In my ongoing series, The gurus are all frauds, another guru bites the dust: the Fly, over at ibankcoin, who has been telling us for years that he's been KILLING IT and BANKING COIN and RINGING THE REGISTER. http://ibankcoin.com/flyblog/2014/04/25/o-u-t/ Having visited the site a couple of times, my sense was that he was another overtrading blow-up in waiting, much like all the rest of the self-appointed gurus. The problem with these gurus is that they are action addicts and egomaniacs determined to create the image of always killing it in order to draw in the novice traders, but if you don't acknowledge that trading is not easy and trading is frustrating most of the time, eventually you blow up. Previous episodes in this series: http://elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?t=280730
Well, it is easy to say after the fact I was right all along. I did think he was overtrading and I didn't see much method to his trading, but I didn't predict he was going to blow up, and 32% isn't a total blow-up, he should be able to recover from that, depending on his level of skill.
I'm not going to go thru all this clown's past postings and his fanboys' pity party. Bottom line: was he monetizing his crap (newsletter, portfolio management, etc.) or was his blog the whole of it? I can forgive a blog, even a worthless one. The "gurus" who bother me are the ones who charge for their bullshit.
http://ppt.ibankcoin.com/learn-more.php Looks like there was more than a blog, maybe that explains why he had to fess up. Maybe somebody here was a subscriber and can add a little color. $60/month "The PPT is a premium site developed by iBankCoin that provides traders with a rich set of technological resources and community support for finding trading opportunities and making more informed decisions. Our platform quantitatively ranks over 4,000 stocks, ETFs, industries, and broader market indexes according to the proprietary algorithms developed by the traders at iBankCoin. It embraces both fundamental and technical analysis, yielding a "hybrid score" for each issue that reflects a vast array of trading considerations from both of the two major disciplines. Despite the secretive nature of our proprietary algorithms, the rankings and indicators they produce are 100% transparent. Every signal for each stock is meticulously archived and made to be accessible for personal backtesting."
I think The Fly deserves credit for admitting his screw-up. And I suspect his subscribers may have gotten some value for their money by watching it unfold. One cannot be a successful trader for long without knowing and respecting what can go wrong. I find it a bit annoying when non-traders claim skill and experience that they don't have. Far more annoying is when they lecture me on how to trade. But what really pisses me off is when con artists bilk unsophisticated investors. I read about a ponzi scheme in which the victims were all friends and family. That's really sick. <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";} </style> <![endif]-->
He were averaging down on stocks like FEYE, SPLK, WDAY. Remind me of Y2K internet bubble when valuations do not matter much.
I guess he had some successs but the market got him in the end like many others. Very few people have long term consistent success in the markets. In this forum, I can only think of one, NoDoji.
So what, the guy lied and played people that were gullible! Almost every religious leader does the same thing. I am yet to see any proof of God, heaven, hell or any truth to their claims. At least this guy had a few trades that might have worked out.