Quote from ElectricSavant:
So a swing point could be a reaction to news and not necessarily Technical Analysis...?
ES
A swing point can be a reaction to anything assuming your use of the word news implies anything.
However, lets pretend a swing point occurred via a key economic report being released at 10am est (e.g. consumer confidence report). That's a a reaction to economic event but if you're using a
chart to visualize that swing point...you're using TA.
Yet, I do know there's a camp of traders out there (I'm not one of them) that believes they aren't using TA even though there doing chart analysis. In fact, many of EliteTrader's well known TA bashers do chart analysis via the facade
"it's for visualization purposes only" while having no impact on their trade decisions.
Therefore, I strongly believe if someone is using a chart for anything...they're using technical analysis because the nature of a chart is technical. However, if someone can make trade decisions without using a chart or doesn't believe in TA...I would then say that's a trader not using technical analysis and shouldn't be using a chart for anything.
However, it can get messy in the definition if someone is using "quote screens only" (no charts) with special tools that show where the key levels "were recently at or currently at"...I would lean to the side that such is not using TA depending upon what type of tools are being used. Therefore, in most cases, using "quote screens only" is true tape reading or tape analysis that's not involved in TA.
As you can see, any of the above is an easy debatable topic when trying to
define s/r, chart analysis, tape analysis or TA.
Mark