1. Memoirs turn stones into gold
At a meeting with readers, two readers had a dispute over "Memoirs of Stock Makers". One of them, who had spent many days in the stock market, appreciated "Memoirs of Stock Makers"; the other was a young man who believed in value investing. He retorted: "This book promotes speculation and is incompatible with value investing."
Seeing that they were red-faced, it was inconvenient to interrupt.
Take Elliott’s wave theory as an example. Thousands of people have waves. Many people think that this theory is an afterthought, but it is difficult to predict beforehand. But Elliott’s wave theory is philosophical. It tells people that even if the general trend goes up, it will take two steps back. In addition, the wave theory is a way for many people to view the stock market. You can disagree with it, but you should understand it, and then you can explain some phenomena.
"Memoirs of a Stock Maker" is more complicated than the wave theory. It is not a speculative textbook, nor is it just a record of the words and deeds of speculators, but a classic that reflects the ecology of the stock market itself. This is like saying that Mao Dun’s "Midnight" is a novel based on the principle of realism, while "Dream of Red Mansions" is more complicated. It can be said to be realistic, romantic, classic and symbolic. ,etc.
What I want to say is that Lawrence Livingston, the protagonist of "Memoirs of a Stock Maker" does have a real prototype-Jesse Livermore. Although Livingston is a master speculator, Raphael is not a simple narrator, he is a creator, just like Cordonan created Sherlock Holmes. In other words, in the stock market for hundreds of years, there is no lack of stocks that are similar to or even more sophisticated with Livermore, but the former is immortal by Raphael. Raphael also hinted in the book. He wrote a special description of interview techniques at the beginning. I believe everyone will ignore it because it has nothing to do with speculative investment.
The difference in "Memoirs of a Stock Maker" is that people are looking for whether they can learn two tricks to make money. Raphael is just a financial reporter and has no experience of big speculation. Why trust him? Raphael wrote a financial novel earlier, and he must know the mystery, so he dedicated it to Jesse Livermore a year after finishing the book. As a result, the value of "Memoirs of a Stock Maker" soared, and Levimore became one of the few big speculators in history.
Second, the ending of stock manipulation
Anyone who reads "Memoirs of a Stock Maker" will think that Raphael is preaching the magic and charm of speculators, and thus regard Livingston (or Livermore) as a god and take the road of speculation. This is a misunderstanding. Raphael is also aware of this. At the end of the book, he directly warned those who read "Memoirs of a Stock Maker":
"I wrote these articles to prove my point that no one can win over stock speculation." "Livingston himself said that no one can win speculation in the end. He used his ability to observe the market to make money, which is rare, but every time he sets out to win speculation, he loses. This is a fool. speculation, he paid a high price. his ability, innate talent and a wealth of experience and did not let him play a role in the implementation of the speculative theory of victory. "
stock Operator memoirs" almost wonderful chapter chapter chapter chapter climax due to the " , So we can easily overlook the final chapter "The Harm of Kings, Commoners, and Speculation" without Livingston as the protagonist. The so-called "kings" refer to the big speculators who aspire to be the leaders of Wall Street. Raphael counted the big speculators in Wall Street history and concluded that "these kings do not rule for long! They are humans, they belong to stock idiots." Compatriots, they make mistakes.
Making mistakes on Wall Street means giving up. I can't think of a king who died with a crown." Of course, Levi Moore, the prototype of "stock-handler", also ended in complete failure. "Memoirs of a stock maker" was written in 1922. In the early summer of 1929, Livermore sold all his long positions and then began to short, and by the October crash, he made a net profit of millions of dollars and received his most lucrative salary. Levy Moore is also known as one of the culprits of the stock market crash. But he filed for bankruptcy again in 1934, and it is said that he has lost all the property he had earned in the past five years. In early 1940, Livermore published "How to Trade Stocks", but at the end of that year he shot himself due to severe depression.
Although the history of China's mainland stock market is not long, think about how many of us who have tried to manipulate the market to speculate on the market have completely lost out.
3. Don't trust market news
The wonder of the world is that, although Raphael wrote this "Memoirs of a Stock Maker" with a heart of exhortation, because of his brilliant pen, he vividly narrates the joys and sorrows and wisdom of speculators, which makes many readers imitate. The meaning of learning has become a classic that will never tire of reading. Those "technical" and "operable" books that single-mindedly advocated the magic and great speculation were impetuous and eventually disappeared.
Newcomers to the market may be interested in some market stories in the book. For example, Livingston told a story about the Borneo tin trap in order to illustrate the unreliability of news in the stock market. Borneo Tin is a stock manipulated by a market maker (collective fund). When it first went public, Livingston bought 10,000 shares. The market maker tried desperately to shake the position after detecting it, but Livingston just couldn't make it out. The dealer could only push up the stock price. When the Borneo tin rose to 120 points, Livingston threw 1 million chips to the dealer. The dealer finally pushed the stock price to 150 points. As the general situation did not match, he could only throw a bargaining chip all the way down, hoping that the "fools" would rebound. At this time, the dealers thought of Livingston.
Livingston and his wife went to Palm Beach that day. The dealer told her that Borneo tin would rise tomorrow while his wife was eating alone. He hoped that through her, Livingston would be interested in it and buy 10,000 to 20,000 shares. Borneo tin. Livingston's wife believed the story of the bookmaker's boss and bought Borneo tin with $500 private money the next morning.
As everyone knows, in order to show her ability, Livingston's wife did not tell her husband about this. The Borneo tin stock was very active that day, and it rose by 3 points at the close. Livingston felt that he had the opportunity to take advantage of it and sold 10,000 shares in a short sell. It turned out that, in order to convince Livingston, the dealer deliberately created the illusion of rising, and it was in his hands. Later, of course, the stock price fell. His wife told Livingston about the incident, and the dealer broke the rice instead of stealing the chicken.
Blindly following the news is the worst enemy of investors, but almost all investors like to listen to the news to make stocks. Many relatives and friends sometimes ask me to recommend stocks, and they will then ask: "Is there any news?" If I say there is no news, they will definitely not buy. Later, when they saw that the stocks I recommended had gone up, they felt uncomfortable, so they asked me again. I told you bluntly that even if I made up a piece of news on these two stocks, they would have bought it a long time ago. The problem is, they really don't have any news.
Livingston simply called the people who chased the news "drunks." He believed that not to mention the public, even professional speculators were obsessed with the news.
Today, there are still many retail investors and institutions in the A-share market that are often tired of news. It is commonplace to buy blindly and then lose money.
