Why should you want to steal someone else’s stock market lesson plans?

First, let me tell you that a trading plan is only useful if you follow it. Following your plan will make you successful, yet many traders circumvent the stock market lesson plans that they have carefully created. They become emotional invested in a trade, to the point where they ignore all warning signs. Remember, when the market corrects itself, which it always does, no position is immune, no matter how strongly your ego may be tied to it.

Many investors have stock market lesson plans that watch as their portfolio values are cut in half or more, yet they will still hold their positions. They may fear being left out of a big gain, or be so deep in loss that they felt they couldn’t possibly sell at that point. But even if you believe that all positions will recover from their losses, and the truth is that not all of them will, this is a terrible way to trade.

You tie up too much capital, and your rate of return plummets. Just as you shouldn’t become emotionally involved in a trade, you should also never become tied to ideas. By this I mean becoming so fond of a particular strategy or trend that you cling to it even after it has stopped working. You need to have strategies, and to have plans, but you must also be aware of the shifts and swings of the market, the beginning and the ends of trends.

When you first form your plan for a trade, you should consider what price or price range you think the stock is likely to reach. This is often called a target price, which gives some traders the wrong impression. A target price is not a price that the stock has to meet. A stock does not have to do anything. If you treat your target price as a goal, it can lead to many problems. Your target price should only be used as a guideline.

The target price helps you figure out your risk to reward ratio, and it gives you an exit point in your trade. At the least, it should give you a point where you’ll reassess the trade’s ability to continue to moving upward. But your trade may never reach your target price. Many market factors can interfere with its progress, and you may have set your target higher than you should have. Since there’s no way all your trades will hit your price targets, it is a good idea to sell half your position at a more conservative target. Routinely taking profits will reward you in the long run.

There are a number of things that can interfere with a stock’s movement and force you to close your position sooner than you’d anticipated. Your stock market lesson plans should cover all of these possibilities, but here are some reasons that should always prompt you to close a position:

1. The end of a trend. All trends end some time, and you should be prepared for this.

2. The stock’s upward movement has slowed or been abruptly broken, ending its momentum.

3. The stock is approaching a major psychological barrier, perhaps reaching 100 dollars or 200 dollars a share, which should have been anticipated in your plan

4. The stock is about to reach a resistance level it has been unable to break through before.

This technical barrier should also have been anticipated in your plan.

5. A sudden market wide decline, or the threat of one, or some other serious uncertainty,

which leads to unsafe market conditions.

Exiting a losing trade is not a big deal. Ending a position whether or not the stock reaches its target price, in accordance with your stock market lesson plans, is good trading. The best traders would rather lose a small profit than take an unnecessary risk. You don’t have to win on every trade; no one does, and it’s dangerous to try. In fact, by limiting losses, a good trader can be profitable overall, and make money on only 40 percent of his trades. Cut your losses and start fresh with something else when you need to. You’ll be happier, and you’ll make much more money.

Specialists for OTCBB and Nasdaq Companies
By William Cate
Published June 2000
[http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/] [http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/globalvillageinvestmentclubwelcome/]

An orderly market should be the goal of every public company. Sharp
rises or falls in share price attract regulators. A rapidly rising share
price feeds upon itself and guarantees a share price collapse. A sharp drop
in your share price creates selling barriers. When you attempt to revive
your strong share price, your shareholders dump their stock. A steady
upward climb, with minor downward adjustments, keeps shareholders loyal.
The question isn’t how high can you drive your share price? It’s how long
can you sustain your current share price?

One weapon in your share-price stability battle is the trading of
your stock by a specialist. Most U. S. Stock Exchanges use a specialist to
match buy and sell orders to create an orderly market. When buying and
selling are relatively constant in any U. S. Stock Exchange company, the
market is orderly. Specialist can be overwhelmed with selling and this
leads to a market correction or a Bear Market. But the matching principle
is sound.

The National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) rely upon
their brokers acting as Market Makers to act as specialists. This is the
basis to the Bid/Ask price structure in the OTCBB and Nasdaq Markets. The
NASD policy doesn’t work. The Market Makers goal is to make money for their brokerage firms. Share-price stability is counterproductive to profit,
because it reduces trading. The Market Maker needs volume to profit from a
stock. Trading volume infers instability as buyers go into a feeding frenzy
or sellers panic. Feeding frenzies and panics kill public companies.

If your company trades Nasdaq or the OTCBB, your investor relations
person MUST act as a specialist for your stock. They must trade your stock
to maintain an orderly market in your share price. Your specialist’s job is
to maintain the current share price, not to drive it up. Your specialist
should have a short term goal in restructuring your shareholder base. For
example, EFHCF’s current share price trading allows speculators to sell at
a profit. However, my goal is to replace the speculators with investors who
will hold the stock as it moves up. If I achieve my goal, I’ll need less
buying to sustain a higher share price.

