I watched a YouTube playthrough yesterday and the player used 3 stamina to move while trading items and then attacked 2x. So no 'Move Action' was used. This is incorrect, right?

Yes, incorrect.

Hi! Although Sadgit is completely right as the rules are written ("Heroes may give or receive Shop Item cards, Relic cards, and Search cards to or from each other during a move action. At any point during his move action, a hero may trade any number of Shop Item cards, Relic cards, or Search cards with an adjacent hero. Trading does not require an additional action or the expense of movement points."), I think that this is not in the spirit of the game: I think that the rules should say "when using movement points" instead of "during a move action". My statement is based on the fact that a Move Action just gives you movement points in the pool and converting fatigue does the same. Trading happens when using the movement points. One can say on the contrary that trading is a plus of a Move Action to differentiate it "more" from "just" converting fatigue.

Any other thought or evidence in one direction or the other?

Anyway, you can house rule the way you prefer :-)

Well IMO if you go that (house rule) route, then you can remove the requirement for movement from trading altogether.
The movement action is the "cost" of trading.

Recently, there has been an update on the rules of trading items that is included in the current version of the Road to Legend rules pdf.

Quote

After a hero performs a move action during his turn, at any time during that turn he can freely give, receive, or exchange any number of equipped or unequipped Shop Item, Relic, and Search cards with a hero in an adjacent space.

This new rule addresses the problem, that the end of a move action is not very well defined in the standard rule set. A uFAQ confirmed that a move action ends as soon as the last movement point is spend. With the old rule (quoted above) for trading this would mean that the hero cannot trade items when he entered a space adjacent to another hero with his last movement point. With the new ruling this has been resolved now and FFG has confirmed that the new rule from the RtL pdf is also applied to standard games against an OL. I have included it in the CRRG.

I am of the opinion that the requirement to perform a move action before trading is a restriction that is there for a purpose, e.g. to prevent excessive trading and double usuage of items such as Mana Weave etc. in a single round.

I imagine it as the hero using fatigue to sprint across the map. Thus not being able to trade. Whereas a move action is a walk.

I agree that the Move action is the 'price' you should pay for trading to prevent excessive item re-use, such as people round-robin using the same powerful weapon - reducing the need to properly gear up your whole party.

It seems quite reasonable to me and getting rid of it would be unbalancing.

It also reduces the value of cool heroic feats like Ronan of the Wild's, which lets you trade for 'free' with anyone on the map.

You convinced me: Move Action is the cost to be able to trade. Thank you :-)