country writer, vendor & nasabear, page-15

Best way to learn without losing money: look at a chart and write down what you think will happen (a) tomorrow (b) next week (c) next month. Keep notes and mark yourself. If you get better than 50% and your decisions are genuinely based on charts (not guessing) you're doing OK.

Oh and by the way if there's a "secret" to trading it's not T.A., it's money management (position sizing, setting stops etc). If you set a trailing stop and stick to it (ie you really do sell if the stock closes below the stop) then you have overcome the biggest barrier IMO to being a good trader. This applies whether you are a short term or long term, FA or TA investor IMO. So, if you are going to paper trade, practise setting stops too.

The best thing about paper trading is that you can practise with as many stocks as time allows. Though nothing focuses the mind like having real money in there.

There are lots of good T.A. books around, these are my favourites:

Louise Bedfords Trading Secrets and Candlestick Secrets are the best starting points for me

Martin Pring's book ons indicators are a bit dry but useful.

I like Steve Nison's book on candlestick charting (chich also includes other indicators). It is kind of pricey though.

Since you're on an ABU thread why not start with ABU's chart :). For my money we might get a run now that 0.075 is on the buy side, buy:sell is healthy, and volumes may be building