Stan has recently written a new trading manual called Option Magic that focuses on short-term OEX option trades and I recommend the new manual and course as much, if not more, than the first one. The manual was published only a few weeks ago and although some of the basic market analysis tools are the same as in the Rhythm book, it is not simply an add-on or a rehash of Rhythm. Compared to the day trading of S&P futures taught in Rhythm, the new option method trades are short-term position trades. The analysis is done on larger time-frame charts and you are looking to catch bigger moves.

Only long positions are taken, buying at-the-money puts or calls with the expectation that the OEX will move up if long calls or down if long puts. The method does not trade every day and it will work anytime throughout the option cycle, although the better reward/risk trades are found closer to expiration. The ultimate goal, bold that it is, is to earn multiples on your capital while keeping losses few and small. Good analysis and trade execution keeps losses few and good money management rules keep them small.

The accuracy of the method is very high and the few money management losses are very small, compared to the trades which earn multiples on capital. The first real-time signal using the new method was a strong buy after the low on May 8. At expiration, a week and a half later, the OEX was up 37 points. OEX 610 calls bought on May 8 at 6-1/2 went to 36, which means a ten lot cost of $6,500, less than the margin for one S&P contract, went to $36,000. Even if one S&P contract was bought and held overnight for the same time period, the margin would be about twice the cost of the ten lot, the risk would be a lot greater and the potential profit only about $19,000 vs. about $29,000. The book shows many examples that are even more profitable than this one.

I highly recommend the new Option Magic course. It is said that 90% of all option traders lose money, but the 10% who win do very well. I had never traded index options before; but after studying the course, I'm finding that I trade less often with much better returns. The ultimate goal of earning multiples on your trading capital in days/weeks time is not an overstatement. I have no financial connections with Stan, except as a student who bought his courses. I have developed, as many of his other students have, a good relationship with Stan and have found him to be an excellent teacher who believes that if it isn't fun, you're doing it wrong. (Bill James).

Since that time, my trading has become consistently profitable and my confidence level is high each and every time I pull the trigger. Needless to say, and to make a long story short, after 16 years of practicing public accounting, on October 1, I sold my accounting practice in order to trade full time. Stan Moore and the ROM trading course had a lot to do with it. I suggest that anyone who has the dream like I did to become a full-time trader contact Stan at 800-686-0833. And no, I am not connected with Stan, nor am I being compensated by him for writing this. By the way, Stan continues (nearly two years later) to phone me with any new ideas and techniques he comes across. Good trading!

I wanted to share my thoughts on Stan Moore and ROM. My remarks need to be prefaced. I am a novice trader (emphasis on novice). I have an engineering back-ground. I have a bachelor's from the University of California and a master's from Yale, both in chemical engineering. I have been in consulting for twelve years and became interested in the markets two years ago. Rather than go through my extensive learning curve, suffice it to say that I learned very quickly that no one else will make you rich and that money management and psychology are critical to the success to any trading system. In October of 1996, I requested information from a variety of vendors. I looked at mechanical systems as well as methodologies. I asked everyone for references.

I called Stan Moore after reading an ad in Futures magazine. My initial impression of Stan was very good. He spent a great deal of time with me, discussing where I was at and what I would like to accomplish. Stan sent me a packet of information on both the S&P and Option Magic courses. Stan's information included an extensive number of references. One of these references was Bill James who had recently begun trading full time. Bill shared with me a number of resources, including Club 3000. Bill's assistance was invaluable. Stan's references were honest and credible I shared with Stan my concern that the course was too advanced for a beginning trader like me. After lengthy discussion with Stan, my concerns were addressed and I ordered both courses. Stan also helped me in developing a reading list. I received the information and went into seclusion for three months. I had an easy job; my wife volunteered to watch our eight month old while I was at the library.

I have found Stan's course to be excellent. The most useful aspects of the course for me are retracements, time-of-day, re-test/failures and channels. By far, the greatest material in the course comes from Stan himself. He is available during market hours. In a short phone call, Stan will quickly assess your read of the market and either confirm your trade or discuss with you why he disagrees. Stan has taught me the value of patience in waiting for a high probability trade. My criticisms of the course are limited and qualified by my novice status. It took me two readings of the course before I could begin to assimilate the material. The course is well written; it just took me a while to grasp some concepts as a novice.

