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Exponential Growth and 52 Cards

  
Analysis, Education
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Just 52 cards (weeks) with 4 suits (seasons) with 13 cards (weeks) in each season can be shuffled into 400000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 combinations. That’s 4 and 69 0’s.

The Pips (spots on a card) = the number of days in the year for trivia buffs (jacks count 11, Queens 12 and Kings 13).

Oh and here is a mind-fuddling bit of math that I perform with all the time and I’m still shocked that it always works: The Gilbreath Shuffle.

Trade Like a Casino by Richard L. Weissman -Great points to Read

  
  Education
  1. The Casino Paradigm
    1. Developing Positive Expectancy Models
      • Price has memory – traders experienced pain, pleasure, and regret associated with a linear price level
      • Kahneman & Tversky found the reflection effect proved that people were risk-averse regarding choices involving prospects of gains and risk-seeking over prospects involving losses
      • We can NEVER know all the reasons why the market rose or why it fell, but we can develop various rules for entry, exit, and risk management based upon objective, mathematically derived technical formulas
    2. Price Risk Management Methodologies
      • In higher volatility environments we need to place our stops further from our entry price so we can avoid being needlessly stopped out of trades; in lower volatility place stops closer to entry
      • Any idiot can take a profit.  Professionals know how to take losses
    3. Maintaining Unwavering Discipline
      • All humans have a psychological bias against taking losses -Kahneman & Tversky
      • We abandon discipline in risk management because we do not want to admit that we are wrong

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To Make HUGE Profits, You Have To Think SMALL

  
  Education
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Profit abstractThe more i trade, the more i realize that trading with big size is just stupid. Sure, you  will have your occasional huge win. Sure, there are a rare times when trading with size is good to capitalize on ‘easy’ trading setups but i believe that 95% of the time trading with size will surely lead to over trading, micro managing, flinching at the smallest wiggles, lead to emotional decision making, stressful trading and burnout.Trade small positions and you will see how you will think more clearly, you will stay objective, you will stay calm under pressure, you will trade less and ride out bigger
trends for more ‘profits’. Small positions will not bank you the thrilling homerun but they will accumulate into your account at the end of the month/year. Large positions will give you a homerun from time to time and they will eat your lunch from time to time too and at the of the day, you are left wondering ‘what happened’??So, trade small positions and stay unemotional!

Germany Ban Short Selling

  
Analysis, Economy, Education
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Germany’s financial-markets regular said it is banning naked short-selling of certain euro-zone debt and credit default swaps as well as some financial stocks effective at midnight local time, saying “excessive price movements” could endanger the stability of the financial system.

The ban will remain in effect through March 31, 2011. (more…)

Sovereign Debt Estimates

  
Analysis, Economy, Education
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Sovereign debt is a key driver of the current economic jitters. The chart below shows next year’s sovereign debt estimates for the G-7 and other key global economies – the U.S. debt in 2011 would be about equal to GDP ($15 trillion), while the debt loads carried by Japan, Italy and Greece would exceed GDP.

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