Brent Donnelly - Alpha Trader: The Mindset, Methodology and Mathematics of Professional Trading

HERE IS WHAT SOME FINANCE HEAVYWEIGHTS HAVE TO SAY ABOUT ALPHA TRADER.

I couldnt put this book down! Brent has done an amazing job at capturing the challenges that traders face on a daily basis and how best to navigate todays markets. It is an essential read for anyone who is interested in managing money and the behavioral psychology behind those who make the market! Brent shows himself to be as skillful an author as he has been one of the leading players in global foreign exchange. Well done!

Ben Melkman,
founder and CIO of Light Sky Macro

Brent has been on my must-read list for years. This book is no exception.

ALPHA TRADER is an instant trading classic.

John Mauldin,
president of Mauldin Economics

Brent is a smart, balanced and hyper-pragmatic trader. I have known and worked with him for years, and his constant search for new paradigms is what sets him apart. ALPHA TRADER is a very, very valuable book which may save young (and old) traders from significant emotional (and monetary) pain.

Jens Nordvig,
world-renowned currency strategist,
economist and founder of Exante Data

Alpha Trader is one of the most intuitive books about applied trading psychology and rational behavior. It is a masterpiece that puts you in control of your trading.

Saed Abukarsh,
partner at Ark Capital Management (Dubai)

Brents book is an honest assessment of what is required to be successful in the markets. Successful traders have a process that is not canned or rigid... Because markets are not. If you are serious about making it as a full-time trader, ALPHA TRADER is the book you need to read. Its an honest take on what you will need to do and expect to make it like a pro.

Dave Floyd,
founder of the Aspen Trading Group

Brent has been trading for 20 years and you should listen to anyone who has been trading that long. Over the course of a 20-year career, a trader will experience at least 50 major panics, crashes, and dislocations. Having the wrong exposure to one of these means the end of your career. Trading isnt about getting rich; its about staying alive.

Jared Dillian,
publisher of the Daily Dirtnap
and regular Bloomberg contributor

Copyright 2021 by Brent Donnelly

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright holder. It is fine to use excerpts if you are reviewing the book.

First edition 2021

Editing: Stephen K. Donnelly

Cover design: Emir Orucevic

Interior layout: KUHN Design Group

Author photo: Christine Donnelly

ISBN 978-1-7367398-0-8 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-7367398-1-5 (softcover)
ISBN 978-17367398-3-9 (ebook)

For more information go to: www.brentdonnelly.com

This book is dedicated to

the small bird who carries us all on her back.

I f youre reading this foreword, youre probably considering whether or not to buy this book. You also probably have a professional or semi-professional connection to financial markets. Maybe you already work on a trading desk. Maybe you work in sales at one of those too-big-to-fail outfits and trade in your personal account. Maybe you dont currently work in the financial industry at all, but youve been spending a lot of hours on Robinhood and youre thinking about taking your involvement to the next level, whatever that means to you. In any event, youre reading this foreword for clues as to whether this book will make you a better trader. Whether it will help you make more money.

It will.

Why will Alpha Trader help you become a better trader? Not because it tells you WHAT to think as a successful trader. Not because it gives you instructions on trading this or trading that. No, no, no. Its because Alpha Trader teaches you HOW to think as a successful trader. And thats what makes all the difference. Its the only thing that makes a difference, in every game that we humans play.

Here, Ill give you an example of what I mean.

If youre not a serious chess player, youve never heard of Aron Nimzowitsch. If you are a serious chess player, you undoubtedly have a dog-eared copy of his groundbreaking book My System first published in 1925. What was so revolutionary about Nimzowitschs book? It wasnt a collection of openings. It wasnt a list of moves and countermoves that you should memorize. It wasnt a manual full of instructions. No, no, no. Nimzowitschs book doesnt tell you what to think about chess. It teaches you how to think about chess. How to think about position. How to think about the flow of the game. How to think about risk-taking and aggression. How to think about edge and strategic dynamics. Sounds pretty dry, right? Not in the least. My System is written with wit, with a point of view. My System is chock-full of examples and illustrations, but presented as annotated stories of personal experience, not constructed applications of pure theory.

These are the same topics covered in Alpha Trader position, flow, risk-taking, edge, strategic dynamics all amplified by Brent Donnellys keen understanding of the pervasive role of variance and chance, the crucial difference that makes the game of markets so much more difficult than the game of chess.

This is the same format and style of Alpha Trader wit, a point of view, annotated personal experiences all in service to illuminating a frame of thought rather than rote instruction.

I think that Alpha Trader and Brent Donnelly are to the game of markets what My System and Aron Nimzowitsch are to the game of chess. Truly revolutionary. Truly useful. Books and authors that will change forever HOW you think about playing their games with mastery.

But wait, theres more.

Yes, Alpha Trader will help all you professional and semi-professional and professional-wannabe traders become better traders. This book will help you make more money. You should buy this book and you should read it cover to cover.

And then you should give this book to your partner or your father or your daughter or your close friend someone who has never traded a day in their life, someone who has no professional or semi-professional connection to financial markets whatsoever and ask them to read this book. Please.

Because Alpha Trader wont only make you a better trader. It wont only help you make more money from trading. It will make you a better player of games.

Back in 1988, Iain M. Banks wrote a book titled The Player of Games, part of a wonderful series of science fiction novels that describe The Culture, a super-advanced galactic civilization. In this book, The Culture sends a representative to negotiate with a less advanced civilization where everyones social and political status is determined by how well they play a very complicated game. The Cultures representative enters the global tournament himself, and despite only a few years to study a game that all of the inhabitants of this civilization spend their lives playing, he manages (spoiler alert!) to win the game. How? Because anyone can master the rules, even the intricacies of the rules, of any game. Theres nothing special in that. Theres no edge. What IS special, however, and where there IS edge comes in the very personal and very human understanding of position, informational flow, variance, risk-taking and strategic dynamics that shape ALL games.

And not to burst anyones bubble, but that less advanced civilization where everyones social and political status is determined by how well they play a very complicated game? Thats us. Thats Earth. Thats the modern human civilization. Thats the very complicated game of markets and politics and social interactions that we all play, all the time, in ways both large and small.