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There are several threads related to Traders Expos on board here, however they are all specific to a single subject. The purpose of this thread is to post observations, lessons learned, new trading technology, new tricks, vendors, etc. from Traders Expos, Money Shows and so on. Basically, anyone may post any observation that might be of interest to members.
I have attended many of these shows and expos at my convenience every year in my backyard for the past 18 years. It is amazing to see the number of newcomers that disappear from the scenes the next year and those that keep showing up every year. You will see many of the trading and industry personalities and serious traders looking for ways to improve their performance. Also, so many people attend these expos not knowing the basic things like a moving average, etc. that we take for granted. One thing for sure; a majority are looking for a way to get rich overnight, and boy do some of these scam artists that surprisingly show up every year know how to take advantage of these poor soles
Not that a seasoned trader would learn much from a young 20-30 something old enthusiastic presenter that is pushing an old idea with a perceived new twist, but expos are more of a place to pick a nugget here and there, be reminded of trading things one used to know and follow, new opportunities, new technology, the freebees, and of course the 20 pounds of literature that provide enough potty time reading material until the next expo.
So, to begin, here are some of my observations from the Traders Expo, November 14-17, 2012 at Caesar Palace in Las Vegas:
Taxes - Robert Green's web site probably will give you the best information on treatment of trading taxes. It is amazing how complicated it can get if one trades commodities, equities, futures, option, ETF, etc. when it comes to tax returns, especially if the tax laws are changing for 2013. There is a wealth of free information and updates on his web site. The most interesting to me was how you can substantially benefit from properly choosing between LLC, C Corp, S Corp, Partnership, etc. You will be surprised to know that your current accountant often takes the easy option for him to prepare your tax return not your best prospects. When it comes to trading, many of tax laws are vague and the accountants take the easy way.
Technology There is a whole lot going on at TOS and TDA as far as trading platform. New features are added routinely. Don Kaufman heads the trading department with the sole function to develop new technology and software for traders. If you don't have a TDA account, a free demo account of TOS will open a new horizon to a wealth of free information and ideas available out there. Trade Architect is amazing for what it offers without being intimidating like TOS.
Trading Systems So much noise about "advanced" Fibonacci time and price analysis. Carolyn Boroden's presentation had nothing new in substance. Although a nice lady, most of people on this board would have come out empty handed. Nevertheless, some of those poor soles paid the $295 for a 4 hrs talk that offered nothing advanced beyond those things explained in any basic TA article about the subject. She uses her own software that plots fib levels (lines) on both time and price, and probably that is what she sells with emphasis on swing trading stocks. She did not touch futures, forex, options, or day trading.
Books Wiley was there with a nice selection of trading books for day traders. They had a 30% off, so it was a good opportunity to load up. There were three books from Al Brooks on Price Action, Range, and Trend. They were big and heavy and the set would have cost over $200 after the discount. But not for me, I never read that much stuff on one subject for my post-graduate. The over 1000 pages material is highly detailed with pages and pages of small font and relatively few figures that can put me to sleep without 100% conviction. I like Al and his work, but he could have written his message easily in three small pamphlets of 50 pages each.
By the way, his presentation on placing stops and targets (one module of his work) was excellent and is recorded as a web cast available free to watch on TradersExpo.com.
Food for Thaught The popular and most attended event, as the last four years, was the two hours Tom Sosnoff's (TastyTrades) and Dave Johnson's humor-me show on trading the markets. The big picture: the latest drop is not even a big correction since March 2009 and the trend is still up. Will see.
But a point Tom made makes for some food for thought, and that is in the long run odds are against you trading an industry that operates like a casino. Placing a one point stop and 2 points target will eventually take you out of action, regardless of the instrument or time frame traded. The only way to win is to spot big discrepancies between the actual and historical values of liquid markets and take advantage of that. One instrument that is totally void of fundamentals and is totally based on perceived value is "Volatility" and the best is to trade an instrument against VIX when you spot these discrepancies between historical and implied volatility. Non-the-less, risk must be spread across a balance portfolio, ideally with a zero sum risk.
Well that is enough, it is cutting into my football games.
I kind of want to, but I haven't been to one in years and I just don't think it would be worth my time, but it's been so long maybe I'd catch something new. Yeah, at best, you can get a few nuggets here and there.
