Book excerpt: Most investors have been led to believe that stock market behavior is random and cannot be timed. Nothing could be further from the truth! Futures markets have been successfully timed by traders since the mid 1800s, and today's stock markets exhibit amazingly similar, recognizable trending patterns. Investors who understand and spot those patterns can—with a minimum of trades—double, triple, or even quadruple their long-term returns! THE STREETSMART GUIDE TO TIMING THE STOCK MARKET explains for all investors how basic technical tools—well-known and popular in the futures market—can show you how to make the most of stock market opportunities. Using key indicators from the futures market, leading futures trader and advisor Colin Alexander has developed an innovative decision-making system for determining which stocks to buy and how to recognize when those stocks are poised for an upward move. Case studies for market leaders, including IBM, Citicorp, Schlumberger, and others, demonstrate the book's techniques in action, and show the value of technical analysis in predicting stock movements. This groundbreaking system, similar to work done by John Murphy, Richard Dennis, and other legendary futures traders, will show you how to: Buy only those stocks most likely to have above-average performance; Run your profits and cut your losses; Sell when either the stock or the market is running out of steam; Monitor the risks—as you let the rewards take care of themselves; Take personal responsibility for your investments. That last point bears repeating. You wouldn't for one second think of driving a car without oil or going sailing without checking the weather. Yet that is precisely what the proponents of buy-and-hold would have you do: buy a stock or a mutual fund and hold it forever, ignoring cycles and trends which, quite frankly, could be understood and acted upon with a minimum of research. THE STREETSMART GUIDE TO TIMING THE STOCK MARKET shows you how to conduct that research, and profit from the stock market's cycles and long-term trends. Whether you use its techniques to buy high-tech stocks or blue chips, you will effectively take control of your investments. Market timing secrets learned in THE STREETSMART GUIDE TO TIMING THE STOCK MARKET will give you renewed confidence and optimism. This breakthrough book makes advanced market timing techniques understandable—and makes it possible for you to achieve long-term returns superior to those of indexing, mutual funds, or buy-and-hold strategies.