Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Coaching Call Week 7

On today's call Rob showed me a number of cool things. By far the coolest thing was the correlation between the MACD and the NDX (NASDAQ-100) during basically all of 2005. Check it out for yourself. Pull up a chart for NDX in 2005 and watch where you would enter and exit trades when the MACD crosses. I told you that was cool. Also notice that this strategy would not do well for you in 2006.

After that fascinating study, we reviewed some intraday charts to look for volume spikes. Paying attention to volume spikes helps you spot a great ground-floor entry to capture a bit more on the move. This does require being in front of the computer during market hours and I'm sure some practice to get down pat.

The volume spikes lead us to looking at Institutional Intent. We used The Trade Center software to pull up information on Institutional ownership and intent. You can get directly to I-Watch by clicking here. It seems pretty obvious that it is wise to heed what the big players are doing and I-Watch aids in discovering what the institutions are up to.

We then looked through my fledgling trading journal and my hotwatch lists. He provided me with some valuable feedback on the stocks that I had in my watchlist, in particular the bulls hotwatch folder. Honestly, I had some stocks in my hotwatch folder that did not belong there. It's great to have someone to give me that sort of feedback. My bears hotwatch list was far better than my bulls hotwatch and although my bulls hotwatch was embarrassing, it was great to have someone give me that feedback and keep me on track.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Mark, I am following your progress. I am so glad I found your web page. I attended a three day Teach Me To Trade seminar - a little over a week ago and I was overwhelmed with information and high sales pitching. I decided to wait and find out more information about these courses before signing up. In hindsight, for a new person, can you recommend what classes-level you think would be good for a new student without exhausting their financial resources? Keep up the great work!

taocode said...

Hi Lois in Florida,

That is a great question... I'm only midway through the courses I've bought from Teach Me To Trade and am very pleased with my experience thus far. The answer is highly subjective. I think the less you can spend to get started and see ROI, the better off you are and the less you have at risk. Trading isn't for everyone. If you complete your initial training and discover that it just doesn't work for you, the less you spend for that training, the less you have risked. Not exactly a profound statement I know...

With that said, I don't think anybody who is serious about trading will just walk away after learning (and paying for) what Teach Me To Trade teaches. I am of the opinion that, if you're serious, you'll learn your style of trading and get back your ROI. It may take a while to get there, but sticking to it and really treating it as a business with time commited to analyzing, opening, and managing positions will improve your success rate.

What's the minimum I think would get me trading successfully? 1) Master Trader, 2) Trading P.I.T., 3) coaching program, and 4) time with mentor.

I'm loving the calls with my coach and see this as a terrific way to becoming a practicing trader with feedback and guidence on the application of what I've learned. I'm also fond of supplementing TMTT's teaching with the books I've mentioned in my blog. I'll write up more about these books as I read more and have some time to write up my thoughts.

Anonymous said...

What is the difference between coaching and mentoring.

taocode said...

My understanding is that the difference is primarily that the Mentor is someone you spend a couple days with during market hours, whereas a coach is someone whom you have 16 weekly calls. I've attempted to answer this question in a bit more depth in the previous coaching call post comments: Coaching Call Week 6.

Anonymous said...

Hi Mark....

You and I are in a similar position as far as TMTT. I've taken the three day initial class and then signed up for MasterTrader and Advanced Covered Calls and the coaching of course. I'm taking first Master Trader in Orlando on Sept. 20...but studying constantly in my books and on-demand. And paper trading like crazy...some good, some not so much. I've had two coaching sessions so far too.

I have a thought......I've watched the little old ladies on TV forming "trading groups"...and if two heads are better than one and you and I both have coaches ( who will approach things differently ) then four heads are better than two.

Want to start forming a "trading group" where we share ideas and coaching info ? Not a big group...just maybe the two of us to start as we " get it"........here's my personal e-mail as I don't for sure get the blog contact thing. info@lindabrown.net