Editor’s note: The MTA’s Annual Symposium always brings together the best minds in technical audience as speakers and attendees. This year’s event, held at the end of March, was no different. Each speaker presented useful trading ideas and attendees left the event with dozens of testable and practical ideas. In this article I am highlighting just a few of the many great insights into technical analysis that I heard over the two days. In the coming weeks, all presentations will be available online so that all MTA members can benefit from the speakers. We will also feature more about the Symposium in future issues of Technically Speaking. Beyond the Benchmark: Applications for Active Investment Management offered attendees a chance to explore how top money managers outperform the market. Conference presentations showcased unparalleled industry experience and included discussions on how some of the best in the industry implement disciplined approaches to investing

Editor’s note: this is an extract of an article that was originally published in Issue 8 of the MTA Journal in May 1980. The original article includes several other examples of board bottom configurations which are also known as “big bases.” Low Risk vs. High Risk The Investor vs. The Speculator The Conservative Approach vs. The Aggressive Approach Broad Bottom Configuration vs. Relative Strength / Momentum Back in the early 1960s this writer interviewed George Chestnutt of American Investors. “Bill,” he said, “how do you pick next year’s winners?” “Well,” I explained, “I’d look for a breakout of a big base pattern and then I would buy the stock as it settled back on top of that broad bottom.” “Fine,” he said, “you’ll probably do a bit better than average. Top performance will come, however, by buying last year’s winners.” I had to give that some thought–and I have pondered that statement ever since. As we

When you are one of the best in the world at what you do, you probably don’t do things like most people. Our honored guest and presenter at the February 19, 2015 Puget Sound MTA meeting, Ed Seykota, certainly doesn’t do things like most people. We had around 100 attendees at this meeting for the opportunity to meet and hear from one of the original Market Wizards brought to the investment and trading public’s awareness in Jack Schwager’s classic book, Market Wizards; Interviews with Top Traders (NYIF, 1989). Ed Seykota is a long term trend follower trading automated systems that he builds. From Jack Schwager’s interview; “He conceived and developed the first commercial computerized trading system for managing clients’ money in the futures markets”. Our evening with Ed Seykota was covered in three sections. When the parts are understood and merged together, what Ed presented was a roadmap of the markets, based on

Editor’s note: this article was originally published in the Winter 2015 issue of Financial Executive magazine and is reprinted here with permission. Without risk none of us would make any money in the markets, but managing trading risk is a lot more complicated that one might like. Often risk limits are set arbitrarily. Risk is impacted by trader performance, units traded, the typical risk per trade, and whether the risk per trade is statistically appropriate, or too high, or too low.  If the risk is too low that means you constantly see your stops hit and exceeded, only for the market turn back in your favor. If the risk is too high, you will stay in losing positions too long, and give up too much on profitable exits. Proper stops cannot be placed purely on one’s comfort level, or budget, but are dictated by market conditions and volatility. Step One: Understanding

Editor’s note: this was originally published at the Global Financial Data blog and is reprinted here with permission. Global Financial Data has stock histories for over 50,000 securities.  Some of these stocks cover centuries of data; others are quite short, lasting only a few months or even a few days.  One of the most interesting of these is Wilt Chamberlain’s Restaurants, Inc. for which there are only two days of data. Wilt the Stilt Wilt Chamberlain was one of the greatest, some would argue the greatest, basketball players in history.  He holds 71 NBA records, and he is the only person to score 100 points in a single game. He averaged more than 40 to 50 points per game in some seasons, and in one season he played every minute of every game. Chamberlain was 7-foot 1-inch and played for the University of Kansas, Harlem Globetrotters, the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors, Philadelphia 76ers and