How's Tim Sykes making more money selling alerts than trading?

speero · Jan 19, 2012

All of what this guy said.

Would you rather make lots of money with lots of risk? Or lots of money with little risk? You don't even have to be a trader to answer B. for that question...

It makes much more sense once you've implemented a strategy successfully ONE TIME to market that strategy as if it's the holy grail. I love that someone brought up the Gold Rush - I did a paper on entrepreneurship in college and cited that.

Quote from gaj:

quick summary:

-> he trades pink sheet stocks. you know, the market where quotes aren't guaranteed to be filled, shorts are insanely difficult without the right brokerages. so in some regards, for others, it's similar to paper trading because they can't get the same fills even if they tried.

in fact, his latest list of trades has 20 trades. 11 of them are pink sheet stocks. the rest of the stocks, the legit names - have floats of 4mm, 7mm, 6mm, 12mm, and not available (according to yahoo finance).

general strategies for marketers who want to generate subscriptions:

-> don't trade a lot. goal is NOT to make tons of money, but to have "right" trades.

-> take credit for stocks that have lots of movement AFTER you exit, and even claim you're not that good a trader as your students. that way, you get all the "reward" of a huge move without the risk of it damaging your p&l.

-> say things about how much more money you'd have made if you took on a large position, but you're a scaredy-cat.

-> after you've gotten a bunch of subscribers, your alerts will become self-fulfilling. you get in at the price, and then lots of others lift the offer (or hit the bid) all at once. if it's CSCO, it won't affect the price much. if it's a small-cap or micro cap, you've already got yourself a profitable position. in fact, you can make the excuse 15 minutes later that the trade went so well for you, you can't turn down a quick profit, and get out.

-> many of his DVDs have 3/4 or more of virtually identical information, which is the tim sykes story.

i don't follow him anymore (this was the first time i went to his website, a cached version from a couple days ago, in i have no idea how long), but used to follow what he did so i could explain to others the fallacies in some of his trading materials.

btw, he's gone back on a bunch of his initial stated claims for what his site would be, but that shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone on ET.
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stock777 · Jan 19, 2012

i called the clowns bluff years ago. a shameless hustler.

western · Jan 19, 2012

Quote from stock777:

i called the clowns bluff years ago. a shameless hustler.
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Sykes has made over $1 million off his website and subscription services since he started a couple years ago. Thats a proud accomplishment and I will be the first to congratulate his success.

Tim spends his time promoting his website and business. Meanwhile others here spend all their time posting on ET.

Are his services overpriced and of marginal value? Maybe, but who cares. I don't think he's violating any laws, and he's making money and thats all that matters.

PARACLESE · Jan 19, 2012

Quote from EMRGLOBAL:

Tim Sykes may be a shameless self promoter but he talks very openly about exactly what he is doing.
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YEP, and he is making more money than 99% of the ass clowns on this site. So, lets see......would one rather be pretending they make money...????? Or would one just make money and watch everyone else fumble around pretending?

Hummm.....:eek:
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I see some useful people still havent left et.

speero · Jan 20, 2012

Quote from western:

I don't think he's violating any laws, and he's making money and thats all that matters.
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Questionable... We're talking pink sheets, not GOOG.

bwolinsky · Jan 20, 2012

Quote from speero:

Questionable... We're talking pink sheets, not GOOG.
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The banker doesn't ask if you made it trading pink sheets or goog, but the investor might. Either way, nice system.

377OHMS · Jan 20, 2012

Sykes is a complete huckster.

His book on Amazon sucks and generally any negative comments are removed by him within...minutes. Pathetic.

He feeds on the weak-minded so obviously he has a bright future in the USA.

dlonET · Jan 20, 2012

Quote from 377OHMS:

He feeds on the weak-minded so obviously he has a bright future in the USA.
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LOL funny but true and sad.

speero · Jan 21, 2012

Quote from bwolinsky:

The banker doesn't ask if you made it trading pink sheets or goog, but the investor might. Either way, nice system.
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I'm not even talking about his 'hedge fund', or whatever he has nowadays. I'm talking about his sub services, and using his subs to pump his positions. I don't have proof that that is what's going on, but the possibility of that happening seems pretty obvious.

bwolinsky · Jan 21, 2012

Quote from speero:

I'm not even talking about his 'hedge fund', or whatever he has nowadays. I'm talking about his sub services, and using his subs to pump his positions. I don't have proof that that is what's going on, but the possibility of that happening seems pretty obvious.
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This point holds no water in the 50 gallon tank.

Every single newsletter or alert service is like this. This is not exclusively a problem with Tim Alerts, but it's not like I've ever subscribed. His model is excellent and all this nonsense about him frontrunning doesn't change his business model, because that's really what this discussion is about and he's not the only one that blasts e-mails about his latest trades. Usually the trades are short "carcass company" penny stocks, but the more I watch the model the more I think it makes a lot of sense.

Tim Sykes is no different than anybody else when it comes to his business practices, so stop saying foolish, jealous things about an excellent model manager!