A complete set of these extremely rare collected issues of the magazine Stock Market Technique edited by the legendary Wall Street investor Richard Wyckoff (1873-1934), best-known for innovating the ‘Wyckoff Method’ of technical analysis.
Wyckoff was one of the towering figures of early twentieth century investment literature, both as an analyst and a prolific publisher. “Today Technicians still refer to his tape reading methods. Indeed his Studies In Tape Reading (1910), written under the pseudonym ‘Rollo Tape’, is a classic, the first work on the subject, and still available in print. However, to recognise him for his market skills alone fails to do justice to his wider influence. Not only did he work with many of the great players including Keene, Gann and Livermore, whose insights he handed on in his newsletter and books, single-handedly he would influence an entire generation of speculators and stock traders with The Ticker Magazine, later the Magazine of Wall Street. There were other newsletter writers - Roger Babson, Thomas Gibson - but no one could compete with Wyckoff. He was a Wall Street missionary spreading the gospel the length and breadth of America, publishing his magazine and many books on all aspects of speculation” (Dennistoun, p. 141).
Stock Market Technique was Wyckoff’s final major journalistic publishing venture, the culmination of his long career and written at the height of his wisdom. “This new publication included interviews with traders, more on tape reading, advice from the past, as well as Wyckoff’s own favourite epigrams. In the magazine’s second volume in December 1933, he offers his trader’s prayer, which has never been bettered in expressing the desperate feelings of loss before an inevitable coup de grace” (Dennistoun, p. 141). It ran as a bi-monthly magazine from March 1932 up until September-October 1935, but was clearly significantly impacted by Wyckoff’s death from heart disease in March 1934. The issues that appeared after his death continued to include numerous original articles by Wyckoff, most of which are accompanied by notes stating: “These extracts are taken from an old diary found among heretofore unpublished writings of the late Richard D. Wyckoff”.
The production of these volumes bear the hallmarks of haphazard self-publication, no doubt impacted by Wyckoff’s death. The first volume is straightforwardly a collected edition reprinting the principle articles, editorials, and correspondence originally published in the magazine from March 1932 to July 1933; meanwhile volumes two and three gather together six issues each of the original magazine, bound with their wonderfully vibrant original coloured wrappers. The third volume is particularly uncommon, making complete sets rare and desirable.
Dennistoun, Bubbles, Booms and Busts, 449.
