This is the Safari online edition of the printed book.

Millions of investors have been left to pick up the pieces and figure out where it all went wrong over the last couple of years. They're furious with the "professionals," and determined to regain control of their own investments. This book gives them the easy-to-use tools they need to do just that: simple tools based on techniques that have earned a 26.1% positive return over the past decade, while the S+P 500 was plummeting by 37.4%. For the first time, Thomas F. Lydon, Jr. brings together two of this generation's most well-proven investment approaches: low-cost, flexible ETFs and powerful trend following strategies, along with basic technical analysis tools. You'll learn how to quickly identify markets that are about to plummet, get out of the way, and how to identify markets that are headed up, and capture all the profit they're getting ready to deliver. Lydon shows how to systematically remove the emotion from investing, and replace it with simple mathematical tools that work consistently well: tools like the 200-day and 50-day moving average, which are easy enough for any investor to utilize. By the time they finish this book, investors will know how to make a plan that works, stick to that plan, and reap the rewards, even as others are mourning their lost assets.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 17 Ratings

intro to etf, not a playbook - 2009-10-07
Reviewer Rating:
This book is packed full of descriptions of various ETF's, however there is almost no suggestion on putting various portfolios together or how to use the selected portfolio other than based on your investing likes or dislikes. It makes a strong point to get out of the mindset of buy and hold and gives an brief intro to 200 d moving averages, but using the 200d average is not clearly gone into with much detail or examples.

The most useful suggestion is placing a stop or picking an exact point to get out of a position. You rarely see this in typical books promoting individual stocks and certainly never with mutual funds. This is frequently overlooked in stock investing and makes tremendous sense when following Lyon's strategy of trend investing with ETF's.

I think almost all the info from this book can be obtained by reading Lyon's interesting insights on his website and as listed in the above reviews. I was expecting more strategies in using ETF's. The author is an obvious knowledgeable proponent of ETF's, but this book fails as a playbook. I can imagine future versions of this book with chapters dealing with specific situations such as economic depression, inflation, weakened dollar, retirement portfolio, etc.

Good basic overview - 2009-10-14
Reviewer Rating:
Easy reading, good basic coverage of all types of ETF's, the timing model can be explained in a paragraph. That's not to say it isn't effective.

Good introduction but left me with several questions - 2009-10-25
Reviewer Rating:
This book provides a good introduction to the world of ETF trading along with a strategy of utilizing a 200-day moving average strategy. It also provided a listing of some of the ETFs available in various sectors although since there are new ETFs appearing almost daily, the author cannot be faulted for not listing more of them than he did.

The author's 200-day moving average strategy is certainly easy to understand for the reader but in his efforts to make it appear so simple, he seems to have left out some details that someone might need to know when attempting to implement it. For example, he recommends buying your chosen ETF when it crosses above the 200-day moving average and selling it when it falls below the 200-day moving average line. Simple enough. Unfortunately, he fails to indicate what to do if you're interested in buying an ETF that is already above the 200-day line. When would he recommend still buying it? He mentions that whipsaws can occur but he makes no recommendation as to whether a trader should wait to see whether an ETF that dips below the 200-day moving average line remains there or whether to simply sell and not look back.

Although he does make mention of the use of stop loss orders, he makes no recommendations within the book about whether traders should put in a stop loss after an ETF drops by a certain percentage or not. I did visit his website and found that he recommends setting a stop loss at 8% below a recent high. In my opinion, this is the sort of advice that should have been included within the book, but I guess one of the purposes of writing the book was to increase visits to his website.

For what its worth, I did visit the website and found it to be a valuable source of additional information regarding ETFs. I anticipate visiting it on a regular basis.

ETF Trend following.. - 2009-11-05
Reviewer Rating:
A good introduction to ETFs if you are new to them.
The trend following method is what Tom Lydon speaks about on TV when he talks about his 200 days moving average.
Good ideas for various existing ETFs.

great - 2009-10-03
Reviewer Rating:
The book got here quick and in new condition. I plan to use its content to limit losses in a bear market.

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