Entries by Peter Brandt

2016 Update – U.S. health care: Highest in the world in cost, 37th in performance. This system has already been declared guilty.

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Trading and the U.S. healthcare system — these are the two issues for which I am most passionate about. Trading — because it is how I made and continue to make my living. The healthcare system — because of a major accident I had in 1984, this has made the cost and delivery of healthcare a focus of my life….This blog was originally posted on March 12, 2012 during the height of the U.S. national debate over healthcare reform and Obamacare….

Something To Watch – Crude Oil — Developing Trade

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Crude Oil -- Developing Trade

The weekly continuation graph (Crude Oil) continues to form a possible 14-month inverted H&S bottom pattern and is flagged as a Developing Trade possibility.  Notice that the right shoulder has taken the form of a possible symmetrical triangle on both the continuation and Dec contract charts. A close by the Dec contract above 49.00 would represent a buy signal, although diagonal patterns (symmetrical triangles included) lack reliability. Factor is flat.

 

A bearish technical case for Gold

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Remember three things as you read this:

  • An opinion is not a position and a position is not necessary an opinion
  • I deal in possibilities, not probabilities and certainly not certainties
  • A chart pattern does not become a pattern until it is completed -- and even then it may fail

Summary

A bearish chart case can be made for Gold based on five factors.

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Trading Psychology – The Human Side of Trading

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Overcoming self and mastering Trading Psychology is an individual struggle – this is why consistent long-term traders have developed a tremendous and unbiased awareness of self. When I came into the trading business in the mid-1970s there was a saying around the Chicago Board of Trade that went something like this … “If you want to know yourself – all your insecurities, character faults, issues of pride, areas of greed or selfishness, unresolved traits, etc. – just become a trader. How true! Self-awareness and managing the Human Side of Trading is a hallmark of every great trader I have known over the years.

Factor Member Monthly Webinar – Sep 22nd

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Recorded live September 22, 2016

Discussion Points

  • Edge - The nature of a trading scheme that provides it with the ability to carve out beta against its appropriate benchmark universe
    • Classical chart patterns - in and of themselves - provide no meaningful trading edge - in fact, no trade identification mechanism provides a meaningful edge
    • Win rate - in and of itself - provides no meaningful trading edge
  • Factor’s Edge - Factor’s edge is attributable to four primary things
  1. An emotional separation from the need to be right
  2. Aggressive risk and trade management protocols resulting in many non-injurious losses - protecting trading capital in the SINGLE DOMINATE PRIORITY
  3. Identifying and committing to very selective highly asymmetrical reward-to-risk trades
  4. Allowing the odds to provide a few trades that work immediately and provide profits of 350 to 450 plus basis points each
  • Soybean Oil - Walking through the trade

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Sample Member Q&A’s

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Here at Factor, we receive so many great questions covering Risk Management, Trade Management, Classical Charting Principles, The process of Trading, and the Human Aspect of Market Speculation. As followers of our public blog, we wanted to share just a handful of these Q&A’s with you.