Chuck Whitman

One of the biggest influences on inflation this year has been commodity-based inflation. Food, and energy in particular, but also industrial metals. Commodities are often key harbingers of shifts in economic growth and economic cycles, so we always want to listen to what commodities are saying for insights. Some major bellwethers in the commodity complex are starting to correct sharply enough that further breakdowns could portend a shift in the economic backdrop and perhaps even a temporary shift in the intermediate-term inflation outlook. This could be equity positive if it […]

One year ago, we began to pound the table that Modern Portfolio Theory was broken. The traditional 60% Long Equities/40% Long Fixed Income was setting up to cause losses that investors were unprepared for. In fact, people were incentivized to take on even greater risk by assuming larger equity allocations because fixed income interest rates were so low. One year later, our prediction has proved to be prescient. The model, which is diversified between 60% equities and 40% bonds, is getting killed. In fact, 2022 is one of the five

Significant internal and ancillary indicators can help a trader find strong odds and highly asymmetric times where the upside potential vastly outweighs the potential risk. One of those indicators we use, and teach, in our VTI/REED$TRADER Stock Market Timing Workshop, highlights possible short-term market lows. Today, let’s take a brief look at the Jeff Clark-VIX indicator. In 1993 the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) started releasing data on the VIX (Volatility Index). Shortly after that, astute trader Jeff Clark noticed that this Volatility Index on the S&P tended to pop

Last year, I wrote an article for the VTI Weekly Newsletter (April 8, 2020) entitled “Same Trades, Different Views. Improve Your Results with Positive Reversion”. In this article, I introduced the concept of the Excursion Ratio, which I now call the Capture Rate. The Capture Rate uses two different inputs. The first is Maximum Favorable Excursion (MFE) which is the furthest the trade went in your favor during the life of your trade. The second input is the actual profit (or loss). When we take the profit and divide it

Last fall, Van and I held a workshop called, “How Big Money Trades.” The purpose of this workshop was to teach students how the market works and who are the participants. By understanding the participants and their objectives, we can use their behavior to find strong edges in the market that we can exploit in our trading. When is a trend a REAL trend? A REAL trend lasts several months, and prices rise by 50-200% or more. In “How Big Money Trades,” we talked about the role of the Commercial.