Stock Charts For Dummies

Stock Charts For Dummies

by Greg Schnell, Lita Epstein
Released February 2018
Publisher(s): For Dummies
ISBN: 9781119434399

Read it now on the O’Reilly learning platform with a 10-day free trial.

O’Reilly members get unlimited access to books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.

Start your free trial

Book description

The easy way to get started in stock charts

Many trading and technical analysis books focus on how to use charts to make stock trading decisions, but what about how to actually build a chart? Stock Charts For Dummies reveals the important stories charts tell, and how different parameters can impact what you see on the screen. This book will explain some of the most powerful display settings that help traders understand the information in a chart to find outperformance as its beginning.

Stock Charts for Dummies will teach you how to build a visually appealing chart and add tools based on the type of trading or investing decision you're trying to make. It will also introduce you to the pros, cons, and best practices of using three key types of charts: Candlesticks, Bar Charts, and Line Charts.

  • Build and use technical chart patterns
  • Increase profits and minimize risk
  • Track and identify specific trends within charts

A unique guide for beginning traders and investors, Stock Charts for Dummies will help you make sense of stock charts.

Table of contents

    1. Cover
    2. Introduction
      1. About This Book
      2. Foolish Assumptions
      3. Icons Used in This Book
      4. Beyond the Book
      5. Where to Go from Here
    3. Part 1: Getting Started with Stock Charts
      1. Chapter 1: Brushing Up on Stock Charting Basics
        1. Minimizing the Emotional Roller Coaster of Investing
        2. Viewing Stocks from Varying Perspectives
        3. Discovering All the Tools You Can Use with Your Charts
        4. Getting Organized with Your Charts
        5. Customizing Your Charts
        6. Putting Everything Together
      2. Chapter 2: Using Charts to Minimize Your Emotional Roller Coaster
        1. Getting Ready for the Emotions of Owning a Stock
        2. Building a Chart to Track and Control Emotions
        3. Checking Out Index Charts
        4. Defining Trends
    4. Part 2: Viewing the Money Trail through Different Lenses
      1. Chapter 3: Focusing on Chart Settings
        1. Choosing Chart Attributes
        2. Setting Overlays
        3. Selecting Indicators
      2. Chapter 4: Burning the Candle at Both Ends with Candlestick Charts
        1. Deciphering the Parts of a Candlestick Chart
        2. Introducing Color onto a Candlestick Chart
        3. Crafting Your Chart
        4. Reading and Using Your Chart to Make Decisions
      3. Chapter 5: Spotting Differences with Bar Charts
        1. Beginning with Bar Chart Basics
        2. Building a Bar Chart from the Ground Up
        3. Putting a Bar Chart to Work
      4. Chapter 6: Seeing What’s Trending with Line Charts
        1. What Is a Line Chart?
        2. Making a Line Chart the Easy Way
        3. Reading and Using Your Chart Line by Line
      5. Chapter 7: Getting the Lay of the Land with Area Charts
        1. Comparing Area Charts to Line Charts
        2. Making an Area Chart You Can Show Off
        3. Adding a Personal Touch with Styles
        4. Knowing When Area Charts Matter
    5. Part 3: Using Chart Tools for Decision Making
      1. Chapter 8: Charting Different Time Periods
        1. Converting Candlestick Charts to Different Periods
        2. Converting Bar Charts to Different Periods
        3. Converting Line and Area Charts to Different Periods
        4. Taking It One Day at a Time with Daily Charts
        5. Embracing Short-Term Thinking with 60-Minute Charts
        6. Seeing the Big Picture with Weekly Charts
        7. Knowing When a Monthly Chart Can Come in Handy
        8. Picking the Right Chart for the Right Range
        9. Shifting Your Focus to Closing Prices
      2. Chapter 9: Reading a Price Chart
        1. Running with Bulls and Sleeping with Bears: Uptrends and Downtrends
        2. Bucking the Trend: When a Stock Isn’t Trending
        3. Leveling Out: It’s All about the Base
        4. Reaching the Top: Muffins, Spires, or Something Else?
        5. Scaling for Profit: It’s Only Money
      3. Chapter 10: Harnessing the Power of Overlays
        1. Keeping Track of Moving Averages
