Chapter XIX Summary and Analysis

Livingston becomes a stock operator, or manipulator. Many of the tricks of the trade he has used on his own behalf, he now accepts a commission to do for others. The main problem is how to buy or sell large amounts of a given stock at a favorable price, since any such trade begins to affect the price before the trade can be completed. Livingston points out that many of the methods used to manipulate the price of stocks in the past are illegal by his day, but that one can always rely on the mass psychology of traders and the general public.

Livingston discusses cornering the market as a way of influencing prices. Cornering a stock rarely makes a profit for one who tries it and is usually only a way to demonstrate skill, or get back at...