Andreas Clenow flew in from Zurich to give an in-person presentation at June’s regular STA monthly meeting. Billed in a lengthy promotional email as: ‘This presentation will demonstrate that there are flaws in point and figure which can be fixed. […]

Ironically members of all three societies met in the auditorium at One Moorgate Place on the hottest day so far in London. This, as the expert panel reminded us, was against a background of a freeze in the crypto market. […]

Sometimes in today’s ‘’instant knowledge at the touch of a smartphone’’ world, it’s very easy to become overconfident. Or assume that everyone, and anyone, could know what they need with a quick Google search.

The STA’s May monthly meeting was, unfortunately, conducted via webinar because of the Corona-19 virus; a pity as veteran (3rd time) invitee Zaheer Anwari is someone I look forward to catching up with over networking and drinks at our regular events. What I found out in this week’s presentation is that he has had a varied and interesting career, though he claims to be from a rather ordinary background.

Published on the 10th April 2020 in the Financial Times newspaper, this wasn’t the first time Mr Coates had contributed an article. Acting on a hunch he had had when running a trading desk for Deutsche Bank, he then retrained in neuroscience and physiology at Cambridge University. He wanted to find out whether ‘the rollercoaster of physical sensations a person experiences while immersed in the markets alters their risk-taking’.

Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar came to a sticky end on the 15th of March, lending the phrase negative connotations ever since. In fact, an Ide is a very ancient word for certain dates in the calendar, the first full moon of the month (March, in this case). Tonight, the 7th April, we have another full moon, a pink super bright one as the moon’s elliptical orbit around the earth brings it closer to us than usual. It actually looks orange, and the ‘pink’ comes from the phlox that flowers at this time of year.

Earlier this month Tim Harford, a Financial Times (TimHarford@ft.com) writer and author of best-selling books ‘The Undercover Economist’ and ‘Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy’ – who I rate highly, published an article about losers – in which category he includes himself. These are people who consistently purchase products which most people don’t want.

A regular guest on this 10:30 am slot, host Victoria Scholar slickly puts charting veteran Lee through his paces. Interestingly, he kicks off with FX cross the Kiwi (New Zealand dollar, for the uninitiated) against the Canadian dollar. While these ‘commodity’ currencies (plus the Australian dollar) feature regularly on specialists’ radars, I’m wondering whether the average IG spread-betting fan is really that interested.

That’s how Adrian Schmidt said he felt as a fundamental analyst slotted between two technical analysts at yesterday evening’s special panel debate organised at the STA’s usual (and lovely) venue in conjunction with the ACI. To an almost full house – maybe because of the ACI hook-up, maybe because investors make plans in January, maybe because of the calibre of the speakers – the session was riveting.

On reading the Weekend FT last Saturday, I stumbled on a piece entitled ‘Algorithm for our times’ about a man I’d never heard of. It’s the American in the photo, taken in 2011, who looks like a grizzled and possibly grumpy old man (says this grumpy old bag). It’s no wonder I, and no doubt many others, are unfamiliar with his name and face as he shunned publicity. In a rare 2006 interview he says, quoting Orwell’s donkey in ‘Animal Farm’: ‘’God gave me a tail to keep off the flies. But I’d rather have had no tail and no flies’’.

One of the ‘advantages’ of being a journalist is the vast amounts of unsolicited email I receive. The other is that I spend a lot of time on social media and websites looking for information, finding what’s new, and what […]

I must say, I don’t envy men these days; sartorial decisions are so very nuanced. IG TV host Jeremy Naylor this week invited Member of the Society of Technical Analysts’ Lee Sandford of tradingcollege.co.uk onto their regular slot, looking at […]

I’m not talking French Revolution or anything like that – at least I hope not – but to tie in with this week’s IG TV interview with Eddie Tofpik MSTA, Senior Markets Analysts at ADMISI, where he makes extensive use […]

IG TV host Jeremy Naylor this week invited Fellow of the Society of Technical Analysts, Nicole Elliott, onto IG’s regular slot looking at the week’s markets from a chartist’s perspective. Both agree that Brexit is dominating the headlines, Britain’s Supreme […]

Murray Gunn, currently with Elliott Wave International and previously head of technical analysis at HSBC, told us his talk would last between 30 and 45 minutes. Timed to perfection, he wound up his presentation after 37 minutes commenting on the […]

Prompted by a viewer suggestion, IG anchor Jeremy Naylor contacted Nicole Elliott to see if she would do a special slot on TV about how to start with, and trade, based on the Ichimoku Kinko Hyo cloud charting system. Not […]

As John Maynard Keynes famously said, ‘’the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent’’. Markets can also, unlike leopards, change their spots, moving from crushingly boring and lethargic for months to quite the raging tiger. This has […]

Never the shrinking violet, STA member and technical analyst at Financial Trends, Patricia wades right in as cable sits perilously on what many believe to be key support at $1.2600. Using the phrase ‘base-building’, and interestingly a 52-week moving average, […]

Today, 24th May, as PM Theresa May tenders a weepy resignation, producer and presenter Jeremy Naylor of IG TV interviews Lee Sandford of TradingCollege.co.uk His focus is on the hammer candlestick, which some confuse with the hanging man – one […]

I’ve read the Financial Times newspaper for longer than I care to admit. Over the years our relationship has had its ups and downs, me favouring some writers over others, complaining about coverage of certain topics, and shocked by the […]