jbarnby

Lastly, for any of you (except Mandelbrot) still hard at work trying to put together the pieces of this method - I would be happy to give you my time this summer. I typically don't trade as much during the summer months as I enjoy spending the days with my son, so I have quite a bit of free time. I maintain several blogs on this method and would be delighted to share this information with anyone serious about learning. But I will not share any further info on this thread. It's not worth the hassle. There is no charge - this is completely free and will only require your time and dedication to learning. If interested, send me a private message along with any questions you have regarding my experience/knowledge. Best to all.

I SAID blue equals red. You are the one who CLEARLY disputed it when you asserted that one is a FF and one is a Traverse. What are YOU not getting? I was obviously misguided when I read some of your post from May 2015 and assumed you were still struggling and/or had unanswered questions. Clearly you have it all under control and are prepared to lead the learning for those still working to resolve issues. I wish you well and won't clutter your thread any further. But for those of you still learning, Mandelbrot's assertion that Increasing volume over a sym pen is just that is absolutely incorrect. Increasing volume following a formation MUST be compared to the first bar of the formation. Spyder never published that information in this thread - but he said it to our group a hundred times. You can bank on that being the absolute truth.

You disputed it. You implied that the red container was demoted because what preceded it was a ff. Your words, not mine.

Not exactly correct. Volume LEADS price. You need both to determine equality. No exceptions. And for the record, the blue and red containers are absolutely equal and of the same fractal. Volume moves price through the blue container with pts 1,2,3 ftt and a completed volume cycle. Price then exits that container and builds a FF container down to 1035. The first (skinny red) container is not equal to the blue. It has pts 1,2,3 ftt but no volume cycle. We have an implied R2R achieved from crossing the blue RTL, but no increasing volume within that container to complete the cycle. 1025 is actually decreasing volume because volume must be tested against the first bar of the sym pen (1015). As such, one knows with absolute certainty that the skinny red container is a faster fractal than the blue. And as further price/volume action develops one also knows that we will require THREE of these ff containers, each of them with pts 1,2,3 ftt, to complete the slower red container. The slower red container is indeed absolutely equal to the blue. I've no doubt that some of you will debate the assertions made in the preceding paragraph. I could care less. The reality is that these facts came directly from Spyder during an hour long video chat with myself and my study partner five years ago. It is what it is and there's no other (correct) way to view the market.

http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/technical-analysis/6320-price-volume-relationship-46.html#post96963 One of my favorite posts from Spydertrader. He may not have discussed some of these items much (or at all) in this thread, but he certainly did (a lot) off the thread during one-on-one's.

I have traded it full time for quite some time now, but your question is a difficult one. All of the elements work together in harmony, so I'm not sure how one would go about breaking it down into pieces of useful information that would successfully stand alone. (although I think Mr. Black did this to some extent - if you remember him) The volume sequences you reference (b2b2r2b & r2r2b2r) are absolutely essential in knowing when the order of events has reached completion. But, it's more complex than just tracking these volume sequences. Peaks/troughs, lower troughs/higher peaks, dom direction vs nondom direction - these elements all factor in to analyzing volume as we look for continuation vs completion. Volume, however, doesn't function exclusively on it's own. We have to know when/if we can use volume within laterals, the type of lateral, did price break the lat boundary, volume following formation patterns (Spyder's ten cases), etc. Then there's the analysis of containers in which price travels from one point to another. Knowing when to fan a container, when to accel a container, what to do if you get a VE, all of these things play a critical role imho. Spyder taught us that the market is fractal, but I found that hard to see until I clearly understood the relationship of trendlines to price/volume. Essentially, I believe the most important element for me is volume. If I were forced to only use one component it would definitely be volume sequencing. The downside to that is that many of those trades would result in wash trades if/when I discovered that the volume sequence was going to repeat (continuation instead of change).

So I assume you are a skilled trader since (according to you) none of them give a crap. My goodness....and all this time I thought it was possible to be a good trader AND also provide a service. Thanks for opening my eyes! BTW, since you're so sure you'll get a download of my class, then I'm sure you already have several hundred recordings of my other classes in your possession. Hope you enjoyed them.

