Tools for reading market character
One important question for discretionary traders to consider is how to weigh objective and subjective elements in technical analysis. Some things are simple and clear, which is one reason that…
Reading trend strength through patterns
There are patterns in market prices that can point to trading opportunities and potential profits. This is one of the fundamental assumptions of technical/tactical trading (and can be verified by…
MarketLife Ep 13 – My macro process
Process--it doesn't sound exciting, but it's maybe the most important part of what we do. In fact, it's the Holy Grail in trading: having something you can replicate year after…
Five steps to a successful investment process
It's easy to make money in the market. Anyone can place a winning trade; no expertise, experience, knowledge, or edge is possible. It's not so easy to make money in…
MarketLife Ep 12 – How to read a chart
A_Joe wrote to ask me for some thoughts on how to read a chart. Here is his question: A Quote goes "People See What They Have Learnt to See". Would Request to…
The importance of reading inside the bars
One skill that is often overlooked in chart reading is the ability to look at a bar on a chart and to infer what price action might have created that…
An easy way to avoid some losses
I can get right to the punchline, and make this a very short blog post: don't trade when the market you trade is in consolidation; more specifically, do not trade…
A new look at measuring trend days
For intraday traders, trend days can offer outsized rewards. For some styles of traders, much of the work of trading is focused on capturing trend days, and most of the…
MarketLife Ep 11 – Managing the emotions of trading
Trading is hard, but it's even harder because our emotions so often work against us. In this episode, I look at some ideas for managing emotions and putting them to…
Maybe it’s the map?
I wrote a post late last week on the value of admitting what we don't know. I made some arguments about the dangers of false confidence, and the errors we…
The hardest words to say
We live in a world where most of our basic needs are fulfilled; most of us have food and water, we have a sense of safety and security, a sense…
Bullish setups in US stock indexes
I've been writing about this for quite a while, tweeting about it, pointing out the relative strength in smaller cap names, constructive sector flows, volatility compression that could support a…
A look at my new book: Quantitative Analysis of Market Data: a Primer
I want to take a few moments and share some information on the new little book I have released. First, it is exactly what the title says: it is a…
MarketLife Ep 10 – Tuning out negativity and fear
In this episode: Tony C asks: How to tune out negativity and fear from the media? Understand the nature of media-driven information: It's constant and emotionally charged. The media has…
Could stocks be ready to break out? What’s your plan?
Group-think is a problem in markets; so many smart people look at the same (pretty limited) set of information, so it's easy to understand why many people come to similar…
Ready to rumble? Is the US Dollar set for another breakout?
To trade or invest successfully, we have to think one step ahead of the market, but we have to discipline ourselves not to act early. We also must strike a…