subject: Traders Make Millions Strategy That Will Murder You [print this page] Some have stated that traders make millions trading the SPY around significant U.S. holidays. I'm going to reveal their barely known secret then let you decide if it is for real.
This concept has little to do with fundamental or technical analysis.
It's focused only on probabilities.
I'll be frank with you, I'm not comfortable with stock trading probabilities. The guy who is, identified only to me as Frank, has closed down his website.
Frank believes that stock traders who buy at the end of trading on the first day of the year, then sell at the end of trading on the following day make millions.
He calls this the New Year's Day Trade.
So I researched SPY and here is the move in 2010: 0.2%
I'm sorry? You would have to be stock trading with tens of thousands of dollars to get eager about a 0.2% move. And if you had that large amount of money would you really be gambling it away like this on a dicey probability trading strategy?
Frank says that another holiday that stock traders make millions on is Washington's Birthday. He says short at the close of trading right before Washington's Birthday, then close the short at the end of trading on the following trading day.
Consequently I examined the S&P 500 and here is what would have occurred in 2010: 1.8% gain.
What did you say? ? SPY rose 1.8% which suggests had you gone short the market, you would have lost 1.8% in the move.
In a jiffy it starts to make a little more sense that Frank's probability trading website is closed down. If this was such a terrific method of trading, then why did the chap close down his website? Could it be that his probabilities stock trading approach is a failure?
Common seasonal patterns are one thing, but this probability trading is another beast entirely. Seasonality works for the reason that there are fundamental things going on at particular times of the year: tax selling, money manager window dressing, traders leaving on summer vacation, elections, and so on.
I'm not in awe of the concept of buying something just because it is a certain day of the year. I have a preference for technical analysis and stock charting to find out the trend, then stock trading with the trend.
In this video I show you more crazy trading myths.
