscences of a stock operator

2005-12-16T23:19:00.000+02:00

As part of getting back into investment, trading and technical analysis (see my new blog at http://trademachine.blogspot.com), I have read this book: Reminiscences of a stock operator by Edwin Lefevre. Although this book was initially printed in 1923, it is interesting to see that the psychology of stock traders have not changed much. Nice book with an interesting story. It tells the actual story of the writer which happened to be one of the geratest stock speculators who become a legend throughout his living and also known through the following nicknames: "Daring Kid", "Cotton King" and "The Big Bear". The basic principle of stock trading remains the same, along with the excitement that came with it.

46 Ideas To Make Your Business A Success

2005-12-09T16:34:00.000+02:00

A small booklet (87 pages) that describes Business Success Ideas under the following categories:
[1] ARE YOU MAKING MONEY OR BUILDING A BUSINESS ?
[2] DOES YOUR COMPANY REALLY NEED A LOGO ?
[3] HOW TO ACHIEVE EXCELLENCE IN SALES
[4] HOW TO DEVELOP KILLER MONEY-MAKING IDEAS
[5] HOW TO GET FREE RADIO ADVERTISING
[6] HOW TO GET RICH GIVING AWAY SOMETHING FREE
[7] HOW TO GIVE AWAY CARDS AND MAKE EASY MONEY
[8] HOW TO MAKE MONEY WITHOUT LEAVING THE HOUSE
[9] THE NECESSITY OF FINANCIAL PLANNING
[10] HOW TO OBTAIN A MERCHANT'S CREDIT CARD ACCOUNT

Sort of deja-vu while comparing to other books that I read, but nice.

The World Is Flat

2005-11-19T16:11:00.000+02:00

The book The World Is Flat, by Thomas Friedman (TF), deals with globalization and analyzes the moves that causes the world to be flat - as stated by the author. Flat world means for example that everyone can access anywhere easily and compete as equals.
TF succeeded to draw fear around the question whether the west will loose its current economical position to the Asian countries in the race that causes for massive expansion in manufacturing capacities and increased productivity, leaning on the current low wages in Asia.
As an Hi-Tech veteran I already see the impact of the growing economies of India, China and others. I also believe that the competition will lead to better innovation and will produce better products. The overall PIE that illustrate the market will grow and as suggested by TF the complexity will also grow, leading to further need for new engineers. As a western engineer and an Hi-Tech manager, the question that keeps bugging me is whether the western countries and the US as a leader will wake up long enough to maintain the balance and not loose it to the east. It is only a matter of time till the center of gravity will move to the east, unless real cautious and startegy planning will be made.
An important and understanding outlook that I still wondering about (from the book) is the understanding that during the time the world's market pie grows, professional matters and wide know-how become a must for each individual that does not want to see its job outsourced (become a swiss army knife as stated by TF).
TF defines 3 eras of globalization: [1] 80' - Countries developed and meet each other in the global world, [2] 90' - Companies developed and become global, [3] 2000' - Developed Individuals from all around the world acquired knowledge that is equaly valued and thus enable them to go global.
More interesting facts are the followed: Approximately 400k engineers finalizes their studies each year in China. The US government narrows its investment in education for almost a decade starting from 1995. Most of the highly talented students in math at the US are childrens of foreign immigrants (60%+). It takes more than 15 years to grow up talented proffessors.
There is a claim that the Asian engineers are more hungry for work and thus more motivated. An Asian engineer on average is more productive than a western one and cost only 20% in comparison to western standards. Useless to say that although he/she earns "only" 20%, it assumed to be amonsgt the highest salary standards of the developing countries.

Joy of Thinking

2005-11-15T23:06:00.000+02:00

Joy Of Thinking - The Beauty And Power Of Classical Mathematical Ideas.
Hey, although I have not finished to hear all the set of audio lectures, I'm enjoying it - If you love numbers, math, or just recognize yourself to be curious about the surrounding, this might be a good audio for you.
Joy of thinking is a set of lectures that deals with numbers. There are 24 different lectures and they are all delivered as an interesting story. The lectures tells the stories about the golden triangle, Fermat's Last Theorem, Fibonacci Numbers, fractals and much more. Interesting.