Good question. When I first started out I didn't charge a dime. My first student, who was a long-term friend, still trades with me in my Skype room every day. He's done well. BUT, I learned something important during that first training experience. This stuff is not easily transferred. And I ended up causing him much confusion, answering his questions with riddles, etc...much like many of us experienced with Spyder. It was not effective for either of us. Later on, after my success, other friends started crawling out of the woodwork. (don't they always?) I realized that with a family, an elderly mother who lives with us, and young children that needed a lot of my attention, that I couldn't possibly continue training in the same manner. This is where I broke away from Spyder's teaching methods and developed my own system/syllabus for teaching. I have and maintain a blog for each class, I give regular homework assignments which are graded BY HAND and returned to the student, I hold regular Skype meetings where we take time to walk thru the assignments and I demonstrate the thought process/analysis that one should be considering as each bar develops thru the day. And yes, MANY of my students have watched me trade live right here in my home. I pour maybe 20-30 hrs a week into training. And we not only discuss the method, we discuss the value of entry/exit points, high risk vs low risk analysis, trade sizing, etc. It goes far far beyond anything that is presented here on TL or other forums. Maybe you should ask my new student who profited over $10,000 in the months of June/July this summer if it was worth his time. I know his answer. You call me a scam - so be it. Truthfully it doesn't matter to me what you or anyone else here thinks of my method for doing this. The only opinions that matter to me are those of the students who have worked with me and those that I have helped. edit: And of course I make more money trading it than teaching it. But unfortunately I'm not skilled enough to do both at the same time. If I'm going to teach it, then each student deserves my full attention. We don't just annotate random days - each assignment is chosen for a very specific reason - to learn something that they can (and will) use again over and over. But I also place a high value on my personal time. Since most of the work around my training is in the evenings, I consider there to be a value on that time that it takes away from my family. If someone doesn't understand that value - then they can certainly choose to look elsewhere. No harm done.

The track record exists in the many students who have studied my program, and those they have referred. Beyond that I have no motivation to prove or disprove anything to you or anyone else. As for Todd and Jack passing it on for free - I think the track record of "failure to succeed" for most of those students is quite obvious. Furthermore, if you think I'm going to give up three weekends with my family out of the goodness of my heart, you would be incorrect. Maybe you should contact Spyder. I'm more than happy to step aside if he's willing to offer the same to you for free. Quite a few folks have already signed up. As for you getting your hands on a copy. Good luck with that. Best to you in your journey.

Hey folks - I continue to receive so many private messages for request to answer questions about this method, fractals, etc. And as many of you know i'm teaching my final class at this time. So what I'm considering is the possibility of a three-wknd Saturday (or Sunday) skyped seminar sometime in October? I'm thinking perhaps 5-6 hrs/day for three consecutive Saturdays? If there is any interest please PM me. Thx

Actually, it's not relevant or helpful. Try re-reading from May 2010 thru October 2010.

right, right.....thanks for pointing this out. Now I realize all of my success has been a fluke. Guess I'd better hang it up.

Oh c'mon man - google it or ask your broker.

I find volume supplied by TradeNavigator to be very pure and accurate. No complaints and I've used them for years. Couldn't do this without it.

To expand on what EZ said - building equal containers isn't always obvious, or at least doesn't always appear obvious. Let's say the market gives you a dominant container. The events that happen within that container suggest if it's "on" or "below" your fractal. Is the container built from three faster things? If so, are THEY equal, and so on. Also important is how price/volume moves between the points of said container. Are there laterals, if so what kind, do they begin on an ftt or a ve? Does market pace play a role? etc etc. The market cannot reach pt 3 of your trading fractal unless and until it builds an EQUAL nondominant container. Equal being the key word. You can't just look at price. You can't just look at volume. And you can't just examine pts 1,2,3 ftt. I have seen subfractal building block tapes go on for more than a day, and I have also seen traverses complete in a few short hours. Looks are deceiving and, for some, it can take years to refine that process. In my opinion, after years of study followed by great success, I cannot see how this method could ever be successfully transferred via a trading blog thread. I've sacrificed a huge chunk of my personal life in recent years, mentoring students in small groups or one-on-one, and even with that personal attention the process is long, tedious, and frustrating for most everyone. (about to wind down the mentoring process in 2014) Finally, some may not realize that even Spyder changed his approach to fractal integrity mid-stream during this very thread. (You think maybe there was a reason he discouraged gucci and others from referencing older charts?) While basics of the method, x2x2y2x, ve's, etc can be found early in this thread as well as on on other forums, I've repeatedly stated where the real meat is located. IMO older threads are a waste of time. Period. Nothing within TL is going to supply you with all of the answers, but if you can dissect the basics, and think outside the box, you have some chance of making progress over time.