Posts Tagged ‘stocks’

Top Moving Average Secrets

Friday, March 12th, 2010

One of the most popular technical analysis indicators is the simple moving average also known as SMA, if you learn how to use these correctly they can be a very useful tool to help you to make good trading decisions, eben if you are trading penny stocks.

The 50 simple moving average, or 50 SMA, is simply the sum of the last 50 readings for each period, divided by 50, this is a moving window, as time moves on so does the average. Notice that I used the term period because this indicator works on any time period in exactly the same way.

It can be used on monthly, weekly, daily, hourly, 30 minutes, 10 minute and on whatever time period you want to monitor and trade. Although the SMA is the most widley used there is also the exponential moving average or EMA. This is a weighted version of the formula using the mathematical exponent function to give more weight to the more recent values, this has the effect of making it a much faster average that many traders like.

The truth is that it probably does not matter if you used the SMA or the EMA, what does matter however is that you use one or the other and then be very consistent with it. Do not switch between them, it is more important that you trust your chosen indicator then a slight difference in its value.

The SMA is oftern used to determine what the trend of the stock is, depending on the value used it could be a short term, medium term or long term trend. An important point to note is that moving averages are really only useful when the stock is trending, if the moving average is flat, i.e. horizontal on your chart it can become very choppy, this is a good time to not trade.

The general rule is that if the chart price is above the SMA the trend is up, if below the trend is down. This is very important to know because it forms the basics of trend trading and trading with the trend. These rules also apply if you are a swing trader using trading strategies as found in the swing trader guide.

For the short term trend many traders like using a 5-8 SMA or EMA, here is a trading secret, never trade again the direction of the short term tend, actually this is really just common sense when you think about it.

Moving averages often act as support or resistance, many traders use the 15, 21 or 30 SMA for this purpose.

There are a number of other very important moving averages that you need to know about, these are the 50, 100 and 200 SMA, and this mainly applies to the daily and weekly charts. A lot of big players in the markets, the mutual funds, investment banks etc use the 50 and 200 SMA as support and resistance, if they decide to buy or sell based on these you need to follow suite, the 100 to a lesser extent. These are very useful averages to watch if you trade EFT’s such as an Oil ETF.

A useful tip is that when a stock breaks through one moving average it will often move all the way to the next, for example, if a stock breaks the 30 it may move to the 50 before finding some support or resistance.

Find more useful trading strategies and tips by reading and studying top trade books

A844534297

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INO TV’s Online Technical Analysis Course

Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010

INO TV’s Online Technical Analysis Course

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Reviewing: INO TV’s Online Technical Analysis Course 

Learning in the financial industry is a lifelong process. There are an unlimited number of fundamental and technical aspects that regardless of your education or experience there is always something new to discover. INO TV has provided me the online trading education I need to maintain and grow my skills. If you have been investing or trading for some time no doubt you have seen roundtables or other online technical analysis courses you desired to sit in on but couldn’t because they were too expensive or only available at the wrong time. In some circumstances you may be interested in being taught about a select subject but cannot find an excellent resource. On INO TV you will discover in excess of 1000 hours of technical analysis course education resources in their online library. INO TV is multimedia technical analysis course education available 24 hours a day.

Learn about Free INO Online Technical Analysis Courses Here

Learn about Premium INO Online Technical Analysis Courses Here

The training material of INO TV is categorized into eleven channels tailored to a traders or investors interest. The Channels are:

Channel 1 – Beginners  

Channel 2 - Charts & Analysis 

Channel 3 - Currency Trading 

Channel 4 - Day Trading 

Channel 5 - Futures/Commodities 

Channel 6 - Money Management 

Channel 7 - Options Trading 

Channel 8 - Market Psychology 

Channel 9 - Spread Trading 

Channel 10 - Stock Trading 

Channel 11 - Trading Systems

Regardless of your interest in online trading education its likely INO TV has programs for you. A search tool is also available on INO TV to help traders and investors find the content that interests them the most. If you have a question or a concern their toll free support hotline is available to answer your inquiries. One quarterly or annual subscription entitles you to their entire library and there are no hidden fees. If you want to sample INO TV for at no cost there are featured videos you can watch to give you a sense of what INO TV has to offer. I would also recommend visiting the INO TV Premium page and search through the channels to see what’s available. This will give you an idea of the richness and depth of technical analysis courses available on INO TV.

