TradingLoot

Trading Books, by What You Want to Learn

These pages describe trading books: what each book covers according to its publisher or author, who it may suit, and how it connects to the trading process. They don't score or rank books.

Book details come from publishers' own pages and publisher-supplied tables of contents first, then from authors' official sites and bibliographic records where a publisher doesn't state something. Retailer listings aren't used as sources. TradingLoot doesn't claim to have read these books; each book's details say what its description is based on. See our Methodology for the full standard.

Educational content only. These pages describe books; they are not investment advice, and no book described here predicts or guarantees trading results. Trading carries risk of loss.

Choose a topic based on what you want to learn. This is a selection by need, not a ranking.

Technical analysis foundations

For: traders who want one broad reference on chart analysis, trends, patterns and indicators.

Covers: John J. Murphy's Technical Analysis of the Financial Markets surveys the classic toolkit, from charts and trend to price patterns, indicators, candlesticks and intermarket analysis, according to its publisher and a contents listing.

Limitation: a broad survey, not a single trading method; this edition is dated 1999.

For reading individual price bars on intraday charts, see Al Brooks's Trading Price Action Trends in the price action section.

Japanese candlesticks

For: traders who use candlestick charts and want the patterns explained in depth.

Covers: Steve Nison's Japanese Candlestick Charting Techniques runs from candle basics through reversal and continuation patterns to combining candles with Western tools, according to its contents. Candlestick patterns are made of one candle or a few candles in a row.

Limitation: it teaches a charting technique, not a complete trading system.

Chart patterns

For: traders who trade chart patterns and want to look them up one by one.

Covers: Thomas Bulkowski's Encyclopedia of Chart Patterns gives each pattern its own chapter. Chart patterns are structures such as triangles or head-and-shoulders that form across many bars. The book's statistics on how patterns performed and failed are reported from its own samples; they describe the past, not how a pattern will behave next time.

Limitation: its publisher lists 1,312 pages, so it works as a reference to look things up in, not a short introduction.

Market Profile

For: futures and day traders who use or want to learn Market Profile.

Covers: Mind Over Markets by James F. Dalton, Eric T. Jones and Robert B. Dalton covers value areas, price rejection and the strength of buyers and sellers, organised in stages from novice to expert, according to its publisher and contents.

Limitation: it's less useful if you don't use profile or volume-at-price charts. TradingLoot's current book selection doesn't include books on footprint charts or the DOM.

Psychology and discipline

For: traders whose problem is execution, inconsistency or repeated mistakes, not chart setups.

Covers: books grouped by the problem each addresses: thinking in probabilities (Mark Douglas), recurring emotional mistakes (Jared Tendler), mindset, self-coaching and building a trading process.

Limitation: these books don't teach entry setups, indicators or a trading system.

Trader interviews

For: readers who learn from first-person accounts of how other traders work.

Covers: Jack D. Schwager's Market Wizards series: six books of interviews, each volume with a different focus, in publication order.

Limitation: many traders' approaches, not one step-by-step method.

All book pages