        2. Getting into the Groove with Channel Investing
        3. Finding Your Sweet Spot between Horizontal Support and Resistance
      4. Chapter 11: Using Indicators to Facilitate Chart Analysis
        1. Beginning with Indicator Basics
        2. Rolling with Momentum Indicators
        3. Using Volume with Price
        4. Determining How Many Indicators to Use on One Chart
      5. Chapter 12: Making Sense of Relative Strength Indicators
        1. Relative Strength Investing Basics: Seeking Better-Performing Stocks
        2. Measuring a Stock’s Relative Strength to the S&P 500, a Sector, and an Industry
        3. Ranking Stocks with SCTR
        4. Checking Out Performance Charts
        5. Using Relative Rotation Graphs (RRG)
    6. Part 4: Getting Organized and Managing Stock Trends
      1. Chapter 13: Organizing Charts into Industry or Sector Groups
        1. Recognizing the Importance of Sectors and Industry Groups
        2. Creating and Populating ChartLists
        3. Organizing Your ChartLists
      2. Chapter 14: Keeping Track of What’s Going On
        1. Making a Watch List
        2. Creating and Using Your Three Main ChartLists
        3. Setting Alerts
      3. Chapter 15: Conducting Breadth Analysis
        1. Investigating Bullish Percent Indexes
        2. Studying the Percentage of Stocks above the 200 DMA
        3. Reviewing the Breadth of Different Exchanges
      4. Chapter 16: A Quick Check of the Week’s Action
        1. Counting the Days
        2. Responding to Weird Price Action
        3. Tracking Key Events
        4. Spotting a Break of Support on Indexes
    7. Part 5: Personalizing Your Stock Charts with Styles
      1. Chapter 17: Customizing Candlestick Charts
        1. Picking Your Personal Candlestick Indicators
        2. Saving Your Personal Style
        3. Trading Using a Candlestick Chart with Your Settings
        4. Sharing Your Customized Charts
      2. Chapter 18: Fine-Tuning Your Bar Charts
        1. Adjusting Bar Chart Settings to Your Liking
        2. Trading Using a Daily Bar Chart with Your Settings
        3. Trading Using a Weekly Bar Chart with Your Settings
      3. Chapter 19: Adjusting Your Line and Area Charts
        1. Creating a Custom Weekly Line Chart
        2. Developing Your Own Monthly Line Chart
        3. Setting Up a Specialized Monthly Area Chart
    8. Part 6: Putting Your Stock Charting Expertise to Work
      1. Chapter 20: Using Your Charts to Inform Your Buy, Hold, and Sell Decisions
        1. Separating the Strong from the Weak
        2. Knowing When to Hold ’Em and When to Fold ’Em
        3. Selling Stocks Before They Head South
      2. Chapter 21: Putting It All Together
        1. Gauging the Market’s Direction
        2. Narrowing Your Focus to Certain Sectors
        3. Using Targeted Scans
        4. Working with Price Displays, Overlays, and Indicators
        5. Taking Away Lessons from Your Wins and Losses
    9. Part 7: The Part of Tens
      1. Chapter 22: Ten Common Investing Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
        1. Trying to Fight the Market Instead of Following It
        2. Buying a Loser
        3. Chasing a 25–35 Percent Off Sale in Great Companies
        4. Falling for a 75 Percent Off Sale
        5. Forgetting That Commodity Stocks Are Very Volatile
        6. Buying a Story Instead of a Stock
        7. Investing in a Sick Sector
        8. Selling a Winner Too Soon
        9. Continuously Avoiding What’s Worked
        10. Not Buying Stocks in Falling Markets
      2. Chapter 23: Ten Tips for Cashing In on Tomorrow’s Amazingly Great Stock
        1. Being Prepared for Big Moves in a Short Time
        2. Understanding That You Don’t Have to Be First to Buy
        3. Waiting on the Big-Name IPOs
        4. Seeing Huge Gaps on Earnings
        5. Watching for Crisis in a Stock
        6. Using Volatility to Warn the End Is Near
        7. Measuring Volatility with the Average True Range
        8. Realizing That the SCTR Won’t Help Find Exits
        9. Working with Bollinger Bands
        10. Using the U.S. Dollar as a Guide
    10. About the Authors
    11. Advertisement Page
    12. Connect with Dummies
    13. End User License Agreement

Product information

  • Title: Stock Charts For Dummies
  • Author(s): Greg Schnell, Lita Epstein
  • Release date: February 2018
  • Publisher(s): For Dummies
  • ISBN: 9781119434399