Today we sit down with the newest (and likely youngest) Chartered Market Technician (CMT) Mr. Tom Bruni live from Washington Square Park in New York City. The CMT program is different today than what it was 12-13 years ago when I first went through it. I wanted to pick Tom's brain about his experience and what advice he has for others thinking about sitting for the exams.
Market Breadth means a lot of things to a lot of people. The way I see it, we're analyzing a market of stocks. There are a variety of tools to help us do that including the Advance-Decline Line, List of new highs & lows and the percentage of stocks getting overbought or oversold, which can be calculated in many ways. Today I'm joined by Andrew Thrasher in a video we shot earlier this month in New York. It's an important topic and I'm glad we had the chance to discuss it.
How come we never hear that in the financial media? Because they don't want you to say that.
How come we never hear that from the sell side analysts? Because the institutional customer will just call another desk at another firm with an analyst that has an opinion, and they will get the trade and earn the commission.
As humans, we're just not built for this. It's hard to admit you're wrong and move on. But the truth is that none of us know what is going to happen next, especially in the market. So to admit that you don't know is not only okay, but is actually fact.
In this video I sit down with David Keller to discuss this very topic:
Have you ever heard that the stock market cannot go higher on an absolute basis if the Equally-Weighted S&P 500 is underperforming its Cap-Weighted counterpart. Does this measure of market breadth have any predictive value with respect to market direction? What about the sectors themselves? Well, we've run the numbers and the answer is no!
Are you guys using Koyfin yet? If not, I suggest you start.
Koyfin is my favorite new financial data and analytics platform. It seems like every day I learn about a new feature that helps me throughout my process. It's so easy to use and everyone I speak to loves the product.
Full disclosure, we're investors in the company. But we're investors for a reason. The product is amazing and I believe founder Rob Koyfman is creating a ton of value to our community, and not just technical analysts but everyone.
Last week I was at the CMT Symposium in New York and had a chance to chat with Rob so he could explain exactly what Koyfin is and some of the new features that they will be rolling out this quarter.
In today's video I sit down with Phil Pearlman to discuss Phone Addiction. Many of us are unaware and even more people don't even care to be aware. Is it the power that we have in our phones? Or do the phones have the power over us? Phil offers some advice on this front and shares what he's been doing.
I've been talking markets with Liz Claman for the better part of the last decade. Whenever I'm in New York, I like to swing by the FOX studios to say hello. This week we discussed the relative strength in Semi's and how I think they will lead stocks and the S&P500 to new all-time highs.
I'm in New York this week for the annual CMT Association Symposium. I always learn so much at this event, not just from the presentations, but from the attendees themselves. A lot of smart folks in one room is a win for all of us.
Tuesday I was up at the Nasdaq to chat with Catherine Murray about the S&P500, my favorite Semiconductor names and where we are in Canadian Equities and Crude Oil.
Sean and I have known each other for over a decade but there are still things he's interested in learning about my experiences. In this video, Sean asks me how playing baseball made me a better trader or investor. The key takeaways here are:
1) Hard Work and Mental Toughness
2) Preparation and knowing what you will do under any circumstance
3) Learning how to lose. If you fail 70% of the time on the diamond, you get inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Being able to take a loss and move on is part of the path to success.
We have to play the cards we're dealt. Like it or not, this is the environment we're forced to invest in, but only if you want to. You don't have to invest. Cash has been a viable option for 6 months. It's worked out great. Most stocks, sectors, US and International Indexes are still below their January 2018 highs. I can give you the exact numbers like we provide for our Institutional Customers, but just take my word for it. It's not even close. We've been in a 14-month sideways range, or downtrend, depending on who you ask. Either way, it's not an uptrend for most stocks.
Now, this 14-month nothing burger comes within the context of a major bull market in stocks, that arguably started in 2016. After a monster run throughout 2016 and 2017, the stock market, both U.S. and abroad, has consolidated those gains. It seems perfectly normal, and well deserved, if you ask me.
Do you live on the East coast and ever wonder what it would be like to be a trader on the West coast? Could you handle working on a much different schedule? In today's video, we chat with my pal Mehmet Gunay who I met during his time at SMB Capital when I lived in New York City. Today, he lives in San Francisco and seems to have adjusted pretty well to the time change and lifestyle. I would have to agree with him. I enjoy the west coast hours much better than when I lived in New York. The ability to do things after work with plenty of sun light left is very appealing.
We might be in a rangebound market for stocks, but one thing is for sure: the trend for Technical Analysis is up.
I've had a front row seat to the growth of this discipline and its practitioners for the past 15 years, since first starting my journey. I was half way through John Murphy's Technical Analysis of Financial Markets when I knew this was for me. Things only became more clear after that. As I read through Edwards & Magee and many other books, the way markets behaved just started making more and more sense.