Reading of the Month

2005-11-12T23:54:00.000+02:00

Just wanted to share what I'm reading this week. So I have 2 audio books:
[1] The World Is Flat (By Thomas Friedman)
[2] Joy of thinking (by Edward B. Burger, Michael Starbird)
And an e-book: [3] "46 Ideas to make your business a Booming Success"

You might be wondering how do I do it, so it is very simple. I plan each of the reading the same as of planning to take a course. If you have been to the university you'll know how it works, each hour you have a different lecture, your brain adjust itself to the new setup, so here is what I'm doing: During the day I switch between [2] and [3] on planned hours, and hearing [1] during my workout at the GYM and at night.
So, by the end of this week, I am planning to write here my impressions of these books.

Good night, going to enjoy some audio from [1]

The Books World

2005-11-11T11:06:00.000+02:00

I love reading books. Actually, I better say I love to know what is it inside of the books - I love knowledge!
There are several kind of books that I'm using to obtain my knowledge:
1. Printed books
2. Digital books, better known as e-book, mostly appears in a .pdf format
3. Audio books - my favorites. Mostly appear in an .mp3 or .wav format

Except for books I obtain my knowledge from magazines, articles in the Internet and news. I find it both fascinating and frustrating to learn on new isseus through the internet. The fascination comes due to the flexibility to choose sources of information like you could never had before. The frustration comes through the realization that there are too many sources and too many subjects to learn about - you'll never know it all.

The form of audio book helps me to better manage my day and feel more efficient. I can "hear the reading" of the book during my workout at the GYM, during my way on the road and even before I go to sleep - all that without stressing my eyes and by preserving and better use a precious time. I can also better plan my day and based on the time I plan for the book hearing know exactly when I'll finish that book (haha - this is a clear advantage isn't it?). So, whenever possible, I prefer to consume books by hearing them rather than reading them.

I have another bad habit of falling in love with having new books. It is a rare situation to see me inside a bookstore without buying at least one new book. This does not say that I'm in a rush to read it (I wish) - but I love to know that I have new books in the waiting list to be read. The same goes with audio books of course. Although being easier to consume, they are waiting on the line as well.

This Blog will be used to help me document whatever I'm doing with books. This might help me to put some order with my bad habbits, and giving maybe some advantage and help for others to decide which books might be of interest for them (you for example). You can of course also see my books and decide to recomend me on some other books that may fits to my interests as you see it.

Maybe one day I'll write a book by myself. This is something that I already tried several times, already have several initiations of chapters on different subjects, but still don't have a plan for a real book for now - maybe the blogging here will give me the spirit to go for it again - time will tell.

List of recomended books

2005-11-10T20:40:00.000+02:00

1. Crossing the Chasm - (Geoffrey A. Moore, Regis McKenna)
2. Built to Last: - Successful Habits of Visionary Companies
3. Good to Great
4. Business @ The Speed Of Thought (Bill Gates)
5. Jack - Straight From The Gut (Jack Welche
6. Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People - (Stephen R. Covey)
7. Who Moved My Cheese - (Spencer Johnson, Kenneth H. Blanchard)
8. Managing High Technology and Innovation - (Dr. Levy, Nino)
9. To the Desert and Back - (Philip H. Mirvis, Karen Ayas, George Roth)
10. Rich Dad, Poor Dad - (Robert T. Kiyosaki, Sharon L. Lechter)
11. Rich Dad's Retire Young, Retire Rich - (Robert Kiyosaki, Sharon Lechter)
12. Marketing - Philip Kotler
13. The Power of Nice - (Ronald M. Shapiro, James Dale, Mark A. Jankowski)
14. Engineering Your Start-Up
15. Starting An On-Line Business
16. New Ideas About New Ideas (White)
17. The New Rational Manager
18. Guerilla Marketing - (Jay Conrad Levinson)
19. Goldratt's Theory of Constraints
20. Process Innovation
21. The Unified Process Elaboration Phase - (Scott Ambler, Larry Constantine)
22. Strategic Management
23. International Business
24. Practical Management Science
25. The Art Of War (Sun Tzu)
26. The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins)
27. The Prince (Niccolo Machiavelli)
28. The Art Of Deception (Kevin Mitnick)
29. The Innovator's Dillema
30. Inside the Tornado
31. Linked: The New Science of Networks (Alberto-Laszlo Barabasi)
32. Think And Grow Rich (Napoleon Hill)

Startup

2005-11-10T20:26:00.000+02:00

This is the 1st post of the books-review blog. The target of this blog is to help me document the books that I read and give me the tool to share it with others.