Learn about Free INO Technical Analysis Courses Here

Some of the professionals I enjoy learning from are John Murphy, Martin Pring, Larry Williams, and Mark Cook but there are a variety of others. At last count I saw 138 experts online and new programs are being added all the time.

Bottom Line: If online technical analysis course education is significantto you INO TV is the greatest resource you will find anywhere.  

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How To Look At Stocks

Thursday, December 31st, 2009

Brought to you by trend trading system review.

Share picking is akin to weather prediction - no one can predict with certainty five hours from now if the price will rise or fall, much less five years from now.

Nevertheless, there are indicators that help to reduce the risk and increase the odds of profiting over the long term. After all, historically stocks have returned over 10%, as measured by the growth of the S&P 500.

The first step is to get educated. Learn not only about dividends yields and earnings per share, but also some basic accounting. Reported figures have an air of authority but the sad fact remains that those numbers are arrived at, in part, by accounting methods which are not cut and dried. 

The Enron case (case in which the executives of Enron manipulated their earnings figures to appear to be much more
successful than they were) is extreme, but even ordinary procedures involve judgment calls on the part of financial officers and auditors.

Next, commit to continuing research about stocks both inside and outside your intended portfolio, and update it as you buy and sell. There’s a broad spectrum between exact prediction and throwing darts blindly. In the long run, those who do their homework do far better and almost all day traders lose money.

Research both prospective buys and intended sells. Many investors put considerable time and effort into analyzing a buy, but then only watch for some price to be reached in order to sell. Knowing when to sell is just as important, and a target should be selected before the share is bought.

RESEARCHING BUYS

Obtain the latest, and some historical, financial statements. The SEC provides these free (www.sec.gov) in their EDGAR database, but other exchanges have similar arrangements.

Analyze the quarterly statements covering two to three years, looking for EPS (earnings per share) and revenue trends. Calculate dividend yields, if the company pays dividends.

Compare the company’s P/E (Price to Earnings) ratio to others in the same economic sector. Look at P/S (Price to Sales) ratios, too. Sales growth is easier to predict than earnings and less volatile than P/E ratios. 

Examine general economic factors. Interest rates affect share prices as well as bonds (though less directly), since almost every company borrows money. Even when they don’t, their competitors, suppliers, and customers do. Interest charges reduce profits for all but the lenders, for whom it’s income. 

Even when researching a bank, though, high interest rates increase short-term profits, but can reduce the number of loans and cause certain current ones to be repaid early. High interest rates aren’t necessarily good for banks either, therefore.

Use some of the more common technical indicators, such as MA (moving averages) and RSI (Relative Strength Index, which compares the number of days a share finishes up versus down). An RSI of 70, or above, for example, does tend to indicate a stock which is overbought and due for a fall in price.

RESEARCHING SELLS

Pick a target price, which amounts to deciding how much profit (in dollars or percentage terms) you seek then sell at that price, unless your continuing research has turned up significant new information.

Consider selling if the price has dropped substantially or remained unchanged for several months. Losses are hard to bear, but consider that you can’t always pick winners and while you’re invested in one share, you’re forgoing potential profit from another. That profit could help reduce or more than make up for the loss from the sale.

Continue to monitor the company’s fundamentals by obtaining updated filings. Re-evaluate them by updating earnings trend calculations, significant management or general economic changes.

You can ease the difficulty of performing calculations (which is a useful exercise at least once) by finding Internet sites that provide objective data and go easy on the “here’s how to pick winners” sales talk.

And remember, ‘on the street’ opinions are a dime a dozen - including mine.

For more please see trend trading stocks and What Types of ETFs Are There.

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