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Street Smarts: High Probability Short-Term Trading Strategies

by Laurence A. Connors and Linda Bradford Raschke (1996)

Quick summary -- an in-depth PhD-level extended summary (10-30 pages) for this book is coming soon.

Street Smarts: High Probability Short-Term Trading Strategies

By Laurence A. Connors and Linda Bradford Raschke

Quick Summary

Connors and Raschke present 25+ high-probability short-term trading strategies organized around swing trading, retracements, climax patterns, and breakout modes, each with specific entry/exit rules and historical test results.

Executive Summary

"Street Smarts" is one of the most respected practical trading books ever written, presenting specific, tested short-term trading strategies with clear rules for entry, exit, and money management. Connors (a quantitative trading researcher) and Raschke (a professional trader featured in "New Market Wizards") combine their complementary expertise to deliver strategies that work across stocks, futures, and other markets.

Key Strategies

  1. Turtle Soup / Turtle Soup Plus One -- Counter-trend strategies that fade false breakouts of 20-day highs/lows.
  2. 80-20's -- Reversal strategy based on wide-range days that close near their extremes.
  3. Momentum Pinball -- An oscillator-based mean reversion strategy for short-term swings.
  4. The Holy Grail -- Buying the first pullback in a strong trend (ADX above 30).
  5. Wolfe Waves -- A pattern-based reversal strategy with specific geometric rules.
  6. ADX Gapper -- Trading gaps in the context of strong trends identified by ADX.
  7. Historical Volatility Breakouts -- Trading volatility expansion after periods of contraction.

Conclusion

"Street Smarts" remains one of the best collections of tested, practical short-term trading strategies available. The combination of Connors's quantitative rigor and Raschke's real-world trading experience produces strategies that are both theoretically sound and practically executable.