The Day Traders: The Untold Story of the Extreme Investors and How They Changed Wall Street Forever

While how-to books for day traders abound, Millman (The Vandal's Crown), a business journalist, takes an analytical look at the phenomenon. The combination of a roaring bull market and the spread of technology has enabled anyone with access to a computer to trade his or own stocks. Day trading is so widespread now that even the largest brokerage houses are starting to offer online trading services to customers. While many day traders invest for the long term, others are in the market for a quick kill, and these are the people who are featured by Millman. So-called ""extreme traders"" are not investors at all. They're not interested in lending capital to businesses they believe will be profitable in the long term, but rather look to make money by exploiting price discrepancies and by making many--sometimes hundreds of--trades per day. Millman is both admiring and critical of how day trading has evolved. On the positive side, online trading has opened up the markets and made them more democratic, while at the same time scores of day-trading brokers have emerged looking to take advantage of market neophytes. Millman's narrative is generally an unfocused collection of anecdotes peppered with commentary. Cumulatively, however, his snapshots add up to a revealing picture of the day-trading landscape. Millman's clear message: day trading is not for everyone, and most day traders lose money. (Nov.)