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Don’t Compare Yourself to a Fund

Posted on by Michael Covel

Feedback in:

Hi Michael,

I’ve been listening to all your podcasts–an episode-a-day while driving to work. It’s full of great interviews and I’ll try to get your word out to my world as much as I can.

After listening to your Martin Bergin episode I found myself asking a question. And this is what I want to ask you: is it necessary to use automated (computer-run) systems to follow trends in these days or can it still be done manually by retail investors like me?

I’m not math-phobic but am no PhD in Math either. I do have a computer but it’s a plain old Macbook Pro and not a blackbox kind of supercomputer!

Please help, as I’m struggling to hear how a retail trader can effectively but manually follow trends.

Keep the flag flying!

Warm Rgds
[Name]

Please don’t compare yourself to a billion dollar fund (see Turtle story)! You can absolutely keep track of trades as a retail trader via a spreadsheet (EXCEL or paper). Mind you: you are trading end of day (no day trading) and or end of week bars. That is a very straightforward tracking issue. Can you make it pretty and fancy with automation software? Sure. Do you have to do that? No.

How can you move forward immediately to Trend Following profits? My books and my Flagship Course and Systems are trusted options by clients in 70+ countries.

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Trend Following is for beginners, students and pros in all countries. This is not day trading 5-minute bars, prediction or analyzing fundamentals–it’s Trend Following.

Ep. 269: Robert Aumann Interview with Michael Covel on Trend Following Radio

Posted on by Michael Covel
Robert Aumann
Robert Aumann

My guest today is Robert Aumann, the fourth Nobel Prize winner to appear on this podcast. Aumann is an Israeli-American mathematician, and a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences. He is a professor at the Center for the Study of Rationality in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel.

The topic is game theory.

In this episode of Trend Following Radio we discuss:

  • Conflict and cooperation through game theory analysis
  • World via his game theory perspective
  • Meeting John Nash and Aumann’s early background
  • What game theory is trying to accomplish
  • The economic definition of rationality
  • The idea of a strategy matrix
  • The world champions of peace and the best way to maintain peace
  • The 2008-09 bailouts from Aumann’s perspective and a game theory outlook
  • Behavioral economics
  • Game theory, diplomats, and the Cuban Missile Crisis
  • The existence of nuclear weapons and the Cold War

Listen to this episode:

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Singapore Calling!

Posted on by Michael Covel

Feedback in:

Dear Michael:

Having just recently finished ‘The Complete Turtle Trader’, I must commend you on a very informative (& readable) analysis on the development, success & continued relevance of the original Turtle program. For guide, I am based in Singapore as part of [Name] derivative trading team. As you spend a fair bit of time in the region, it would be a pleasure to meet for lunch (or dinner) on your next stay here.

Regards,
[Name]

Next time, 100%.

photo

How can you move forward immediately to Trend Following profits? My books and my Flagship Course and Systems are trusted options by clients in 70+ countries.

Also jump in:

• Trend Following Podcast Guests
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Performance
• Research
• Markets to Trade
• Crisis Times
• Trading Technology
• About Us

Trend Following is for beginners, students and pros in all countries. This is not day trading 5-minute bars, prediction or analyzing fundamentals–it’s Trend Following.

“Listen, I surrender, you beat me Mr. Market, now where do you want to go?”

Posted on by Michael Covel

Feedback in:

Hey Michael,

Recently I started listening to your podcast and have been researching a bit of what you have been saying. I find your podcast I be extremely informative. I think sometimes it’s the kind of kick in the ass the public needs so I am glad you are out there speaking your mind on a lot of important topics.

I did find a lot of research verifying that trend following is a valid strategy and one where a lot of people have made a decent amount of money. However, I couldn’t find very good information as far as annual returns over the long-term goes. Can you send me some of this?

The trend following system, in general, makes a lot of sense. Trends happen, obviously. Those who want to be a passenger can be and can make a lot of money. Intuitively I like the idea. It appeals to my sense of logic. You’re not trying to figure out anything. You’re merely saying, I don’t know where this will go, it seems to be going somewhere, and you buckle your seat belt. The seat belt is the stop-loss in this analogy.

Anyhow, just wanted to send a kudos your way. Keep up the good work. Would like to hear you talk more about a lot of people that are in boats they never thought they’d be in. For instance, in my case, I got myself into a lot of debt via students loans. It’s not an easy ride in this economy to have a degree no one cares about (I have an MBA). Agree with the entrepreneurial lifestyle. I worked a dead-end job for a bit of time and now am ready to move on to something new and try to get out of the “zombie-like” mindset.

