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Strategies & Market Trends : John Pitera's Market Laboratory -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ItsAllCyclical who wrote (14501)	8/15/2013 12:52:05 PM
From: ajtj99	5 Recommendations Recommended By chris714 kimberley ksera MulhollandDrive re3 Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 33421

IAC, thank you for the kind words. I will respond to your reply with a couple of posts. The first is regarding Gold. While many have spent countless columns writing about the new paradigm of Gold and the various supportive fundamental reasons for owning it, few have ventured into what appears to be a more obvious reason for the decade long rise in the price of Gold - The Financialization of Gold. With the Commodities and Futures Modernization Act of 1999, derivatives, and finally, the precious metals ETF's, we've seen Gold move from an often times boring commodity to one with all the momentum and volatility of modern financial instruments. Whereas in the 1990's most of the options, futures, and hedging was done by the miners and those taking physical delivery, in the 2000's much of the action has moved to speculators. Sure, there was a supercycle bottom in 2002, but I'm of the opinion that while the fundamentals for owning Gold may have been compelling, the most logical reason for the rapid rise was because it was able to be treated no differently than any other modern financial instrument. Understanding the financialization of Gold means we can step back from the story narratives and see it for what it is - a financial instrument that speculators can move using leverage and algorithms without ever needing to take physical delivery. Sure, it helps to have compelling fundamentals to support speculation, but it is not a necessary ingredient since the financialization has happened. Do not get me wrong. I do support owning physical Gold if your government or currency is showing signs of collapse. It is also a great store of value in high inflation environments. However, outside of India, Argentina, Japan, Spain, Italy, and some other unstable places like Egypt, Syria, Mexico, Venezuala, etc, there is not a real compelling fundamental imperative to own Gold. Who knows, we may need to have a lot of our own personal physical gold here in the USA in the future. However, I'm pretty certain we'll have plenty of notice to make that move. I've found through the years that most investors are moved by story narratives. Narratives better support all level of personal and cognitive bias. Narratives work particularly well when you tap into belief. I am of the opinion that while fundamentals are important, it all starts and ends with charts. Charts allow the objective analysis to help subordinate the rush to subjective judgment. It is not easy, but I think you have found that through the use of charts, we can better analyze, position, and profit. Gold charts appear to best support a rise to back-test the $1,500 resistance, then a drop to test the $1,050 support. The pattern in Gold appears to suggest a long, meandering trading range above $1,050 if it does drop to make a final low in that area. I suspect that range will go from $1,050 to $1,600 over the course of several years. Think of it as an a-b-c correction off the all-time highs, with the "a" down to $1,050, a "b" up to $1,600, followed many years later by a "c" down to $1,050 or possibly even $850 to finish the correction off the all-time highs. The monthly S&P 500 chart from the year 2000 on could be informative for Gold, as that corrective a-b-c pattern may be in play.

To: ItsAllCyclical who wrote (14501)	8/22/2013 5:02:28 PM
From: ajtj99	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 33421

O/T IAC, regarding your tendonitis in your hands, have you tried a different keyboard, like the ergonomic Natural from Microsoft? Also, it's very important to have a good ergonomic workstation situation, particularly if you use the mouse hand a lot. From my experience, having a multi-way adjustable chair, adjustable keyboard base, and adjustable mouse base are the keys to keeping tendonitis at bay in a workstation. I'm glad you're living healthy, including eating. There's one simple thing I do every day that seems to shock people, and I think it's an important tool in maintaining a healthy weight: I weigh myself every morning. That helps me plan my diet for the day. It also keeps a person from being uninformed about their weight. I've done it since I was a kid. A few things I have done to keep calories down for most of my adult life are: 1. Diet Soda instead of regular soda (since age 25). 2. No mayonnaise 3. Avoid butter (except on potatoes) 4. Avoid fried food. 5. Don't add cheese to things (except the occasional italian food). 6. Don't cream it (all the foods that are creamed with butter and heavy creams). 7. Easy on the desserts, sweets, and pastries. I started most of these habits when I was a teenager. My aim was to maximize my longevity and maintain heart healthy habits. Most of these foods I've avoided are high in fat, calories, and cholesterol. Although my chocolate chip indulgence kind of falls into the dessert category, I always made sure it was within the dietary limits my morning weigh in suggested. Anyway, this is what has worked for me. It also probably helps that my genetic makeup works to keep me on the lean side. Like trading style, everyone needs to do what best works for them. I hope you continue on the road to wellville.

To: ItsAllCyclical who wrote (14501)	8/22/2013 7:18:58 PM
From: paul ta	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 33421

tendonitis: I change mouse hands regularly, a bit awkward at first, of course. Also, I use as many keystrokes in place of mouse movements as possible. For example, autohotkeys lets me create abbreviations for such things as my email address, so I type just a couple of characters instead of the full name. Not that you haven't found your own tricks, these or others. good luck. paul

To: ItsAllCyclical who wrote (14501)	11/5/2013 8:34:27 PM
From: ajtj99	13 Recommendations Recommended By Ben Smith bruiser98 chris714 dealmakr Hayduke and 8 more members Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 33421

Message #14501 from ItsAllCyclical at 8/14/2013 10:46:12 PM OT - Have been posting far less but have enjoyed reading your posts again of late. Hope you stick around and maybe put in one post weekly (more if you're generous). How's the health and personal life? What motivated you to start posting again? --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Well, I sent a PM to John Pitera on April 17, 2013 about a market read, and I mentioned to him that after not having participated in online message boards in over 2-years, I was considering participating on his board. I never received an answer to that PM. On June 10, 2013, I received a PM from John saying he noticed I had been lurking in the background, but had not posted in a while, and he invited me to post on his forum. The "lurking" he noticed was my public recommendations on some posts, which was a new SI feature. Well, I was finally drawn back in to respond to a post Jorj wrote on June 20th, and I've been around since. Why do I post? 1. I run across an awful lot of useful, sometimes actionable, material during the course of a typical day, and I feel rather selfish not sharing with a broader group of people who also may be looking for insights. 2. I learned an awful lot in the early years I was on SI, specifically 2001-2002. I've always been very keen on giving back and helping others the way I had been helped when I was way back on the learning curve. 3. I enjoy the collaborative investing community. When I had my own thread it kind of became a job, but when I broke free for a couple of years, I was re-energized. What has my experience been like since I've been back on SI? 1. I've enjoyed re-connecting with those I had exchanged with throughout the past, both on SI and elsewhere. 2. I appreciated the hospitality of John Pitera and his support while he was here. Frankly, I've been disappointed he pursued me to post here, then essentially vanished. He may be busy, have a new job, have other priorities, but to go 2-months without checking in and giving no warning of his leaving was strange to say the least. On dozens of occasions I traveled internationally for weeks at a time, often times going days without food or sleep, but I still checked in on my thread daily with few exceptions when I was running it. I guess we're all different, but this is something that has really surprised me about this thread. John's rarely here, and other interactions here are few. Those of us who do remain are an older demographic than what was populating SI in the late 90's and early 2000's. Much of the chatter back then was not always what you'd call constructive, but there were also many great, young minds contributing to the forums here. Now that group has splintered, with Twitter a popular platform for rapid fire traders and tips. Blog comments have also absorbed many of the folks who used to post on forums such as these. Check out Zero Hedge comments and you'll get an idea of what I'm talking about. It seems we've lost some more folks on SI with the new ad policies, but I'll keep plugging along here as long as I have worthwhile and relevant things others may wish to read.