8/7/2017 What do you think about Al Brooks?

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2 Answers

Scott Phillips, I know things about price action

Answered Jul 13, 2016
Question Stats
Al Brooks is an ex medical doctor who is a “price action trader”, trading 5 minute charts of
the ES futures (mainly). He has a very comprehensive and subjective method for “reading 3 Public Followers
the tape”. He doesn’t use (and hates) indicators, except for sometimes a single moving 1,810 Views
average. He trades one market only, during NYSE hours only, and he switches off his Last Asked Jul 13, 2016
phone, blacks the curtains, uses a small laptop with a single screen, and just does one
Edits
thing.

Al is devoid of marketing bullshit, and in his droning boring way he delivers some hard
truths about markets. He spouts such beautiful wisdom as “If I didn’t make money today,
it is because I am not good enough.” He is completely honest about the level of
commitment and time it takes to become a professional trader. He is not a scam in any
way.

I’ve read all of his books, and bought his video course some years ago. Except for his first
book which was indecipherably dense (and the material is better covered in his later
books) his material is without exception excellent, though his video course is a little basic.
He certainly influenced my ideas about price action and the nature of markets. He
responded to my emails with pertinent questions quickly and comprehensively. I would
recommend him as a legit trading guy (and there are very few of those) although I don’t
trade using his methods.

That being said there are some issues. I met with some traders in Van Tharp’s “super
trader” group in 2012, and there were two guys who had chosen to learn Al’s method and
practice until they were good. Both said it was a difficult row to hoe nearly a year into their
study. My opinion is that Al’s method is very suited to his personality and you probably
need a close match with him to be able to trade it well.

A gross simplification of Al’s method is to firstly recognise if you are in a trading range or a
trend. If you are in a range, you are supposed to BLSHS (buy low, sell high, and scalp).
This means that you identify the low of the range and try for a quick trade to the upper part
of the range. If it is trending you wait for 2-legged pullbacks (analogous to an abc
correction in wave-speak) and buy, holding for a more substantial move. There are
objective setups to take, which are similar to price action setups most traders will be
familiar with, double tops, retests, pullbacks, inside bars, double and triple inside bars.

The positive of his method (and all tape reading methods) is that you get a deep
understanding of the how and why of price moving around on a chart. The negative is that
since methods like this are highly subjective your performance is basically down to how
you feel on any given day. If you are grumpy, angry, hungry, tired, you are not going to
perform well. You are the edge.

I have friends who trade similar methods and make money, it IS possible. However it is
truly expert level stuff. In my opinion, it would take a talented and diligent trader a few
years of hard work to become profitable using this method.

Imagine a spectrum of trading systems, on the left is pure mechanical systems, where you
have no discretion, just objective instructions to carry out. On the right is pure
discretionary systems, where you essentially trade your instincts within a framework and
guidelines for managing trades. Beginner traders are magnetically attracted to methods
which give them a lot of freedom to make decisions, which is not always best.
1
In my opinion
Askbeginner traders
or Search Quoraare better served with more simple, objective systems,
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while more advanced traders can branch out to more complicated systems with many
subjective aspects.

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Have a look at his youtube channel, it is excellent stuff

BrooksPriceAction
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Patrick Ssee, studied at Intra Day Trading

Answered May 8

I believe strongly and as the result of many years of heartrending efforts to daytrade
futures with price action that Al Brooks is a deceiver and a charlatan. He has numerous
fans who say he is free of marketing BS, yet he sells a $399 course, $99 per month
webinars and overpriced and inflated series of books, while Adam Grimes offers a free
price action trading course with backtesting and trading psychology in addition to the
Edwards and Magee price action, which is Al Brooks’ main and minimally acknowledged
theoretical influence.

The basis of the veracity of his teachings is that he uses his method to trade professionally
and for a living, which in America would be a high level of income from day trading
futures, a supplementary and high-stress meagre income is possible while using his
teachings, but to to be able to consistently trade for a living is exceedingly unlikely. He
claims to hate moving indicators but uses 3 moving averages. He suggests institutions look
at the close of 5-minute bars on the S&P 500 futures when deciding whether to place
trades, no backtesting will suggest that, which may be one of the reasons why he eschews
backtesting.

All of Scott Phillips’ testimony is anecdotal and therefore unreliable and should not be
repeated as truths. Mr. Brooks has repeatedly refused to offer any tangible evidence that
his method is as successful as he claims in his marketing blurbs and he stated falsely that it
would be a violation of NFA or regulatory laws for him to share his results with others.
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