how can you dupe people into subscribing to the TEN BEST STOCKS TO BUY NOW" or "MAKE 10K A MONTH TRADING OPTIONS ON A 10K ACCOUNT" crap if you're forced to disclose some track record. How else can you dupe the biggest imbeciles into relying on a complete and utter stranger who is talking, not walking the talk... and thus appeal to the human nature of lazy people to get something for nothing, if you don't misrepresent and use hyperbole????! IMHO most of these guys are smart business men/women and subscribe to the adage (will rogers?) that there is a sucker born every minute. Or is it P.T. Barnum! IcE
Excellent points made by Qwiktrade. It is not just a matter of paying $200 to check out a service, there are other factors involved. One of them is potential losses, which can be far more than the entry fee to the chatroom. Another is opportunity cost, the time spent observing a new system instead of trading (if you have one) an established method. Lastly, the mental and emotional toll taken by trying (yet another) system that doesn't work. The reason for the skepticism on the part of many posters in this thread is that most of us have been burned by vendors before, and are very wary about exaggerated claims. It is easy to minimize the costs of checking out a service like BDT, but it can get very expensive in many ways.
It was P.T. Barnum who said there is a "sucker born every minute." Will Rogers said he "never met a man he didn't like." This saying is actually misused quite often, with regard to Rogers' meaning. It wasn't that he liked everyone he met, he admitted to disliking many people. He meant that he never had a preformed opinion about someone he didn't know, he allowed them to prove themselves before he passed judgement on them.
after re-reading my post, I want to add a footnote: I think there could be value in a few of the "better" services, i.e where there is some indication of trading success by the proprietor, provided the person subscribing had some experience trading and can be selective in getting ideas on perspective trades, and then applying his own independent judgment. At times I have thought about doing that with respect to swing trading equities to shorten the amount of screening needed to locate ideas. So for example I follow the Swing Trader column on Briefing.Com which costs me about $29 per month for their platinum subscription, for ideas only. Years ago I followed a guy who set up his own advisory service. I later got to know this guy as a friend. He had a gift! He was a great trade in his own right! THAT is what one wants to find, if they're going to spend dough for trades! As far as intraday trading I just cannot see deferring one's judgment to another on every trade. I think a cardinal principle of trading (not investing) is one's ability to trust themselves! If one has to defer to another on all trades without any prior ability to independently screen the wheat from the chaff, then why are they trading in the first place; better to go to Vegas where they can only lose the value of their bet. IcE
Sorry if I was a little confusing. My point is that some people need to be led by the hand ... so for someone new to the game they might see "value" in some advisory service. But, I strongly believe that one can't be a "follower" as they mature as a trader. I think most who achieve any reasonable level of success develop their own trading system, philosophy or niche. Each trader needs to develop his/her own convictions while in a trade IMO. I traded the long side today and made $$$. I merely looked for a little bounce after the big decline this morning. I set my exit price, threw out my orders and patiently waited. I'm out and now watching as we sell off a little bit again. Is there any value in advisory services? For some people there is ... but I don't think potential clients should expect such services will be easy way to profits. Trading is hard work ... and extraordinary claims by anyone should be met with some skepticism.
You did not respond to me, so then who have you responded to? I emailed you, sent a PM as well as posted in the thread. Is it because I'm actually experienced? I'm still interested in the service but I find it extremely shady that you completely ignored my offer and will not even comment on the topic. Maybe I should give you a call and then discuss it in the thread.
1. When I went to the site I discovered that the points are dollars in stock intraday trading. 2. One of the tables showing lists 1000 share trades for each "tip" given in the day. The the capital required is simply related to trade overlaps. I figured I would get the answer to Q 3 for myself to figure out the average trade overlap and then get Q2 answered. Several annotated charts were posted so these were really quite helpful. 3. I started to read 5/10 narration. and when I got to the first summary of "tips" by the moderator/trader, I knew to just go to the end of the narration and see how the summary was handled then. I didn't see very many "variations" on types of trades. "Quickie" as a category let me know that there were "non-quickies" and probably several. I saw a couple more types. My conclusions are that I didn't figure out what the S and L numbers meant. For me, I just needed the time of the initial posted "tip" name. As I read "tip" names going down the narrative. I found that I have regularly traded over 50% of them. I checked a couple that I have not traded to find out why. I concluded that if I reviewed about 10 narratives that were not consecutive ones that I could duplicate the selection process easily. Many people here could too I'm sure. The selection, therefore is not a defining advantage. From reading a whole day's narrative, I discovered that the moderator is not too swift on "when" the stock is posted and secondly he is not neutral biased and finally the approach is sort of inefficient capital rotation wise. The timing, therefore, is not too swift for making optimal entries. It seems to be very dependant upon very recent price action as depicted by simple brief "formations" For sure not all the trades can be taken if each "tip" says that the values are for near term entry values for the S or L direction should S or L be met near term. So capital required comes down to have x price times 1000 times the # of concurrent trades that need to be held. I will venture $25 x 1000 x 12 to 15. This is about $300,000 to make 18,000. I would have to lower the 12 to 15 to get the 18 points value. To get to the number of turn overs of capital I simply divided 12 to 15 into the average # of tips per day. One cycle is 6% per day on capital. 6 cycles is 1% on capital per turn per day. To get the 18 points you do more than 6 cycles at the 1%. So the "hold" on these "tips" is fairly short and the middle of the day is really tough going. If you do this range of trading to get 1%, you know it takes a quarter minus (72 days compounding) to double give or take. Personally, for me, this is a level of return that I have never experienced since when I began. I would think this could be done about 4 times more efficiently if it were engineered to optimum.
Grob, This looks like a good post. I think I can follow your logic, but I am not sure. The results seem to be promising, but I really couldn't tell you exactly why. At the end, I had this strange desire to go back to the BDT website and repeat your analysis, so that I get to understand it fully. BUT, that's inefficient too... this communication CAN be engineered better Can you please take a stab at summarizing your findings succinctly for the rest of us? TIA
This is the last post we received from BDT today, stating that we would be hearing from Shay at the end of the day. It is currently 9:10pm EST, and there has been no reply. The day has ended, in my book, and still no reply. As I said before, this thread has been very civilized by ET standards, IMO. There was as much "flaming" from Karen at BDT as from ET posters. One can conclude that the questions that have been left unanswered will most likely remain so. Thanks to Grob for doing the leg work to calculate the amount of capital needed to produce the results BDT was claiming. I too have noticed that their banner ad has changed. I sincerely hope that Baron does not lose another paying vendor as a result of this thread. I enjoy most of what is found here on ET, and appreciate the service Baron provides. This thread was started unsolicited by BDT, when Karen made the following statement: "If you have any questions about bestdaytrader. Please post them and I would be happy to answer them." If she and Shay were only willing to answer questions that would land them customers, that invitation should not have been made. I have nothing against vendors, I currently subscribe to another advisory service, which I find useful as a filter for trades I may be considering. The subscritpion price is $99/month, they gave me a one-week trial, and they post their trade results each day, along with the log from their chat sessions. While their performance results are somewhat optimistic, the way they obtain them is clearly explained, and they do not make exagerrated claims. I was more than willing to be patient with BDT and allow them to make their case. I hoped there would be some substance to their claims. Their lack of response leaves me to conclude that, alas, my initial impression of them was accurate.