its easy, just look at their results and the results of their students. Real mentors don't market thenselves as mentors-- rule # 1.
Did you ever take anyone under your wing only to have them ignore everything you tried to teach or blame you when they traded badly? I still have wounds from people losing their ass, blaming me after I gave them super stern warnings to avoid certain strategies I was not good with but knew they (the strategies used by professionals) were too far advanced for the pupil's skill set. Last week I warned someone I met on the Net to stop selling Naked Puts, he kept telling me after making $3000 on several Weeklies "All I need to do is wait each Friday for them to go to $0, expire worthless. His goals, word for word "I will make 5% per week selling high "iv. He sold the Puts on VRX $200, AGN $190, NVAX $10, ARWR $8.00 after its spike to $9, same with Apple he sold a crud load of Puts at $113 because Apple's so strong and commission is so expensive. I worried about him, I tried over and over to get him to at least cover the options when you have a gains in this environment. MS, I have not heard from him since the Biotech imploded, he was totally sure that the $65 Puts he sold on POST, $50 CCL and many more would not get hit. I hope I did not lose a him because he won't pick up the phone or return emails. That's why people like you and me are so leery of telling people our thoughts, we might tell them what were doing but we can't monitor how their going to react or get out of positions gone good or bad. Great article, your the best dude! As for my Internet friend, I hope he cut his losses and switched course, I hate seeing people lose in choppy nasty Markets like today.