ETF Trading Strategies Revealed (Trade Secrets (Marketplace Books)) Paperback – October 17, 2006

This book is "worth its weight in gold" if you are serious about trading or investing using Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). On first impression it seems like a pretty thin book (90 pages), and the heart of the material in Part III is just 30 pages. But in Part III you learn very simple, practical, back-tested rules and strategies for outperforming the market by rotating periodically to the best-performing ETFs. The book presents results (compound annual returns) from following these strategies from 1998 to 2006, ranging from 15-16% for style index rotation to 19% adding an international ETF, 20% for sector ETFs, and 26% using Fidelity sector funds. [...]The hardest thing for many traders or investors to accept may be that such simple, mechanical strategies that require monitoring the market only once every other week (with variants once per week or once per month) can perform so well. They work, for these funds better than for individual stocks, because of persistence of trends within market sectors, and styles such as value vs. growth and large-cap vs. small-cap that last even longer. Many people want to use fancy indicators, and many traders are in the market for the action and are too impatient for this approach. But if your goal is to simply make money with less risk than the overall stock market, this approach is very practical and usable.The other 60 pages of this book include an introduction to ETFs and how they work, two chapters on chart analysis -- one written by Steve Palmquist, a successful professional trader, and one where David Vomund interviews well-known trader Linda Bradford Raschke -- and a short chapter on trader psychology that presents the personal trading process used by Dr. J.D. Smith, founder of AIQ Systems. They are very worthwhile for their advice and antidotes to the traps that traders often fall into.I know David Vomund and knew Jerry Smith personally, and have met Linda Raschke and Steve Palmquist -- these are four very good people to learn from. David Vomund, the author, manages money using these strategies, and writes and presents seminars for AIQ. He is rated by Timer Digest as one of the ten best market timers for the 10-year period ending December 31, 2005, and has appeared on the cover of that publication twice in this period. But none of this seems to go to his head -- David's philosophy is pretty simple, practical, and all about making money rather than trading excitement or fame. If you actually apply these strategies, this book should literally be worth its weight (just a few ounces) in gold, and potentially quite a bit more.

This is a fine book despite the fact that the materials attributed to Raschke, Palmquist and Smith (Chapters 2, 3, 9) are completely worthless. Either they are dirt basic or too subjective or too shallow and can be dangerous to an untrained eye. The rest of the material is not necessarily new (for that matter, I have been following the variations of the same strategies for last seven years) but is useful in that it does work. Really, there is only one rotation strategy in Chapter 4 and the rest is all variations of it. I will give credit to the author that he states it clearly, shows the results of back-testing and honestly admits the shortcoming of his approach (e.g. he clearly says that he is assuming that you sold and bought the ETF at closing price instantaneously although, in practice, you could do it only the next morning after the closing prices were available at the end of the day and you applied your strategies to make decisions overnight). This is something rare to find in other books which just pretend that their strategies are realistically possible when in fact they are not. Book is yes, overpriced for the less than 75 double space, big font, small pocketbook size pages of ETF information but then cars are not priced by their weights either. Although a cheaper price would be more fitting, after reading it, I did not feel that my money was totally wasted in that it reaffirmed my own trading strategy. My recommendation: you should certainly read Chapter 4 (and well also 5,6,7,8 although they are just the corollaries of Chapter4) possibly in a library. It is just a matter of half an hour of reading.

I am a market participant that has been successful using various "Active" strategies.What I really like about ETF Trading Strategies Revealed is that it is not filled with "extras" to make it larger and harder to get to the meat of the issue. There is a sharing of a good workable active strategies that warrant consideration for at least a portion of your portfolio.There is a background presented briefly and some strategies that are tradable just as they are written. If you are new to any kind of active portfolio management, you can trade this system and most likely improve your returns at less risk or drawdown.If you have experience in this arena, it is a good basis to test and refine for even better risk adjusted returns.All of this without having to wade through hundreds of pages of filler.Highly recommended

I ordered this because I wanted some more information on ETF strategies. The book was not an easy read and I got disinterested in it after about 15 pages. Maybe it would be better for someone who had more experience in ETFs.

Why three authors to discuss in a book of only 88 pages some fairly straightforward material? The chapter on chart analysis is so shallow as not only to be useless, it is downright dangerous in the hands of an inexperienced investor. The portions of the book written by Vomund contain such profundities as: "Investors who want to reduce drawdowns may choose to use this variation [adding bonds]. During extended bear markets, having half of your portfolio rotate to bonds can be beneficial." Right. For this we need Vomund? A book that was thrown together, and one that in effect touts the online program apparently run by the author among others. Recommended for no one!

My main problem has been trying to time the market using Elliott Wave and momentum indicators. I was also trying to trade in both directions instead riding a trend by buying pullbacks and letting profits run. I spent a lot of time in cash which reduced my return. Anyway, sector rotation may be a way to stay in the market and not miss the runs. Thanks for in the insights.