It’s interesting to see today’s writers still referencing Jesse Livermore.

Nils Pratley, writing in January’s Guardian quoted Livermore:

“Being wrong is acceptable; staying wrong is unacceptable.”

Nils’ article was entitled “My tip is don’t take tipping seriously“. Of course, this was one of Livermore’s favorite themes. Having been badly stung acting on a tip from Ed Harding; Livermore established it as one of his cardinal rules that he would never again act on anyone else’s stock tips.

On January 29, Jesse gets another mention – albeit a misinterpretation – in an article entitled Value Investing, Patience and Shakespeare.

“It was never my thinking that made big money for me. It was my sitting tight.”

The author believes the above quote from Livermore helps support the view “that it is time in the market that reaps substantial returns, not timing”. Of course, Livermore’s stock strategy relied entirely on timing. When he talked about sitting tight, he meant sitting tight until the bull market was over – then you need to sell. Here are some thoughts from Livermore about sitting tight:

“In a bull market your game is to buy and hold until you believe that the bull market is near its end. To do this you must study general conditions and not tips or special factors affecting individual stocks. Then get out of all your stocks; get out for keeps! Wait until you see—or if you prefer, until you think you see—the turn of the market; the beginning of a reversal of general conditions. You have to use your brains and your vision to do this; otherwise my advice would be as idiotic as to tell you to buy cheap and sell dear. One of the most helpful things that anybody can learn is to give up trying to catch the last eighth—or the first. These two are the most expensive eighths in the world. They have cost stock traders, in the aggregate, enough millions of dollars to build a concrete highway across the continent.”

Jesse also gets a couple of mentions in an article entitled US Housing Slump Continues. He is quoted:

“In a bull market and particularly in booms the public at first makes money which it later loses simply by overstaying the bull market.”

Jas Jains, the author, concludes his article, in finest Livermore style, “Not much has changed in hundred years, or hundreds of years. The bubbles expose the suckers among us! And Silly.con Valley is overflowing with them. It would prove to be a fine example of Easy Come Easy Go.”