Jesse Livermore on the Importance of Trends
Submitted by Gold Stock Prophet Blog
The following is a quotation from the novel Reminiscences of a Stock Operator, written in 1923 by Edwin Lefevre. This quotation helped reinforce in my mind the importance trading in the direction of the primary move, and to avoid the noise of short-term fluctuations.
His name was Partridge, but they nicknamed him Turkey
behind his back, because he was so thick-chested and had a habit
of strutting about the various rooms, with the point of his chin
resting on his breast.
The customers, who were all eager to be shoved and forced
into doing things so as to lay the blame for failure on others,
used to go to old Partridge and tell him what some friend of a
friend of an insider had advised them to do in a certain stock.
They would tell him what they had not done with the tip so he
would tell them what they ought to do. But whether the tip they
had was to buy or to sell, the old chap’s answer was always the
same.
The customer would finish the tale of his perplexity and
then ask: “What do you think I ought to do?”
Old Turkey would cock his head to one side, contemplate his
fellow customer with a fatherly smile, and finally he would say
very impressively, “You know, it’s a bull market!”
Time and again I heard him say, “Well, this is a bull market,
you know!” as though he were giving to you a priceless talisman
wrapped up in a million-dollar accident-insurance policy. And of
course I did not get his meaning.
One day a fellow named Elmer Harwood rushed into the
office, wrote out an order and gave it to the clerk. Then he
rushed over to where Mr. Partridge was listening politely to
John Fanning’s story of the time he overheard Keene give an
order to one of his brokers and all that John made was a measly
three points on a hundred shares and of course the stock had to
go up twenty-four points in three days right after John sold
out. It was at least the fourth time that John had told him that
tale of woe, but old Turkey was smiling as sympathetically as if
it was the first time he heard it.
Well, Elmer made for the old man and, without a word of
apology to John Fanning, told Turkey, “Mr. Partridge, I have
just sold my Climax Motors. My people say the market is entitled
to a reaction and that I’ll be able to buy it back cheaper. So
you’d better do likewise. That is, if you’ve still got yours.”
Elmer looked suspiciously at the man to whom he had given the
original tip to buy. The amateur, or gratuitous, tipster always
thinks he owns the receiver of his tip body and soul, even
before he knows how the tip is going to turn out.
“Yes, Mr. Harwood, I still have it. Of course!” said Turkey
gratefully. It was nice of Elmer to think of the old chap.
“Well, now is the time to take your profit and get in again on
the next dip,” said Elmer, as if he had just made out the
deposit slip for the old man. Failing to perceive enthusiastic
gratitude in the beneficiary’s face Elmer went on: “I have just
sold every share I owned!”
From his voice and manner you would have conservatively
estimated it at ten thousand shares.
But Mr. Partridge shook his head regretfully and whined, “No!
No! I can’t do that!”
:’What?” yelled Elmer.
“I simply can’t!” said Mr. Partridge. He was in great
trouble.
“Didn’t I give you the tip to buy it?”
“You did, Mr. Harwood, and I am very grateful to you.
Indeed, I am, sir. But –”
“Hold on! Let me talk! And didn’t that stock go up seven
points in ten days? Didn’t it?”
“It did, and I am much obliged to you, my dear boy. But I
couldn’t think of selling that stock.”
“You couldn’t?” asked Elmer, beginning to look doubtful
himself. It is a habit with most tip givers to be tip takers.
“No, I couldn’t.”
“Why not?” And Elmer drew nearer.
“Why, this is a bull market!” The old fellow said it as
though he had given a long and detailed explanation.
“That’s all right,” said Elmer, looking angry because of
his disappointment. “I know this is a bull market as well as you
do. But you’d better slip them that stock of yours and buy it
back on the reaction. You might as well reduce the cost to
yourself.”
“My dear boy,” said old Partridge, in great distress “my
dear boy, if I sold that stock now I’d lose my position; and
then where would I be?”
Elmer Harwood threw up his hands, shook his head and walked
over to me to get sympathy: “Can you beat it?” he asked me in a
stage whisper. “I ask you!”
I didn’t say anything. So he went on: “I give him a tip on
Climax Motors. He buys five hundred shares. He’s got seven
points’ profit and I advise him to get out and buy ‘em back on
the reaction that’s overdue even now. And what does he say when
I tell him? He says that if he sells he’ll lose his job. What do
you know about that?”
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Harwood; I didn’t say I’d lose my
job,” cut in old Turkey. “I said I’d lose my position. And when
you are as old as I am and you’ve been through as many booms and
panics as I have, you’ll know that to lose your position is
something nobody can afford; not even John D. Rockefeller. I
hope the stock reacts and that you will be able to repurchase
your line at a substantial concession, sir. But I myself can
only trade in accordance with the experience of many years. I
paid a high price for it and I don’t feel like throwing away a
second tuition fee. But I am as much obliged to you as if I had
the money in the bank. It’s a bull market, you know.” And he
strutted away, leaving Elmer dazed.
What old Mr. Partridge said did not mean much to me until I
began to think about my own numerous failures to make as much
money as I ought to when I was so right on the general market.
The more I studied the more I realized how wise that old chap
was. He had evidently suffered from the same defect in his young
days and knew his own human weaknesses. He would not lay himself
open to a temptation that experience had taught him was hard to
resist and had always proved expensive to him, as it was to me.
I think it was a long step forward in my trading education
when I realized at last that when old Mr. Partridge kept on
telling the other customers, “Well, you know this is a bull
market!” he really meant to tell them that the big money was not
in the individual fluctuations but in the main movements that
is, not in reading the tape but in sizing up the entire market
and its trend.
