Quote from marketsurfer:
it's popular therefore it works? am i understanding the gist of your argument? yeah, its popular. the PUBLIC loves TA--- looks like easy money, witness the new e.signal advertisments as an example... why is the HERD normally wrong, if your argument is correct? something is amiss here.....
the success of many mechanical systems?? surely you jest!
simply stated---the market moves in the direction of the most money pushing it. this can be one person with the proliferation of monster capital pools aka hedge funds OR many people. So, TA can predict when a group of or single fund will decide to buy/ sell a particular instrument? Come on, dude, your not that naive'. today, one person can hold the market rocking power that 1000's did back when dow theory/TA was first applied....its a different environment man, totally different.
TA divisions are generally part of funds MARKETING departments...TA sells, it seems to make sense therefore its used to illustrate the PAST to the clients of the fund OR of the news outlet. people LOVE pretty pictures.
surf
See what I mean folks?...
I NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT TECHNICAL ANALYSIS MAKING ANY PREDICTION, WE MAKE THE PREDICTION BASED ON THE history of the price action itself made clearer by the use of Technical Analysis...
The purpose of trading is to make money. The purpose of Technical analysis is as an aid to where the money is flowing. Contrary to your opinion it does indeed matter that many use it because a Trader is always trying to move WITH the HEARD not against it, as such whether we like it or not we must therefore concern ourselves at least in part to what people are doing.. is that simple as a point of principle.
Mechanical systems work (not many traders are effective but they work, and many Investment banks use Algorithmic trading in many guises but they are in basic form Technical Analysis based trading systems, Tradestation has been around for a long time and has a reasonably high penetration as an institutional platform when compared to many other platforms.... Man... what is the matter with you?
Also I never said anything about technical analysis itself doing any predicting, rather it described what happened and what IS... Prediction is an extrapolation of what was and IS by the Trader NOT necessarily Technical Analysis.
No one method works easily, even Technical Analysis is a difficult discipline to interpret and understand, my point is that you seem to dismiss it as even being popular or in use by a large number of even Retail traders and investors. I had my initiation to Technical Trading From two huge names, Chuck Mellon and AJ Monte and they introduced me to Technical Analysis as a Momentum Trader and they are worth money and yet you continue to deny this?.. man no more of this nonsense...PLEASE.. your replies are just hot air..look how many posts you've made ... its a wonder you have any time to trade... If you Trade at all that is....
Technical Analysis will provide me an edge in that it is of course impossible to predict accurately, but if you deny that the ARMS index, MACD, RSI, CCI, WADX, DMI, Lines of support and Resistance, TIKI TRINQ, 50 and 200 day moving average somehow are irrelevant as an aid to understand market sentiment currently so I can then make my own market perditions then you are a fool.. pure and simple...
I assert once more... your modus-Operandi here is becoming Transparent. You are playing the Devils Advocate. I just cannot believe that you could be so "stupid" and belligerent in the face of so much evidence.
Im all done here folks... its a shame really the argument needs to move on to which T.A techniques are better suited to particular time frames..e.g. MACD is a lagging indicator not a lading one and which timeframes do Traders find it suitable / unsuitable..etc etc... this is where we should be by now...
As such I wont answer more replies on this issue untill we can move this one along a bit...
sorry but, we both know this is right mate..