I just got back the cover for my new book Strategic Stock Trading. You can see it below. The publisher is going to send me a proof within ten days and if all goes well it should be for sale in 3-4 weeks. I'll let you know once it is. I think the cover looks good, but it is what is inside that really matters. Before I wrote the book I took a look at the top selling stock trading books to get an idea of what people are buying. They all fall into one of two categories - either they tell you how to pick stocks or else they provide something like an encyclopedia to technical analysis - none of the books put all of this together and talk about managing your money or risk. The only technical analysis book I've ever read that actually provided a system you can use to make money is the Stan Weinstein book.

I want to show people how to really make money in the stock market and do it while making engaging for people to read so I included a lot of personal stories I never have told before. I also want it to be adapted to the current market and what I think will happen over the next several years.

Before I wrote the book I also took a look at the best selling investment books that were written between 1900 and 1930. I had heard of none of them. Not a single one of them was devoted to picking stocks. They were all about investing with the overall market trend and talked about market psychology.

I find that interesting. You see between 1900 and 1920 the market basically went sideways with big booms and busts. So people who were making money had to focus on market psychology and keep a pulse on trends. Picking individual stocks wasn't so important then. From 1950 to 2000 though the market basically went straight up with a brief interruption in the 1970's so buying stocks was an easy way to make money - you didn't even really need to know what you were doing.

Since people easily made money in stocks they were attracted - some even obsessed - with the idea of stock picks. That's why almost all of the best selling investment books of the past 20 years - and even today - are about picking stocks.

If you look at the past couple of years though stock picking ability has ranked low on the scale of importance when it comes to market timing, trend reading, and understanding market and individual trading psychology. However, the best selling investment books still are about stock picking. This tells me that either the masses have not adapted to the new reality of the stock market or the book authors/experts haven't - or more likely both. Stock market investors and traders are still living in the past.

What amazes me is that in the past 10 years we have gone through two brutal bear markets and appear to be on the verge of another one and the average investor has learned NOTHING.

Right now most are still obsessed with buying stock picks and playing rallies even though the market has weakened. They have seen the market fall into vicious bear markets - even crashing at times - and they still have no fear.

I fear that at the end of this bear market people will get so fed up that they actually will do a 180 degree turn and give up on stocks forever. Ironically it would be at just such a moment that buying individual stocks as investments would make sense.

Anyway, when I finished writing my book a few months ago I had Andy Emerson and Kevin Amos sit down with me and the three of us recorded a two hour interview on on the essentials of successful stock trading and investing. These are the core philosophies that go way beyond simply picking stocks that separate the 10% of the people who make all of the money in the stock market from everyone else.

You may want to download the mp3 files on to your ipod or burn them on cd's so that you can take them with you and listen to them in your car or on the go.

Stock Trading Essentials - Part 1

Download MP3 File - Stock Trading Essentials Part 1

Stock Trading Essentials - Part 2

Download MP3 File - Stock Trading Essentials Part 2