I have subscribed to a while to value investing and found lots of research to show it does work. The problem with value investing, compared to trend following, is that it takes a tremendous amount of work to try to figure out something the market doesn’t already know or find where the market differs from the underlying value of a company. Trend following seems to hold up the white flag and say, “Listen, I surrender, you beat me Mr. Market, now where do you want to go?”

Regards,
Larry H.

Thanks! Data? See.

How can you move forward immediately to Trend Following profits? My books and my Flagship Course and Systems are trusted options by clients in 70+ countries.

Also jump in:

• Trend Following Podcast Guests
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Performance
• Research
• Markets to Trade
• Crisis Times
• Trading Technology
• About Us

Trend Following is for beginners, students and pros in all countries. This is not day trading 5-minute bars, prediction or analyzing fundamentals–it’s Trend Following.

Ep. 267: Dennis Gartman Interview with Michael Covel on Trend Following Radio

Posted on by Michael Covel
Dennis Gartman
Dennis Gartman

My guest today is Dennis Gartman, the editor and publisher of The Gartman Letter. Gartman appears on CNBC, ROB-TV and Bloomberg television, discussing commodities and the capital markets, and speaks before various associations and trade groups around the world.

The topic is outside the box market perspectives.

In this episode of Trend Following Radio we discuss:

  • How Gartman first got started
  • Chicago trading in the late 70’s to the mid 80’s
  • Why you should never add to a losing position
  • Buying strength and selling weakness
  • Systems from Gartman’s perspective, and keeping your systems simple
  • Being patient with winning trades and impatient with losers
  • Gartman’s daily grind and process
  • Mass psychology, efficient markets, and behavioral economics
  • Gartman’s thoughts on the market today and geopolitical events
  • How we hear about geopolitical events today compared to the past

Listen to this episode:

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The Narrative as Valuation

Posted on by Michael Covel

Aswath Damodaran writes:

If one extreme of the numbers/narrative spectrum is inhabited by those who are slaves to the numbers, at the other extreme are those who not only don’t trust numbers but don’t use them. Instead, they rely entirely on narrative to justify investments and valuations. Their motivations for doing so are simple.

1. Story telling is a powerful attention getter/keeper: Research in both psychology and business point to an undeniable fact. Human beings respond better to stories than to abstractions or numbers, and remember them for longer. After all, the Harvard Business School has taken story telling almost to an art form with its cases, tightly wound narratives that are supposed to convey larger lessons.

2. Unrestrained creativity: “Creative” people through the ages have always fought back against any restraints on their creativity, especially those imposed by those that they view as less imaginative than they are.

3. The Creative Superiority Complex: Just as numbers people intimidate with mounds of numbers, good narrators can browbeat “bean counters” with superior story telling, especially if they can back their stories up with personal experience.

Don’t trade off storytelling. Just don’t do it.

How can you move forward immediately to Trend Following profits? My books and my Flagship Course and Systems are trusted options by clients in 70+ countries.

Also jump in:

• Trend Following Podcast Guests
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Performance
• Research
• Markets to Trade
• Crisis Times
• Trading Technology
• About Us

Trend Following is for beginners, students and pros in all countries. This is not day trading 5-minute bars, prediction or analyzing fundamentals–it’s Trend Following.

1929 Wisdom

Posted on by Michael Covel

From John Hussman:

Galbraith reminds us that the 1929 market crash did not have observable catalysts. Rather, his description is very much in line with the view that the market crashed first, and the underlying economic strains emerged later: “the crash did not come – as some have suggested – because the market suddenly became aware that a serious depression was in the offing. A depression, serious or otherwise, could not be foreseen when the market fell. There is still the possibility that the downturn in the indexes frightened the speculators, led them to unload their stocks, and so punctured a bubble that had in any case to be punctured one day. This is more plausible. “Some people who were watching the indexes may have been persuaded by this intelligence to sell, and others may have been encouraged to follow. This is not very important, for it is in the nature of a speculative boom that almost anything can collapse it. Any serious shock to confidence can cause sales by those speculators who have always hoped to get out before the final collapse, but after all possible gains from rising prices have been reaped. Their pessimism will infect those simpler souls who had thought the market might go up forever but who now will change their minds and sell. Soon there will be margin calls, and still others will be forced to sell. So the bubble breaks.”

Just food for thought for when the machine makes you feel oh so comfortable.

How can you move forward immediately to Trend Following profits? My books and my Flagship Course and Systems are trusted options by clients in 70+ countries.

Also jump in:

• Trend Following Podcast Guests
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Performance
• Research
• Markets to Trade
• Crisis Times
• Trading Technology
• About Us

Trend Following is for beginners, students and pros in all countries. This is not day trading 5-minute bars, prediction or analyzing fundamentals–it’s Trend Following.