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TRADING WISDOM

1. The market expects you to accept losses.  If you want to play in the market you better be prepared to play by the market’s rules.  Accept the losses, make them small based on proper risk parameters, and the market will consider it a tithe.  Just set it aside and help pay for a pew, not the entire church.

2.  The market wants you to admit when you are wrong.  Commit to admit.  If the market is always right, and it is, then go ahead and let the market know NOW that you understand and accept its omnipotence.  Broadcast it to the heavens and to depths of the earth; broadcast it to your friends and family; broadcast it to your neighbors; broadcast it in every chat room you use to brag in.   Let everyone know you will be wrong more often than right and that you are OK with that.  If the market knows you do not mind being wrong the market will leave you alone.

3.  The market will reward your discipline.  Let’s face it, the market is one disciplined son of a gun.  When it says it is going to crush the bears with their death cross and the bulls with their golden cross it does.  When the market says a bearish economic report does not matter I am going higher anyway it will.  When the market says that cute little support line you drew is nothing but “a lead pencil and I am an eraser”, then erasing it will go.  Stick to a discipline of listening to what the market is saying and the market will whisper its direction instead of shouting its lies.

4.  The market is the calculator.  If you are attempting to reach 10 via the calculator, there are many and various ways of getting there:  5+5, 2+8, 15-5, 25 –15, or even  2 + 2 –1 –1 –2 –2 +3 +3 +3 + 3.  When it comes to making money in the market our calculator may want to make it to 10 much quicker than the market does and we may want to add 5 + 5 to get there but be prepared for the market to take its own sweet time adding things up.  If all that matters is getting to 10, then make sure the road you take is paved with minuses along with pluses along the way or all your money will be going to the 5508 (punch this number into your calculator and turn it upside down to see what it spells), which will make the employee a very unhappy and broke individual.

Control Your Emotion or Other People Will Control You

Many people are controlled by fear. Fear of losing an opportunity causes you to act in haste. Fear of losing your paper profit causes you to sell out too early. And fear of losing everything causes you to sell right at the bottom. Although selling right at the bottom is caused more by frustration than anything else, fear also plays a part. How do we overcome these kind of fears? Knowledge is the best weapon. When you know, people cannot scare, frighten or intimidate you. They can’t con you in anyway. Knowledge is your first key to success.
Hope causes you to hold on to a falling stock. Sometimes your hope is rewarded; your stock turns around and you make a profit. Unfortunately, hope often becomes hopeless. Experience tells me that it is much better to keep an uptrend stock and let go a falling one. This strategy is vital, simply because a trend in motion is likely to continue. Hope also causes people to buy into excessively high PE stocks. I prefer what is good today and better tomorrow.  (more…)

The Split Heard Round the World

lnvestors have been clamoring for years and years for Berkshire to split its shares, whether it be the $100,000 A shares or the $3500 B shares.  After voting confirmed the split today, BRK/B shares will be divided into 50 smaller shares tomorrow.  This 50 for 1 split will convert shares to roughly $70.  Berkshire B shares were up $85 yesterday and are up another $130 today.  The bulls are clearly favoring the split and eagerly awaiting its arrival.

Berkshire

Art Huprich’s Market Truisms and Axioms

Raymond James’ P. Arthur Huprich published a terrific list of rules . Other than commandment #1, they are in no particular order:

• Commandment #1: “Thou Shall Not Trade Against the Trend.”

• Portfolios heavy with underperforming stocks rarely outperform the stock market!

• There is nothing new on Wall Street. There can’t be because speculation is as old as the hills. Whatever happens in the stock market today has happened before and will happen again, mostly due to human nature.

• Sell when you can, not when you have to.

• Bulls make money, bears make money, and “pigs” get slaughtered.

• We can’t control the stock market. The very best we can do is to try to understand what the stock market is trying to tell us.

• Understanding mass psychology is just as important as understanding fundamentals and economics.

• Learn to take losses quickly, don’t expect to be right all the time, and learn from your mistakes.

• Don’t think you can consistently buy at the bottom or sell at the top. This can rarely be consistently done.

• When trading, remain objective. Don’t have a preconceived idea or prejudice. Said another way, “the great names in Trading all have the same trait: An ability to shift on a dime when the shifting time comes.” (more…)

legendary speculator Jesse Livermore

legendary speculator Jesse Livermore on LETTING YOUR WINNERS RUN

(Chapter V) … “I think it was a long step forward in my trading education when I realized at last that when old Mr. Partridge kept on telling the other customers, “Well, you know this is a bull market!” he really meant to tell them that the big money was not in the individual fluctuations but in the main movements – that is, not in reading the tape but in sizing up the entire market and its trend.”

