Jesse Lauriston Livermore

Jesse Lauriston Livermore's success story is one of the most inspiring and motivating for new traders.

However, by studying his biography and success story, you will learn about the dark side of the trading world, namely the consequences of abusing luck, how weak players end up and how trading can affect your life, both in good and bad ways.

Jesse Lauriston Livermore was born into an ordinary family of farmers in 1877 in the town of Shrewsbury, Massachusetts.

Realizing that the same fate awaits him and that the next person in the family who will look after this farm will naturally be Jesse, thoughts about escaping from home begin to creep in from early childhood.

Actually, at the age of 15, without even finishing school, Jesse persuades his mother to help him escape and, having received five dollars for his living from her, jumps into the first van that was heading to Boston.

First acquaintance with the stock exchange

Arriving at their destination, by chance the driver decided to stop at the Payne Webber brokerage company. At that time, the fifteen-year-old boy did not have any plans for life, so when he saw a vacancy for a broker that they needed a young man who would write prices on the board for clients, he immediately got a job.

Due to the fact that he had a phenomenal ability to memorize numbers, Jesse becomes simply an indispensable worker in the office, because no matter how dynamic the price, unlike other guys, he never got confused with numbers.

It is worth adding that after not even working for a couple of months, the young man noticed that the price moves in a wave-like manner and very often comes to the same values. In fact, seeing this pattern, he began to actively write down all prices and levels in his notebook, compiling the first analytics.

First deal

One day, while having lunch in the dining room, Jesse’s friend approached him and said that he had some interesting data that indicated the possible growth of shares. His friend did not have enough money to enter the position, so he invited Jesse to enter into a share with him.

The fifteen-year-old boy took out his notebook with price notes and confirmed his friend’s assumptions, and together with him opened his first deal for five dollars. Two days later, Jesse earned $3, which radically influenced his worldview and attitude towards the stock exchange.

Luck and the first brokerage houses

Inspired by luck, Jesse Lauriston Livermore begins independent trading and actively visits brokerage houses. By the way, trading in brokerage houses at that time was practically betting, and the company naturally never withdrew money to the interbank market and played against its clients.

In many ways, this approach is similar now when trading binary options , so the sensational new turns out to be simply forgotten old. However, unlike other players, Jesy has found his own price pattern and quite quickly begins to empty out all such establishments.

After some time, a fifteen-year-old boy earns more than a thousand dollars a year, but at the same time, almost all the owners of such establishments kick him out.

Moving to New York and starting a new life

Arriving in New York, young Jesse very quickly increases his capital from 1 thousand dollars to 50 thousand. However, luck was not on his side for so long and over the course of six months Jesse actively began to lose money, and it got to the point that he managed to get into debt for $1,000.  

Remembering how he beat dishonest firms, Jesse begins to send his people to such establishments, where he quickly makes 4 thousand dollars and says goodbye to all his debts. In 1906, Jesse Lauriston Livermore was in a short position in an up market when a major earthquake occurred.

Having caught such a good moment, he begins to actively dump his shares and with 50 thousand dollars he manages to earn 250,000 thousand dollars. Having become a fairly rich man, his luck repeatedly deserted him, so at what speed he earned a lot of money, he lost it.

He also made his first million on a serious stock market crash, but after meeting the cotton king, after a while he loses all his money.

Sad end

Any person can fall and rise, but when such falls become part of life, it greatly affects a person’s morale. Jesse Lauriston Livermore repeatedly fell from the top and immediately climbed back to it, but each fall and loss of millions of capital destroyed his inner world more and more.

In the end, unable to bear another bankruptcy, Jesse Lauriston Livermore committed suicide. By the way, all three of his wife’s ex-husbands also committed suicide, so a special mysticism is attributed to his death.