The Janus Factor: Trend Follower’s Guide to Market Dialectics
$21.20
| Author(s) | |
|---|---|
| Format |
|
| Pages |
144 |
| Published Date |
2012 |
The Janus Factor presents an innovative theory that describes how feedback loops determine market behavior. The book clearly shows how the theory can be applied to make trading more profitable. The metaphor of the two-faced god Janus is used to reflect alternating market environments, one dominated by trend followers and the other by contrarian bargain hunters.
Introduction:
To A Trader, some profits may seem to come more easily than others. There is a reason for this―known as the Janus Factor―and it’s the single most powerful influence on your trading results. Nobody understands this better than author Gary Edwin Anderson–a thirty-five-year market veteran and winner of the 2003 Charles H. Dow Award from the Market Technicians Association. And now, with The Janus Factor, he shares his extensive insights on this important topic with you.
Janus was the Roman god of gates and doors and was represented by two opposing faces, suggesting the two-sided nature of things. Here, Anderson uses the metaphor of Janus to explain the dual nature of the markets and how the markets vacillate between two different environments: one which is dominated by trend followers and the other by contrarian bargain hunters.
As Anderson addresses how to recognize these shifts–which will put you in a better position to improve your odds of success from market to market–he also offers a systematic view of how positive and negative feedback loops drive capital flows in the stock market. With a firm understanding of how those flows tend to favor either sector leaders or sector laggards at different time, you’ll not only be better equipped to find the market’s high-probability sweet-spot, but you’ll also discover how to avoid low-probability trades. Along the way, Anderson also shows you what it takes to compute “The Spread,” which he considers a trader’s ultimate risk-management tool.
Whether you’re a new trader or a seasoned pro, The Janus Factor has what you need to succeed. Filled with valuable insights into market behavior and new methods for interpreting stock market trends, this reliable resource will help you enter the market with confidence and exit with profits.
Author’s Note:
This book embraces both theory and craft. In the first five chapters, I present a systematic view of the market, not as a battle between buyers and sellers, or even between bulls and bears, but as a struggle for dominance by traders holding to radically opposed paradigms. A new measure of risk is offered, and on that theoretical foundation I build a method.
Craft confronts a real world of noisy data and thorny reality, so in the remaining six chapters I apply these methods to the historical record. In the final three I detail strategic indicators, which readers may use to guide day-to-day trading decisions. Some of what I demonstrate is, so far as I know, taught nowhere else. The main ideas presented in this book are simple but crucial for anyone who wishes to trade successfully in all market environments.
Contents:
- Foundations
- The Assignment
- Feedback and Capital Flow
- The Janus Factor
- Seasons of Success
- Why Jesse Went Broke
- Sheep Dogs and Other Contrarians
- Situational Awareness
- The Direction of Momentum
- Long Strategies
- The Complete Strategy
The Janus Factor: Trend Follower's Guide to Market Dialectics By Gary Edwin Anderson pdf
7 reviews for The Janus Factor: Trend Follower’s Guide to Market Dialectics
Clear filtersOnly logged in customers who have purchased this product may leave a review.
Callie Escobar (verified owner) –
NOT WORTHT THE TIME AND MONEY
Marcellus Norris (verified owner) –
Relative strength is a key part of technical analysis. Anderson, though, shows how there’s much more information to be gleaned from relative strength than just whether a particular stock is doing better or worse than the market — and in this groundbreaking book he takes the concept of relative strength to an exciting new level that provides unparalleled insights into the stock market.
You’ll never look at the market in the same way after you read this book — as all serious market analysts and money managers should.
Kaylee Wiggins (verified owner) –
One of the best books I’ve read on market analysis, and to be honest one of the most satisfying books I’ve read, period. Compare the original paper to the contributions of the other Charles H. Dow Award winners and you’ll see how much has gone into it. The underlying theory is innovative and compelling but also consider it because like The Compleat Angler, its famous predecessor, it’s a work of wisdom and grace. Interleaved with Anderson’s theory of how the market organizes itself are chapters showing the reader how to exercise situational awareness, a skill central to aviation as well as investing.
The Janus Factor’s existence raises an interesting question: How many other brilliant works are out there and remain relatively unknown?
Azariah Wilkinson (verified owner) –
The Janus Factor is a “must read” book for anyone seriously interested in portfolio construction, relative strength analysis or momentum investing. There are very few technical analysis books that put new or innovative ideas out there and push the ball forward in any meaningful way, but Gary Anderson’s book is certainly one of them. The ideas and tools described in this book should give portfolio managers some excellent trail heads to expand upon. The Janus Factor presents innovative concepts in relative strength and relative momentum analysis and gives portfolio managers practical tools to implement these concepts, a powerful combination.
Siena Blackwell (verified owner) –
Google “Technical Analysis” and, no doubt, you will find numerous books/treatises on how to conquer the market using any number of tools, techniques and procedures. This book, the Janus Factor, is different. Without giving away the special sauce, this book takes the reader on a journey thru a technical system that has proven to be effective in the past and, potentially, in the future. However, the most important aspect of this book is the way Gary weaves other markets into each chapter showing the vastness of the human condition and the predicaments that RISK causes in any crucial decision. More than just “another” technical analysis book it gives concrete and objective evidence on why risk can be controlled in the market and how it’s being controlled in other areas of life. This book is recommended for anyone looking to understand risk and achieve success in the financial markets.
Zachariah Patterson (verified owner) –
The book starts out well, and I agree with the Authors logic of buying the strongest and selling the weakest. The big problem I have is that while the content sounds great, it leaves readers feeling lost at the end. He mentions indicators that track direction of momentum and performance spreads but doesn’t provide a way for readers to build this indicator or provide a source where readers could gauge market momentum.
For example, you read William Oneil’s books and you readily have a website that goes hand and hand with what you read, but with the Janus Factor, you read it, it makes sense, but there’s no way to actively use this approach without extensive estimation. (Or institutional tools)
Arielle Mathews (verified owner) –
This book is a major addition to the literature on relative strength investing, which is considered to be the premier anomaly to the Efficient Market Hypothesis. EMH’s narrowest and therefore hardest claim to falsify is that historical price data can not be used to beat the market. Numerous academics have shown that a simplistic form of relative strength investing generates market beating risk adjusted profits. Gary Anderson has taken relative strength analysis in a new direction, created new relative strength indicators and generated performance that soundly beats conventional relative strength analysis.
The indicators are of sufficient interest to me that I plan to add them to my own indicator library. In reviewing the manuscript for the book a colleague did some tests of some of these indicators and the results are indeed encouraging. One innovation called Direction of Momentum or DOM shows potential as a general market timing indicator. It has the very interesting property of smoothness achieved without the lag inducing effect caused by moving average smoothing.
The book is written in a very understandable and entertaining manner but it never talks down to the reader. If you are interested in technical analysis in general, analysis of industry groups and any form of relative strength investing this books is a gold mine.
It’s fair for the reader of this review to understand that I know the author personally. I sought Mr. Anderson out as result of my interest in his innovative research on relative strength investing. My interest in Gary’s research grew and when I heard he was considering writing a book I was very much in favor. The reader should also know that Mr. Anderson wrote a favorable review of a book I wrote, however my decision is to write this review is based only on my strong opinion that the Janus Factor is an excellent book. It has certainly set my thinking on the subject in a new direction.