i don't agree. TA allows for subjective interpretation, this is evident in the fact that multiple TA people can look at the same chart pattern but reach differing conclusions. as the gifted statistician, Dr. M. states: " the essential difference remains: TA is defined by its data domain and quant methods by their methodology and that is the quintessential distinction" thank you, Dr. M. _______________________________ Make no sense, The only thing objective on Wall Street is what happened in the past. Is PE 20 too high, too low, you got a different answer from different people too. The reason quants can fool people is because they can write equations which most people don't understand (called modeling) while just about everybody can draw a trend line.
Yo Surf.......since you have a handle on most of of this stuff than you are the best to answer this? I know how you define a quant and I know how you define a TA guy. What do you call a trader that does use price action and volume and bid/ask analysis along with stream base or event driven processing (EDA) to make decisions and design scalping systems. There is some low level math involved but it is taking a direction or a spread direction in these examples. Not being a smart ass..just interested in opinion.....Thanks for any input. The only thing I am interested in is making money for the week and month but I have to do some marketing material and would like anyone input. How so you define this hybrid model? You can rule out fundamental side but where does this stand as we are looking for least path of resistance for the next 5 sec to next 3 days.
How do you guys feel about what some are calling Evidence-based TA based on this book: Evidence-Based Technical Analysis: Applying the Scientific Method and Statistical Inference to Trading Signals (Hardcover) by David R Aronson (Author) This seems to systematic approach to extract $$$$. Thanks for the input in advance.
LOL, quants DONT trade. At least not in most hedge funds and sell-side firms. I dont mind you call yourself a quant, you can call yourself whatever (not meant in a negative sense) but fact is quants in above mentioned environments program code or develop models, they dont trade and they NEVER bother with any fundamental or technical analysis. Again, I am speaking for the above environments where I have worked and still work. If you call developing some pair trading strategy quant work then yes, maybe you look at prices, indicators, some TA, who knows. But IMHO this is not what the work of a quant is really about at least not in the sense of how i-banks and professional trading desks operate, an environment where the term "quant" was actually born.
Your post is full of bs, sorry to say this so directly. a) TA does not stand for all that can be analyzed. TA has a very specific definition and a break-even analysis can be analyzed but is not TA ;-) b) CDOs made billions to firms before they decreased in value. GS made many hundreds of millions from their CDO portfolio before they decreased their exposure this year. So, yes CDOs generated more than 2%. I just contradicted your statement I am not saying any instrument makes more sense than a savings account ALL the times c) Financial Engineering DOES NOT just teach that 7% is > 5%. It teaches that 7% > 5% with taking exposure to more risk. The risk needs to be quantifiable and many other variables come into play that determine whether one investment is better than another. d) There are no statistical differential equations only partial differential equations ;-) And a trading desk's success is made up of the sum of its people not just the trader. For instance, an exotic trading desk at a sell-side firm needs people with outstanding risk management skills, quants who can work on new or existing models, techs who do coding and maintenance work, traders who take risk and execute trade, support staff. So, when some funds or portfolios blew up it was at the least the fault of some quants you moron!!! Some peoples' ass got kicked but everybody else is happy. To inform you, bonuses are up this year (some get less some get more than last year), nothing dramatic. So, I guess you shut your pilehole unless you learn more English (I am not a native speaker so I dare to say that) and inform yourself better before you write stuff.
Quote from asshole IluvVol b) CDOs made billions to firms before they decreased in value. GS made many hundreds of millions from their CDO portfolio before they decreased their exposure this year. So, yes CDOs generated more than 2%. I just contradicted your statement I am not saying any instrument makes more sense than a savings account ALL the times c) Financial Engineering DOES NOT just teach that 7% is > 5%. It teaches that 7% > 5% with taking exposure to more risk. The risk needs to be quantifyable and many other variables come into play that determine whether one investment is better than another... It was quants who invented CDO, it'a amassing there are still asshole like you to defend it now. People who pay $1000 a month to control $500,000 real state asset hoping 20% gain per year. If the asset does not go up in value, they just walk away. Basically these are investors paid minimum premiums for calls, and banks buy 100% underlining security (delta hedge 100%). It's so simple that asshole like you still can't understand.
Your language is your own jail. I assure you, what I do is as quantitative as anything or anyone you have ever worked with does, and yet I trade. The difference is, I am the one that trades my own models, programmed them, understand it's weaknesses, and understand the artistic methods necessary to calibrate it to the real world, and am my own risk manager. nitro
Surf, remember, when you work for someone else, you live by their rules, their definitions, their limitations. Think about that, then think about what you wrote. If one day you find a method that works, is your own, understood what was needed to make it work, what would you tell someone when they told you "wouldn't be hired" if you believed as you did? lol Break out of your language jail. Categories are invented by men as an organizational principle, but they should be our servant, not our master. "Communities tend to be guided less than individuals by conscience and a sense of responsibility. How much misery does this fact cause mankind! It is the source of wars and every kind of oppression, which fill the earth with pain, sighs and bitterness." - Albert Einstein, 1934 nitro
You just have zero clue, if I was you I would stop exposing my lack of knowledge in such embarressing ways: a) without CDOs, CMOs, ABS, the economy would not be where it is now (and with now I speak about the time before this correction and also after the correction will be over). People like you and average Americans were able to get and use credit cards because those loans could be sold off to investors in re-packaged formats each to their own risk appetite. YOu were able to finance cars because car companies could transfer those loans to willing investors. If they could not have sold them off then all American car manufacturers would be bankcrupt right at the time I write this post. Many bluechip firms were able to finance themselves through loans, bonds that were repackaged in CDOs and sold off to investors. I dont think you get any of my points but its for the others to see the point of the usefulness of structured products. I dont deny that the whole thing has been taken to extremes and all extremes are at one time exposed and cut down to their true, fair value and that is what you are seeing now. About your rediculous real estate example, the fact that many people in the US have become completely controlled by greed and bought houses they could not afford is not to be blamed on Wall Street and those evil bankers. Bankers and traders are people who look for opportunities and such opportunities to make money were very clear when people were willing to go long the real estate boom. Please keep this in perspective, the money made during the real estate boom is a MULTIPLE of what will be lost in this correction. Mortgage and structured products will be there when we are long gone, this market is massive and after this correction people will AGAIN buy houses, will again finance them with borrowed money. Could it be you are one frustrated guy who either a) lost his house because you became a victim of your own greed b) lost a bunch daytrading the last couple days or lost a lot of opportunities ??? If b) then I recommend you looking into position trading longer time frames instead of posting comments that display no knowledge of financial markets
As I said, Nito, I am not interested what you call yourself or what you do, I think nobody asked, me included, and nobody really cares what you do. The OP asked a different question. THe point is there are clear definitions of technical analysis, one being the analysis of past prices and inferring from past prices future price levels. Also considering where this term "quant" was born it has a very narrow, specific definition. It has been watered down because some small wanna-be hedge funds needed to market themselves to the masses and calling their trading approach "quantitative" sounded sexy at the time. Ergo they called their 2 guys in the office "quants". Real quantitative analysts DO NOT look at past prices especially not when deriving new models. It would be a contradiction in itself. Markets are dynamic, in a flux, changing all the time. It does not pay to look at past prices to derive new models. Quants mostely develop new models that throug calibration come up with non-arbitagable prices that are coherent with current traded market prices. This was the original work of quants and still remains so. Again, what you call yourself or some people in the industry to make it sound great does not change anything of what I just said. Please have a look at "My life as a quant" I think its an excellent book to describe what quants actually do. Please lets keep this discussion on a general level, not what you do at home or how you like to call yourself.