Before emigrating to America, Darvas studied economics at the University of Budapest. Arriving in the US in 1951, Darvas trained with his half-sister, Julia, to be a ballroom dancer, becoming extremely succesful and touring the world by 1956. He discovered investing in 1952, when a Toronto nightclub, unable to pay him in cash, instead paid him with shares. It was on a two-year tour of the world that he initially developed his 'Darvas Box' method of screening stocks - a method of picking stocks based on the stock's price and volume - and later went on to refine this to remove any human element from his trading to susbtantial success. Nicolas Darvas is regarded as one of the best traders in the history of the market and his method, whilst complicated and difficult to master, has been rigorously tested and has been found to be one of the best trading systems yet developed.