Oct

15

From Anatoly Veltman:

I just saw this Weekly SP chart, and it's honestly… Ugly (link).

I can't imagine how we're supposed to be Bullish on such chart. Mock me all you want, I am no buyer here, sorry. I'll probably miss another tremendous growth opportunity.

Victor Niederhoffer comments:

Needless to say my silence about the chart interpretations should not be taken as acceptance. And aside from the ecology of markets, deception, avoidance of fear, relation to music and barbeque and sport, longevity, board games, etc, the whole genesis of this site from its founder was to avoid such mumbo jumbo.

Gary Phillips writes a poem: 

beware of greeks bearing gifts
and single data points
they support a myopic view
and play into the hands of the deceivers

at any given point in time
an equally compelling case
can be forged in either direction
depending on one's bias

the thing about charts
is that they fail to let one see
the markets for what they are,
but instead, for what they appear to be

Kim Zussman writes: 

Charts! Charts!
Like musical Tarts
The more you looks
The more it smarts

So look away
From Siren curves
Or you will get
What you deserves

anonymous writes: 

I refer everyone to Bruce Kovner's quote regarding the utility of charts below. If you have a better track record than he does, then you are entitled to mock his wisdom. I will gladly wager that no one who is reading this comes anywhere close to his long-term, continuous, audited track record.

There is a great deal of hype attached to technical analysis by some technicians who claim that it predicts the future. Technical analysis tracks the past; it does not predict the future. You have to use your own intelligence to draw conclusions about what the past activity of some traders may say about the future activity of other traders.

For me, technical analysis is like a thermometer. Fundamentalists who say they are not going to pay any attention to the charts are like a doctor who says he's not going to take a patient's temperature. But, of course, that would be sheer folly. If you are a responsible participant in the market, you always want to know where the market is – whether it is hot and excitable, or cold and stagnant. You want to know everything you can about the market to give you an edge. Technical analysis reflects the vote of the entire marketplace and, therefore, does pick up unusual behavior. By definition, anything that creates anew chart pattern is something unusual. It is very important for me to study the details of price action to see if I can observe something about how everybody is voting. Studying the charts is absolutely crucial and alerts me to existing disequilibria and potential changes.

Gary Phillips writes: 

Indeed, I look at 22 charts on 4 screens myself. But, what I should have said while in my rush for cynicism, is no one single chart stands out and provides me with a competitive advantage or a forward-looking view of the market; at least not in the time honored edwards and magee kind-of-way. But when charts are related to a broader network of market events, themes, and correlated markets, etc., and provide (to borrow from the chairman) a consilience, then one can assess the departures from value that govern trading opportunities. which is what, I may say, you do so well.

Victor Niederhoffer adds: 

Please forgive my not using the term "armchair speculatons" or "furshlugginer" with reference to all those untested hypotheses and impressionist descriptives but not predictive things about chart movements and also ideas about secular bearish markets when we are within 1% of all time high, and a Dimson 1 buck in 1899 would have risen to 60,000 at present.

Scott Brooks writes: 

I say this respectfully. Vic and I have jousted on this front several times (and I believe the back forth has always been good natured). But my overarching point on secular bear/bull markets is valid to the average investor.

The extreme highs and lows we've experienced since 2000 is all well and good for the speculator who can take advantage of the market ups and downs.

But to the average 401k investor, 2000 - 2013 has been the lost decade (plus 3+ years).

Yeah, they've continued making deposits and benefited from DCA'ing. But for far too many of working class Joe's, there is very little gain outside of deposits.

The trader can benefit from the market movements. Johnny Lunchbucket has no idea what to do except to move his money around chasing last years returns, and after a few years of that, he is just flat out frustrated. Johnny Lunch Bucket and Working Class Joe do not care that the market is near all time highs. What they intuitively know (maybe even only on a subconscious level) is that even though the market is near all time highs, they've lost something far more important–13+ years of time for that their money should have been, but wasn't, compounding.

I'm not trying to be contentious with the Chair….I'm just trying to present a different POV that many on this list never experience….the plight of the average investor.

Gary Rogan comments: 

Scott, the average investor is handicapped by having the urge to sell low. If you sold during the 2008/2009 lows and waited to get in you are certainly left with a very negative impression of the market that feels like a bear market. The only feasible way for an average investor to think about the market is to look at their 45 or so year workspan as the period to evaluate market performance. 13+ years should mean nothing in that frame of reference. Now, if you start investing when you are 55, it means a lot, but you are doing the wrong thing so getting the wrong impression comes with that.

It is true, in my opinion, that the market today is expensive by such measures as total capitalization to GDP ratios. This is somewhat likely to limit returns in the next 15 years although it means very little for the next say 7 years, but within any 45 year period starting from 45 years ago to 45 years into the future market returns are likely to remain close to their historical average (barring a major calamity). The average investor who knows next to nothing should learn this very simple behavior: put a certain percentage of your income into stocks every year, and stop complaining.

Scott Brooks responds: 

The best thing that the middle class working man who who is NOT eligible to invest with top tier money managers (due to accredited investor rules) and is stuck with 15 expensive mutual funds in his 401k or his cousins fraternity brother as a broker or some State Farm guy as his insurance agent, is TIME.

Over time he can make handle the ups and downs. But the fact that the S&P peaked at around 1550 in '00, and is now in 2013 getting ready to hit 1700 means he wasted 13+ years with less than a 1% average annual growth rate. Sure, he picked up a point or two in dividends and maybe benefited from DCA'ing….assuming he wasn't one of the many that stopped putting in money into their 401k's for whatever reason (got scared, saw his pay cut or his job outsourced or his spouse got laid off….or whatever)…..but when you subtract out management fees and 401k fees, he almost certainly netted 1% and maybe less.

That my friends is a secular bear market…..and that's the world that 90% of America has lived in for the last 13+ years.

We gotta remember that people on this list are not like the rest of the country, and it's easy to lose sight of that.

I hope it is clear to everyone that I don't pretend to be something that I'm not. I don't pretend to be a counter or even a trader. I'm a simple man who was raised in a lower middle class world and 90% of my family still lives in that world. I'm not trying to raise anyone's ire with these posts. I'm just trying to shed some light on a subject that is very real…..

And maybe somewhere in my words there is a way to create even more profit for those of us that are blessed with:

1. a brain that works better than 95% of the population and
2. have a burning desire to use that brain to it's fullest.


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2 Comments so far

  1. Ed on October 15, 2013 7:02 pm

    Victor, either knowingly or not, education of a speculator provided the most sound basis for subjective chart interpretation that I have ever read. Go figure.

  2. Orson Terrill on October 18, 2013 11:30 am

    Education of a Speculator guided me away from applying all the technical analysis material I had read before it. It felt liberating; there was something nagging me about reading tarot cards doctored up to look scientific. Those fell away and I enrolled in college, studied economics, mathematics, and applied statistics. I look at charts all the time, on a daily basis, often for hours, but I am only looking for something to test, or when I’m in a trade. Its a quick referencing tool, or even a way of reading the story, and that’s it. The charts I have are meant to deliver me real information. Right now on my screen scatter plot matrices made with R, another recommendation I received from some associates of the Chairman here on this site. Recently I took many financial ratios from Damodoran, another recommendation I was able to get from the Chairman, that are averages for a large portion of publicly traded firms. The very nice correlation between cost of debt and standard deviation of stock price is something you can’t get from a stock price, though you may assume that a company has a high cost of debt because the high standard deviation of its stock price. However, if you don’t know what the cost of debt is doing, then you are still lost. Data, to me, sometimes feels like being in a submarine; frequently you have to come up and look around.

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