The material is self-guided; after you have finished reading the course, Stan discusses it with you. This may not be optimal if you learn best through direct instruction. Personally, I have found Stan to be an individual of the utmost integrity, brutally honest and extremely knowledgeable. I am satisfied with his course and feel that the course was right for me. I am very appreciative of all that Stan has taught me and of the patience he has with my extensive questions on daily market action. I have no connections with Stan Moore, except as a student. No one solicited this letter. My current focus is on my own trading psychology. I am continuing to try to hone my skills and improve. I am interested in hearing from other traders.

Over the last two years, we have been struggling to learn how to profitably day trade the S&P. Like many others that have written to Club 3000, we have purchased many thousands of dollars worth of systems to try to find the trader's "holy grail". Unfortunately, the result of trading a number of these systems has cost us much more than their purchased price in losses; we now assume that performance claims by systems vendors that sound too good to be true, are too good to be true.

In a recent issue of Club 3000 News (95.01), Andrew Armour wrote about his experiences with a trader named Stan Moore. The letter stated that Stan day trades the S&P and was selling a manual called ROM - Stan Moore's Trading Methodology. We called Stan and spoke to him about his approach to the markets. As we spoke to him, it became apparent that he had greatly refined some ideas we had been working on for over a year. In particular, the time-of-day trading patterns seemed to be just what we were looking for. The other technical patterns he spoke of also sounded legitimate. Even though it sounded good, we needed some reassurance that Stan's style of trading could be executed in real time by average traders like us. We asked Stan for the names of a couple of people who were currently using his methodology to actually trade. Stan seemed very pleased to provide us with the names of three people who had his manual.

The next day, we phoned one of the people on the list, a broker who had been trading with Stan's methodology for two months. He indicated that the information in the manual was excellent, "for real" and that he already had a good profit going. We immediately ordered the manual and as soon as it arrived, devoured its pages. The manual was written by Dr. Joe Conway, a communications Ph.D.

We were and are very impressed with the clear and concise style used as well with the excellent charts that illustrate the concepts. We have read many systems manuals and trading books few come close to the quality of Joe's effort. The real value in purchasing Stan Moore's manual lies not in the text, but rather in the phone support the includes with the purchase price. While the manual is very clear and complete, we have found that Stan has gone way beyond what we expect of him in helping us to become successful S&P day traders.

He has always been very accommodating when we have phoned to request clarification about a particular trading pattern. On many occasions, Stan has unexpectedly called us to share his valuable insights as to how the S&P market works. Even though we have read some 30 to 40 books on trading and attended several seminars by the big names in the field, much of the information Stan has shared is either new to us or he has expressed it in such a way as to make it much more coherent to us than in the past. In the two months since we started using Stan's manual, we have had much longer stretches of profitable or break even days than ever before. Paper trading this methodology (admittedly much easier than real-time but it illustrates the soundness of the underlying principles) resulted in only one loss in 24 trades.

In real time trading, we recently had 12 trades in a row without a loss. It works! We strongly feel that if one takes all the trades that are indicated by this methodology, profits in the neighborhood of $1,000-$2,000 a day per contract is realistically attainable. It is important to understand that Stan Moore's methodology is just that; it is not a system that could be totally computerized, although he includes many computer indicators that greatly assist trade entry and exit. We don't feel that an average person could read the manual in a weekend and be ready to put his/her money on the line on Monday morning. Trading with the rhythm of the markets requires one to develop confidence that the S&P will react in accordance with the time-of-day, etc. Only through watching seemingly impossible trades work repeatedly have we begun to really understand (as much as that is possible with the S&P) how and why the market moves the way that it does. While being a successful trader requires adequate capitalization, attention to psychological factors, dedication and lots of hard work, Stan has really provided an excellent resource as far as an actual trading method is concerned.

