TECHNICAL ANALYSIS: A LOSER’S GAME?
That’s the conclusions that Massey University has come to. They find that technical analysis, used on its own, is more profitable in some less efficient emerging markets, but overall has proven to be a waste of time.
My personal take is that technical analysis is an excellent supplement to a broader approach. After all, technical analysis is nothing more than a visual representation of the PAST fundamental action of an asset. Therefore, technical analysts are really just another form of fundamental analysts. Using technical analysis alone is akin to a football team that watches lots of film, but doesn’t study the playbook at all. If you do that, you’re bound to look like my Washington Redskins, and that is nothing but bad.
Technical analysis is not consistently profitable in the 49 countries that comprise the Morgan Stanley Capital Index once data snooping bias is accounted for. There is some evidence that technical trading rules perform better in emerging markets than developed markets, which is consistent with the finding of previous studies that these markets are less efficient, but this result is not strong. While we cannot rule out the possibility that technical analysis compliments other market timing techniques or that trading rules we do not test are profitable, we do show that over 5,000 trading rules do not add value beyond what may be expected by chance when used in isolation.
Technical analysis is good to help time entry and exit points…but if you are JUST using TA then you are doomed. I believe if you are using just fundamental analysis you are going to be going through some pain as well, but it isn’t bad as just using TA…
i dont know. I recently realized that the fundamental analysis is crap. How else can you explain the 60% rally in last few months. I wouldn’t have missed the rally if not for all the blogs, gurus, fundamental analysis. I would have caught atleast 50% of the entire rally if I followed tech.analysis. Higher Low —> then enter with tight stop. Its not a sure bet, but five tries with tight stop and hitting a trend with one of those tries and sticking with the trend would have helped me ride almost entire rally. I know its hind-sight, but i think it is possible with tech.analysis, though it needs strong stomach.
James Reply:
October 19th, 2009 at 10:47 PM
Reddweb, absolutely tech analysis doesn’t care if unemployment is low or high. It goes with a trend and volume, and in some cases is superior. But eventually fundamental analysis does take over TA. The question is just when…
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