Listen guys, we can always do better, am I totally happy with
our analysis from last year? heck no, and could we have done
better, hell yes!
I wish I had come out and said OK everyone go balls to the walls
long in April 2009 because the market is going to go up for many
many months. While I thought the market would have at
least a 6 month rally after the march low (which I said back in
March), I didn't come out and say go balls to the walls long and
just hold everything. Of course I did primarily have longs on
the watchlist. Personally I think EW hurt my longer term
analysis last year too.
Listen, all we can do is look back at the past and learn and
adapt! That's why I'm always constantly striving to improve
etc, i.e. just like the long term 401K system that I made, that's
way way better than buy at hold, about 10X in fact.
Also, trading is so emotional, there is so much emotion
involved! It's easy to be the 'Arm Chair' quarterback after
the fact. That's why all we can do is look at our past
mistakes and constantly improve ourselves.
Otherwise, for BPT, will point out the major and long term
trends, however our main focus and where we make the most money is
on short term trade ideas lasting anywhere from 3 days to 3 weeks
or more. You will make a lot more money making 5% - 20% week
after week trading stocks than buying and hold the market in your
trading account. Now for you 401k plans, you can do something
different of course and try to play the major trends.
Posted by pcordeiro on 16th of Mar 2010 at 02:15 pm
haven't seen many (any) out there do that regarding this
unprecedented rally since March. This last push up seems to have
broken every Bear's back (well, except saturn6's) - and it's
painful. And emotional - - oh, yes. Trust crushing -- oh, yes. And
for me, that's the worst - trusting indicators that fail, or
whipsaw, or theories (EW) that you trusted were leading you down
the right path. My goal is to work with the fewest amount of
indicators, along with trendlines, to gain trust back in this whole
trading process. Hopefully that, along with BPT's fortitude in
guidance, financial woes will be overcome and goals met. Again,
thanks for words and re-grouping.
I can't speak for everybody, but a pep talk like that is
helpful. I also thank you for your honesty in not re-writing
the last year's prognostication. On the mental side of
things, learning and adapting and realizing that this game is
played over a lifetime, not a year, helps me re-focus.
I am having a very difficult time right now dealing with
gloating bulls. They are the majority right now and it is
making me hate this game. I have a friend who deals with a
broker and knows almost nothing about how the markets work.
His broker had him "buy and hold" a small basket of stocks
(gold and financials) in 2006. He had mostly TD, IAG and PWE.
I warned him of the danger of this -- he scoffed at my
suggestions. A little over a year ago when his account was
down to almost nothing, he "doubled down" in the same names (he
borrowed as much money as he could to do so and blindly plowed it
into the market at the lows). I'll get an occasional call or
email from him asking me what I think about the markets -- meaning
he wants to tell me how much he is making in the market. I
honestly don't need a lecture on "buying low", "holding for the
long term" or "why gold is going to $5000", so I don't even allow
myself to speak on the subject.
I have family members trying to reason with me and have me put
my money into "a safe mutual fund" and get 10% returns on average
per year. Just buy the dips and in x years, you'll have a
nice "nest egg". Sorry, off-topic, but certainly a mental
part of the game that I'm having trouble with.
One thing that last year has caused me to focus on is developing
longer term mechanical systems for the market. I have my long
term 401K system, which I also call the
'watching paint dry
system' because it only gives about 1 trade a year and is boring as
hell to traders, however still it's returned about 10 fold higher
than just buying and holding the market (140 times your money from
1961 instead of 17 times your money for buy and hold) , the stats
go back to 1961 on this system, it has caught every major bull
market and bear market and kept you in the bull markets or out of
the bear markets. But again, it's like watching paint dry lol.
Also as you have seen, we are developing intermediate mechanical
systems that do about 10 - 15 trades a year, these will catch
market trends and are true end of days systems i.e the signals come
near the market close and therefore trades are entered at the
market close only and held for days to weeks.
and of course we will continue to focus more on the watchlist
and short term trade ideas and cover less market analysis.
Will you be offering this system along with the intermediate
systems when you introduce those? I don't mind watching paint dry
while CNBC dickers away with excuses for why the market went up or
down each day; as long as I know I'm usually on the right side of
that.
ha, yeah maybe Listen guys,
regarding the market
Posted by matt on 16th of Mar 2010 at 01:07 pm
ha, yeah maybe
Listen guys, we can always do better, am I totally happy with our analysis from last year? heck no, and could we have done better, hell yes!
