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Interview with Frank Dilernia

Could you tell us a little about yourself?

I’m 42 years old. I have been a professional trader since 1999.  I have written two books on trading:

  • Analytical Market trading ‘a window into the future’ (2003)
  • The trader trading ‘ principles of successful trading’ (2007)

And I’m about the release my third book sometime in the 2nd quarter of 2010:

  • Market Trading Market Timing  ‘ Time Price Support Resistance (2010)

I also run a coaching service for Traders who have bought my books, as most of the information is based on the methodology I developed in early 2001.

How did you get started trading?

My father was an investor in stocks and he did pretty well shifting between mining stocks and banking stocks during the 80’s and 90’s. I was inquisitive and I bought my first book on technical analysis in 1985

How long have you been trading now?

I  bought my first stock 3-months before the market crash in 1987, however I would say actively trading since 1995.

What do you like best about trading?

Being my own boss.

What markets do you trade?

Australian stocks, SPI, DOW S&P,(Index Futures)  currencies, & OIL.

What style of trading do you use?

I developed my own methodology, which is simply based on using dynamic support and resistance levels within a multi-timeframe model.

What have been the biggest influences on your development as a trader?

The biggest influence would be the program I used which was developed by the late Robert Krausz. Robert was featured in the book Market Wizards.

Robert opened my eyes to multi-timeframe analysis.

What is the one biggest lesson that you have learnt since starting trading?

That the market is easily predictable. But predicting patterns and trading the market using leverage are two completely different things. And optimizing money management (stops) based on the price patterns in the market and not what’s in my account.

How did you get interested in coaching other traders?

I never set out to coach traders. I wrote a book about my methodology and over time it morphed into a coaching service.

Do you focus on coaching of one particular area of trading, e.g. risk management / psychology or finding trades?

I try and get traders to become a three-type trader. What that means is breaking up the trading account into an investor, a stock trader and a day trader.

In a nutshell, finding high probability patterns within the multi-timeframe cycles that on occasions sets up medium-long term trades, whilst also focusing on day trading.

How do you work together with your clients? E.g. phone / email / screen sharing?

I have 6 different reports that are constantly updated throughout the day and based on all the markets I trade.

I focus on short-term , medium term and long term patterns, and I try and get everyone to follow each report even though they might not trade them. That’s because the same patterns are constantly repeating in all markets and it helps traders or subscribers to get those patterns embedded into the trading set-ups.

It helps build an intuitive view of the market, and allows the trader to anticipate trends, likely length of trends and change of trends.

What sort of results do your clients get after coaching with you?

I get a lot of positive feedback from traders because I structure the market  quiet well. I have a number of long-term clients that continue to subscribe to the service, simply because I can alert traders via the reports for potential trades.

What is the most satisfying part of coaching traders?

Receiving emails and positive feedback from clients and buyers of the book.

What is the biggest but most easily fixed mistake that you see traders make?

Impatience. Most traders are impatient and often over trade.

They rely on their own price-based indicators that react to the noise of the market, instead of waiting for high probability patterns to appear. And they don’t appear that often.

Do you recommend journals or other record keeping as an important part of trading?

I think it is extremely important if those journals can be matched with patterns in the market. It helps validate the trades when those trades are matched with high probability patterns

What are the most common issues that you see in your clients that prevent them from becoming better traders?

Patience and trusting the patterns in the market. There is a belief that to become a successful day trader you need to be glued to the screens all day. You don’t.

However, you need to be patient, and let the trades match the keys levels in the market that have a degree of reliability, and then run stops that are optimized to the market conditions at the time of the trade.

What advice would you give traders who are just starting out?

  • Don’t pay for bloated seminars, and don’t believe the hype.
  • Don’t expect to make any money in the markets until you actually understand how markets work.
  • Work out what you want out of the markets (goal) and then build a strategy in trying to achieve that goal.

What 3 books do you recommend traders read?

I would have to say mine, but I would say that.

In my opinion there aren’t too many books that show a method or trading system that is profitable. Most technical indicators or investment literature is ambiguous at best. Most books written are based on hypothetical scenarios so everything looks easy. This isn’t the case when trading in ‘real-time’ and using real money.

There is enough information freely available on the net that you don’t have to buy any books.

There are also a number of stock forums that have a ton of information, and there are senior members that are willing to help any newbie.