How Markets Move

Quite simply a market can do two things.  The conventional thought is that financial markets can either go up or down.  From a traders perspective the two things are TREND or OSCILLATE.  From this the trader knows two things.  First if a market is oscillating it will inevitable breakout and begin trending.  Second, if it is trending is will eventually begin oscillating.  While these concepts are simple, the difficulty comes in the realization that in the dynamic environment of trading, all four things are happening simultaneously on different time frames.

More on this later.

Mr. Pipman

The Best Technical Indicator

In real estate investing they say there are three rules; location, location, location.  Similarly, in trading and technical analysis there are also three rules; price movement, price movement, price movement.  In many of the publications I have read on technical analysis, somewhere in the early chapters the author states that the most important indication for predicting price movement is price movement itself.  This is then followed by several if not all the remaining chapters focusing on technical indicators ranging from A to Z.  Somewhere is the rhetoric the importance of price movement is lost. 

Do you want to learn to become a day trader?  If so study three things, price movement, price movement and price movement.

Mr. Pipman

Swing Trading the Emini

The Emini (SPX mini futures at 50 to 1) is moving up in waves.  If a standard 12/26/9 MACD is applied to the weekly price chart we can see that a price move of 150 to 350 point price move accompanies a cross higher.  The key comes in anticipating the cross and managing trades prior to the cross.