I wish I had come out and said OK everyone go balls to the walls long in April 2009 because the market is going to go up for many many months. While I thought the market would have at least a 6 month rally after the march low (which I said back in March), I didn't come out and say go balls to the walls long and just hold everything. Of course I did primarily have longs on the watchlist. Personally I think EW hurt my longer term analysis last year too.
Listen, all we can do is look back at the past and learn and adapt! That's why I'm always constantly striving to improve etc, i.e. just like the long term 401K system that I made, that's way way better than buy at hold, about 10X in fact.
Also, trading is so emotional, there is so much emotion involved! It's easy to be the 'Arm Chair' quarterback after the fact. That's why all we can do is look at our past mistakes and constantly improve ourselves.
Otherwise, for BPT, will point out the major and long term trends, however our main focus and where we make the most money is on short term trade ideas lasting anywhere from 3 days to 3 weeks or more. You will make a lot more money making 5% - 20% week after week trading stocks than buying and hold the market in your trading account. Now for you 401k plans, you can do something different of course and try to play the major trends.
thanks for the honest comments, Matt..
Posted by pcordeiro on 16th of Mar 2010 at 02:15 pm
haven't seen many (any) out there do that regarding this unprecedented rally since March. This last push up seems to have broken every Bear's back (well, except saturn6's) - and it's painful. And emotional - - oh, yes. Trust crushing -- oh, yes. And for me, that's the worst - trusting indicators that fail, or whipsaw, or theories (EW) that you trusted were leading you down the right path. My goal is to work with the fewest amount of indicators, along with trendlines, to gain trust back in this whole trading process. Hopefully that, along with BPT's fortitude in guidance, financial woes will be overcome and goals met. Again, thanks for words and re-grouping.
Nice comment
Posted by racerick on 16th of Mar 2010 at 04:37 pm
Title: Thanks for that Matt I
Posted by kalinm on 16th of Mar 2010 at 01:30 pm
I can't speak for everybody, but a pep talk like that is helpful. I also thank you for your honesty in not re-writing the last year's prognostication. On the mental side of things, learning and adapting and realizing that this game is played over a lifetime, not a year, helps me re-focus.
I am having a very difficult time right now dealing with gloating bulls. They are the majority right now and it is making me hate this game. I have a friend who deals with a broker and knows almost nothing about how the markets work. His broker had him "buy and hold" a small basket of stocks (gold and financials) in 2006. He had mostly TD, IAG and PWE. I warned him of the danger of this -- he scoffed at my suggestions. A little over a year ago when his account was down to almost nothing, he "doubled down" in the same names (he borrowed as much money as he could to do so and blindly plowed it into the market at the lows). I'll get an occasional call or email from him asking me what I think about the markets -- meaning he wants to tell me how much he is making in the market. I honestly don't need a lecture on "buying low", "holding for the long term" or "why gold is going to $5000", so I don't even allow myself to speak on the subject.
I have family members trying to reason with me and have me put my money into "a safe mutual fund" and get 10% returns on average per year. Just buy the dips and in x years, you'll have a nice "nest egg". Sorry, off-topic, but certainly a mental part of the game that I'm having trouble with.
One thing that last year
Posted by matt on 16th of Mar 2010 at 02:51 pm
One thing that last year has caused me to focus on is developing longer term mechanical systems for the market. I have my long term 401K system, which I also call the 'watching paint dry system ' because it only gives about 1 trade a year and is boring as hell to traders, however still it's returned about 10 fold higher than just buying and holding the market (140 times your money from 1961 instead of 17 times your money for buy and hold) , the stats go back to 1961 on this system, it has caught every major bull market and bear market and kept you in the bull markets or out of the bear markets. But again, it's like watching paint dry lol.
Also as you have seen, we are developing intermediate mechanical systems that do about 10 - 15 trades a year, these will catch market trends and are true end of days systems i.e the signals come near the market close and therefore trades are entered at the market close only and held for days to weeks.
and of course we will continue to focus more on the watchlist and short term trade ideas and cover less market analysis.
Will you be offering this
Posted by oreo on 17th of Mar 2010 at 08:36 am
Will you be offering this system along with the intermediate systems when you introduce those? I don't mind watching paint dry while CNBC dickers away with excuses for why the market went up or down each day; as long as I know I'm usually on the right side of that.
That's OK Matt, some of
Posted by brophy on 16th of Mar 2010 at 02:59 pm
That's OK Matt, some of us actually ARE long term investor/traders!