winstonsmith

Since the crash of 2008, I've heard many people asking "How on Earth is the market moving up when the economy is on life support?" or "Why have market corrections become so volatile and extreme?" So, I though it might be useful to share a picture, which truly says a thousand words. Trade accordingly and good "luck".

I don't know much about your system, Spookywill; I will have to read a bit further to fully understand it. What caught my eye though, is you said you've been trading for 28 years...and recently blew out an account as recent as 2008. When you nuked your account in '08 (not casting judgement, here either, torched one account myself before) were you using this same system you're now endorsing here? Or, were you you using a different system alltogether?

LOL at the notion of trading - especially daytrading - without a chart.... This is like Mr. Miyagi trying to catch a fly with chopsticks... You might get lucky, but 99.99% of the time, things aren't gonna turn out well.

For day trades, I would second this.....learn how to drive the Volvo first (with paper money first)....then, when ya' get that down packed....consider the Ferrari.... But for swing trades...longer term trades....I advocate avoiding margin (but not leveraged ETFs which essentially have built in margin) alltogether...

When accessing a broker; ask yourself: do they rehypothecate your securites ala MF financial? If the answer is YES....find another broker. I use ThinkorSwim....now owned by TD Ameritade....TD DOES rehypothecate....BUT, their customers aren't on the hook for any losses TD might incur.

Trading isn't an exact science..far from it...that said, there are certain patterns, certain clues which are important when accessing when to enter a trade.... But, these things can change....take right now for example, everyone's (justifiably) fretting over Europe again... So, it's important, very important, to watch yields on sovereign debt....particulary Spain and Italy... And, of course, credit default swaps on sovereign debt.... Bloomberg has all of this data and a treasure trove more, and I pay very close attention to it on a daily basis when trying to get a "pulse" of the market, and give myself a better chance of entering a winning trade...

Aside from some good point's by the OP...the foundation for my trading system is KEEP IT SIMPLE and have FIRM rules in place which you NEVER deviate from (see attachment).

This stat is probably related to day-trading. A lot of NoOb traders believe daytrading is the "easier" method; the less worry-free, less risky technique...so a lot of new people (who frankly don't know what they're doing) get sucked into the allure of type of "fast money" trading, that is neither easy, less risky, nor worry free. Subsequently, they lose their shirts, and become...just another statistic. I myself do know how to daytrade somewhat successfully, and have pretty good system in place; but I don't use it, because of the stress, and the higher probability of failure relative to swing-trading, or trading longer term time frames (my favs).

I occasionally will glance at the RSI/MACD...not because I think they're useful...but because other traders think they are...otherwise, I don't use indicators....unless you want to consider the Fed or the ECB's QE'ing/LTRO'ing (see attachment) as an indicator....if so, then yeah, I use indicators...LOL

A rising wedge pattern is playing out to a "T" right now on crude (my favorite commodity to trade)....I'm not short yet....but have a conditional order in place to buy SCO (if shares of UCO aren't available to short) when /CL reaches $99.50...once crude gets close to, or reaches my target of $85, I'll buy to cover (or sell SCO)....then depending on market conditions...will then go long again

BTW...the mvg avgs on the chart I posted are 6 month (light blue) and 10 month (purple) SMA's..found them quite useful in spotting long term trend changes....

Something is definately brewing with Gold....the monthly chart has formed a near-symmetrical triangle....typically this pattern is indictive of consolidation...and once it plays out....the prior trend (in the case of Gold, an uptrend since late 2008) will resume....that said, anything could happen...it could fall bigtime....or, it could go up bigtime....either way, something BIG is about to take place over the next few months....