Planning Wealth

In 1988, Michael Parness followed a stockbroker’s advice and lost nearly all of his nest egg of $150,000. In 1999, he opened an online brokerage account and set out to get his money back. In fifteen months, he turned $33,000 into $7 million, started the online trading Web site TrendFund.com, and developed a trading strategy that delivers profits in both bull and bear markets.

In Rule the Freakin’ Markets, Parness uses visual aids and practice exercises to show online traders and investors how to:

- Practice responsible trading techniques that maximize reward and limit risk
- Avoid the “Seven Deadly Sins Plus Fear” that block success in the market
- Protect investments no matter what the market does
- Understand how market technology drives daily and cyclical market moves
- Avoid the pitfalls of trading in cyberspace
- Recover and learn from significant losses
- Strategize and anticipate, rather than overreact or freeze, when change occurs
- And finally, live full and satisfying lives as traders

With its lively tone and refreshing approach to trading and investing, Rule the Freakin’ Markets is an essential guide to profiting from today’s turbulent market.

Amazon.com Review

Those who can ignore the rather garish cover on this book will find a solid, straightforward guide to making winning trades in even the most bearish of markets. The author, who millions of insomniacs know through his middle-of-the-night infomercials, writes with a highly personal voice that some may find a bit grating, but his rags-to-riches story is compelling and needs to be told.

In a nutshell, Michael Parness went from living on a park bench in Brooklyn to a summa cum laude degree from Hunter College in New York City to founding a successful sports memorabilia company. After making $150,000 in that business, he followed his broker’s advice in 1998 and ended up losing virtually his entire nest egg. Since then, he has invested carefully after studying media reports and understanding “market psychology.” Now a broker-averse multimillionaire, he shares with readers a number of strategies that have worked for him in both bull and bear markets.

Augmented with exercises that truly help readers determine their own level of risk aversion, this guide shows online traders and, particularly, investment clubs exactly how market psychology drives daily and cyclical market moves. As Parness says, “I’m not mechanical, and I’m not good at figuring out technical stuff like computers or plumbing or chain saws, but I can figure out how things measure up in terms of probability. And probability is what trading is all about.”

A few too many ka-chingos and wowsas mar an otherwise informed writing style, but nevertheless the book offers some excellent insight into how the market actually works, and how one can make money using that insight. Those looking for a serious study of economic trends and forecasts may want to look elsewhere, but readers interested in a breezy, anecdotal read about market bubbles and bursts will be entertained and more than likely enlightened. –Charles Decker