In all of “Reminiscences” this crucial idea that the Really Big Money is always earned by prudently riding the large trends over time and not in day trading every minute fluctuation is one of the central themes of the book.

“be right and sit tight”

(Chapter V) … “And right here let me say one thing: After spending many years in Wall Street and after making and losing millions of dollars I want to tell you this: It never was my thinking that made the big money for me. It always was my sitting. Got that? My sitting tight! It is no trick at all to be right on the market. You always find lots of early bulls in bull markets and early bears in bear markets. I’ve known many men who were right at exactly the right time, and began buying and selling stocks when prices were at the very level which should show the greatest profit. And their experience invariably matched mine – that is, they made no real money out of it. Men who can both be right and sit tight are uncommon. I found it one of the hardest things to learn. But it is only after a stock operator has firmly grasped this that he can make big money. It is literally true that millions come easier to a trader after he knows how to trade than hundreds did in the days of his ignorance.” (more…)

Traders Make Decisions based on Probabilities

Most traders take price swings personally. They feel very proud when they make money and love to talk about their profits. When a trade goes against them they feel like punished children and try to keep their losses secret. You can read traders’ emotions on their faces.

Many traders believe that the aim of a market analyst is to forecast future prices. The amateurs in most fields ask for forecasts, while professionals simply manage information and make decisions based on probabilities. Take medicine, for example. A patient is brought to an emergency room with a knife sticking out of his chest – and the anxious family members have only two questions: “Will he survive?” and “when can he go home?” They ask the doctor for a forecast.

But the doctor is not forecasting – he is taking care of problems as they emerge. His first job is to prevent the patient from dying from shock, and so he gives him pain-killers and starts an intravenous drip to replace lost blood. Then he removes the knife and sutures damaged organs. After that, he has to watch against infection. He monitors the trend of a patient’s health and takes measures to prevent complications. He is managing – not forecasting. When a family begs for a forecast, he may give it to them, but its practical value is low. (more…)

Traders Make Decisions based on Probabilities

Most traders take price swings personally. They feel very proud when they make money and love to talk about their profits. When a trade goes against them they feel like punished children and try to keep their losses secret. You can read traders’ emotions on their faces.

Many traders believe that the aim of a market analyst is to forecast future prices. The amateurs in most fields ask for forecasts, while professionals simply manage information and make decisions based on probabilities. Take medicine, for example. A patient is brought to an emergency room with a knife sticking out of his chest – and the anxious family members have only two questions: “Will he survive?” and “when can he go home?” They ask the doctor for a forecast.

But the doctor is not forecasting – he is taking care of problems as they emerge. His first job is to prevent the patient from dying from shock, and so he gives him pain-killers and starts an intravenous drip to replace lost blood. Then he removes the knife and sutures damaged organs. After that, he has to watch against infection. He monitors the trend of a patient’s health and takes measures to prevent complications. He is managing – not forecasting. When a family begs for a forecast, he may give it to them, but its practical value is low. (more…)

Market Truisms and Axioms

• Commandment #1: “Thou Shall Not Trade Against the Trend.”

• Portfolios heavy with underperforming stocks rarely outperform the stock market!

• There is nothing new on Wall Street. There can’t be because speculation is as old as the hills. Whatever happens in the stock market today has happened before and will happen again, mostly due to human nature.

• Sell when you can, not when you have to.

• Bulls make money, bears make money, and “pigs” get slaughtered.

• We can’t control the stock market. The very best we can do is to try to understand what the stock market is trying to tell us.

• Understanding mass psychology is just as important as understanding fundamentals and economics.

• Learn to take losses quickly, don’t expect to be right all the time, and learn from your mistakes. (more…)

The Five Investing Essential Truths

5-number

Markets are notoriously hard to read and people see only what they themselves want to see.

Bulls will find reasons why certain stocks will go higher, while at the same time, Bears will find many reasons for the same stocks to go lower.

The seldom-admitted truth is that most of the time, markets exist in some indeterminate state!

The main thing is that you cannot trust consensus and you cannot rely on the “Establishment.”

You can’t find refuge in the herd and you must resist the urge to join the crowd.

Your passion of the moment will most certainly create a disaster over the years!

On the other hand, if you do stick with the following five essential truths, you do stand a better than average chance to invest profitably:

1. Markets are unpredictable and ill-suited to forecasts.

2. Long-term fundamentals are key.

3. Investor emotion leads to volatility.

4. Valuation discipline should guide investment selection.

5. Perspective and patience are always well rewarded.

 

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