We have no financial ties with Stan Moore and we don't know him apart from our trading experiences. We would be pleased to discuss our experiences in more detail with others who are interested. We have included both Joe and Stan's phone numbers if you wish to speak to them directly. In summary, the cost of Stan's manual and phone support has been the best investment in our trading education to date. We highly recommend it for the serious S&P day trader.

After attending several seminars over the past few years, I feel that one of the greatest benefits of going to these seminars is meeting the people who attend them. At one seminar, I met a trader by the name of Stan Moore, who has become a friend and very good teacher in his own right. Prior to attending the seminar, I had asked the instructor for some references and he gave me the phone number of Stan, among others. Since Stan's office turned out to be a few blocks from mine in New York, I called him for some feedback on the methodology.

He immediately invited me to come to his office and sit with him, which I did. Stan very generously and graciously spent several hours with me, showing me all the techniques that he utilized. Because this was new to me, I understood very little, but it left quite an impression on me. From that first meeting, I knew that Stan was a winner, both as a trader and as a person. I was a complete stranger to him, yet, he invited me into his office and opened up completely to me, showing me all his techniques that obviously took him years to formulate and master. He had nothing to sell me, he was just sharing, one trader to another.

Several months later, I actually attended the seminar, where Stan was also in attendance. There were about 15 of us there and a truly amazing thing happened that all who were there can attest to. The instructor had brought with him a "tick player" where a trading day's action can be played across a screen at any speed, a very good teaching device. As he would display a day's action, Stan, sitting in his seat, very quietly began saying things like "You gotta sell them here", almost to himself. But, as the day's action would unfold in front of our eyes, prices would drop. More and more of us edged closer to Stan and for the next several hours, he would call almost all of the moves, all ahead of time.

I know that Stan had never seen these charts before. He was just doing what by now comes naturally to him. Midway into the exercise, the instructor sat down and Stan took over and mesmerized us for hours. A fellow student in attendance was Dr. Joe Conway, a university professor with a Ph.D. in communications. He began to study privately with Stan. As a means of learning Stan's various techniques and approaches, many of which were learned from others, as both Stan and Joe will gladly volunteer.

Joe began to organize the material for himself. What Stan may have originally deemed to be "gut feel" or intuition as a means of entering a trade really was a quantifiable, concrete rule with reasoning behind it. Joe kept after Stan, extracting one thought after another. What emerged from all this is collaboration between Stan and Joe, published as Stan Moore's Trading Methodology. Stan and Joe are now offering this manual as a trading course which includes personal instruction from them. Stan and Joe sent me a copy of the book and I want to share my opinions with the membership. I will say up front that these guys are my friends, but, as a person who has a closet full of very expensive, very worthless systems purchased over the years, this is a very good manual.

Many of the thoughts in the book are not new or earth- shattering, but are presented in such a clear, delineated manner that they make a lot of sense and are useful. They present a general overview on the market rhythms, explain and show in detail how to judge and use retracements. The chapter on time-of-day analysis is fascinating and bears heeding. They discuss how Stan uses technical indicators and have suggestions regarding what type of orders to use and when. Stan adds his expertise as an OEX trader to point out various low-risk opportunities, especially near expirations where a trader can make two to three times his/her investment. They take you through their thought processes, how they rate trades in terms of probabilities and finally give some examples of the total analysis. If you are a short-term or day trader, this is a book that could greatly help your trading and analysis and anyone who reads this book will surely come away with many ideas that are practical and useful. Stan's options approaches can help traders of all time frames. Again, I state that I am a friend of both Stan and Joe, but have no financial ties with them in any way.

If you are an S&P day trader and are ready and willing to take your trading to another level, I would highly recommend that you give Stan Moore a call. A couple of years ago, Stan developed his ROM trading course into a very understandable and comprehensive manual. I learned of Stan right here in Club 3000 from another satisfied client of his. I have always been generally a counter-trend type trader, using Fibonacci and Elliott methods to trade. So, when I spoke with Stan, it appeared that his techniques were quite similar to the manner in which I was trading. I ordered the course and Stan spent several telephone calls with me every day for a few weeks until I thoroughly understood the methodology.