When To Sell: Inside Strategies for Stock Market Profits

by Justin Mamis

A classic book that was updated and revised in 1994, now with an updated foreword written by the author. A meaningful analysis, a few rules to follow, how to choose good charts, and numerous case histories. Guidelines to follow which help you to be self-reliant.

Genres: Business, Finance, Money, Nonfiction

355 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1977

About the author

Justin Mamis was senior vice president and chief market technician at Hancock Institutional Equity Services in New York, and now publishes his own institutional market letters.

Reviews

[Jonathan Waite · Rating 3 out of 5]

this has been on my shelf for quite some time and I've been out of the market for a year, so I thought I'd catch up and finally read this book (can't remember who initially suggested it). In any case, there are not many books about "when to sell", most would like to tell you "when to buy". This was written for the retail investor, but in some respects is applicable to institutions as well.

Here's what I didn't like:
1. Too much emphasis on technical analysis: as a retail focused book, its understandable that it has a retail focus. However, good professional investors use BOTH fundamentals and technicals. You can sense the disdain from the author for those that focus solely on fundamentals. I felt my own disdain for the author as he focused solely on technicals.
2. Anachronisms: uptick rule, increase in dark pool trading and other advances in technology make some of this book outdated(my edition was from the early 90s).
3. Lack of more scientific evidence: A lot of the discussion here is anecdotal and single point/stock discussions. However, this is a bigger indictment of technical analysis -- a dearth of scientific support. Although to be fair, if one came out in support of a good technical indicator it would likely go away as adoption increased.

Here's what I liked:
1. Great rules to overrule emotion: far too many investors (retail and institutional) get clouded by emotions.
2. Decent technical tools: Some of these are OK (I like some others), but in the end his emphasis that you don't need 100s to be successful is sound.
3. Great investor sayings to live by: Some great sayings.

[KARAN DESAI · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was written more than 2 decades ago and is as relevant today as it was back then. If you miss buying a stock there are other opportunities in market but inhabitation in selling can cost. Selling is one of the most important skill set in stock market investing.

[Tim Traver · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gave me several tangible and practical ideas which changed the way that I will invest. At times highly technical, worth a read if you're interested in developing a framework for how to invest.

[Kevin Currie]

Helpful!!