Here are five golden rules for specialists seeking to maintain an
orderly market.
1. NEVER discourage a shareholder from selling their stock. If you
succeed, you are only delaying the sale until your share price is higher.
2. NEVER advise anyone to buy your stock. Let buyers make their own
decisions. Your job is to help them buy the stock at the current price.
3. Communicate regularly with your shareholders. Keep your
shareholders informed. BUT, understate the positive events and overstate
the negative events about your company.
4. Use your shareholder newsletter to regularly remind your
shareholders of your help with selling or buying your company’s shares.
5. NEVER call a potential buyer. Let them call you.

The SEC should change its rules to help specialists. Changes would
allow public companies to act more effectively in ensuring an orderly
market in their stock. Unfortunately any rule change that would benefit a
responsible specialist would benefit a crook. The crook would use the rule
change to steal from the public and destroy the public company. At present,
the crooks seem to have enough going for them. They don’t need more
regulatory help to bilk the public.

To contact the author: Visit the Beowulf Investments website: [http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/] Or, visit the Global Village Investment Club Website:
[http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/globalvillageinvestmentclubwelcome/]
By William Cate
Published June 2000
[http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/] [http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/globalvillageinvestmentclubwelcome/]

An orderly market should be the goal of every public company. Sharp
rises or falls in share price attract regulators. A rapidly rising share
price feeds upon itself and guarantees a share price collapse. A sharp drop
in your share price creates selling barriers. When you attempt to revive
your strong share price, your shareholders dump their stock. A steady
upward climb, with minor downward adjustments, keeps shareholders loyal.
The question isn’t how high can you drive your share price? It’s how long
can you sustain your current share price?

One weapon in your share-price stability battle is the trading of
your stock by a specialist. Most U. S. Stock Exchanges use a specialist to
match buy and sell orders to create an orderly market. When buying and
selling are relatively constant in any U. S. Stock Exchange company, the
market is orderly. Specialist can be overwhelmed with selling and this
leads to a market correction or a Bear Market. But the matching principle
is sound.

The National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) rely upon
their brokers acting as Market Makers to act as specialists. This is the
basis to the Bid/Ask price structure in the OTCBB and Nasdaq Markets. The
NASD policy doesn’t work. The Market Makers goal is to make money for their brokerage firms. Share-price stability is counterproductive to profit,
because it reduces trading. The Market Maker needs volume to profit from a
stock. Trading volume infers instability as buyers go into a feeding frenzy
or sellers panic. Feeding frenzies and panics kill public companies.

If your company trades Nasdaq or the OTCBB, your investor relations
person MUST act as a specialist for your stock. They must trade your stock
to maintain an orderly market in your share price. Your specialist’s job is
to maintain the current share price, not to drive it up. Your specialist
should have a short term goal in restructuring your shareholder base. For
example, EFHCF’s current share price trading allows speculators to sell at
a profit. However, my goal is to replace the speculators with investors who
will hold the stock as it moves up. If I achieve my goal, I’ll need less
buying to sustain a higher share price.

Here are five golden rules for specialists seeking to maintain an
orderly market.
1. NEVER discourage a shareholder from selling their stock. If you
succeed, you are only delaying the sale until your share price is higher.
2. NEVER advise anyone to buy your stock. Let buyers make their own
decisions. Your job is to help them buy the stock at the current price.
3. Communicate regularly with your shareholders. Keep your
shareholders informed. BUT, understate the positive events and overstate
the negative events about your company.
4. Use your shareholder newsletter to regularly remind your
shareholders of your help with selling or buying your company’s shares.
5. NEVER call a potential buyer. Let them call you.

The SEC should change its rules to help specialists. Changes would
allow public companies to act more effectively in ensuring an orderly
market in their stock. Unfortunately any rule change that would benefit a
responsible specialist would benefit a crook. The crook would use the rule
change to steal from the public and destroy the public company. At present,
the crooks seem to have enough going for them. They don’t need more
regulatory help to bilk the public.

To contact the author: Visit the Beowulf Investments website: [http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/] Or, visit the Global Village Investment Club Website:
[http://home.earthlink.net/~beowulfinvestments/globalvillageinvestmentclubwelcome/]

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A somewhat stronger argument for believing in recoupling rather than comes from financial markets. As is obvious to anyone who follows the US and European stock markets, there is a strong link between them. Whenever one falls, the other …

Africa - Open For Business
But Africa is also a land of stock markets, high rises, Internet cafes and a growing middle class. This is the part of Africa that functions. And this Africa also needs media attention, if it s to have any chance of fully joining the …