Chapter 19
Ten Secrets of the Top Technical Traders
IN THIS CHAPTER
Putting your faith in the chart rather than the “experts”
Getting to know the virtues and drawbacks of technical indicators
Technical trading can take any number of equally valid forms. The trader who waits for multiple time frame confirmations on three indicators can claim just as much technical validity as the guy with the itchy trigger finger who has to trade every hour. The technical trader is the retired rocket scientist, the self-taught housewife, the cubicle programmer, and the college student. You can’t tell from looking at them who is the best technical trader. The technical trader may be sane and reasonable or an outright crackpot, but both types are technical traders. You’ll also run into poseurs who claim technical expertise but really only know one or two things, and although those one or two things may work for them, the danger is real they won’t work for you. As for the academics with systems perpetually in test mode, they may be technical analysts, but they aren’t traders.
Until you put cold, hard cash down on your technical trading ideas, you aren’t a trader. You may be the smartest guy in three counties, but if you can’t make money trading, you’re just a smart guy, not a trader. In fact, the ...