Learn the why. Not just the what.
Investing fundamentals, market logic, and the discipline behind good decisions.
Sector Rotation and the Flow of Capital
Capital does not sit still. It flows between sectors in response to the economic cycle, and understanding where it tends to move, and why, reveals a logic beneath movements that otherwise seem random.
The Limits of Technical Analysis
Having spent thirty essays examining the tools of technical analysis, honesty demands a clear account of what these tools cannot do. Knowing the limits is what separates a disciplined practitioner from a true believer.
Dow Theory: The Foundation Beneath Modern Charts
Nearly everything in modern technical analysis traces back, whether its users realize it or not, to a body of ideas assembled more than a hundred years ago under the name Dow Theory…
Elliott Wave Theory Without the Mysticism
Elliott Wave Theory sits in a strange spot in market analysis -- it draws fierce loyalty from its believers and just as fierce dismissal from its critics, often for the same underlying…
Building a Two-Indicator Confirmation System
Every single indicator eventually fails, and that failure naturally points toward combining tools. But combine them carelessly and you just multiply the confusion, so the path between…
OBV and the Logic of Accumulation
On-Balance Volume tracks the flow of volume into and out of an asset, attempting to reveal whether the smart money is quietly accumulating or distributing beneath the surface of price.
Timeframes: The Same Indicator, Different Truths
The same indicator can flash a buy on one timeframe and a sell on another, and both can be correct. Understanding how timeframes relate is the difference between confusion and clarity.
Why Indicators Fail in Sideways Markets
Most indicators are quietly designed for trending markets and break down when the market goes flat. Understanding why is the key to knowing when to trust any tool at all.
Fibonacci Retracements: Tool or Superstition?
No tool in technical analysis splits opinion quite like the Fibonacci retracement. The method takes a significant price swing and draws a set of horizontal lines across it at ratios…
The Difference Between a Signal and Noise
Every chart contains far more movement than meaning. The central skill of technical analysis is not finding signals but learning to discard the overwhelming quantity of noise that surrounds them.
Pivot Points and Intraday Structure
Pivot points translate yesterday's range into today's map of likely turning levels. They are mechanical, objective, and widely watched, which is both their strength and the reason they should be read with care.
Gaps: What an Empty Space on the Chart Means
A gap is a place where price jumped, leaving a void where no trading occurred. That emptiness is not a flaw in the chart but a record of a moment when the market's opinion changed abruptly.
Combining Momentum and Trend Indicators
Start from an observation that's almost too simple to seem important: the two major families of technical tools break down in exactly opposite conditions. Trend-following indicators…
Histogram Reading: The Underrated Half of MACD
Most users of MACD watch the crossover and ignore the histogram beneath it. Yet the histogram often speaks first, describing the momentum of momentum that the crossover only confirms much later.
The Problem with Over-Optimising Indicators
The search for the perfect indicator settings feels like diligence, but it usually produces the opposite of what it promises. A strategy tuned to fit the past is often a strategy designed to fail in the future.
Moving Average Ribbons and Trend Strength
A single moving average shows direction. A ribbon of many averages shows something a single line cannot: the strength, order, and health of a trend, read at a glance through the spacing between them.
The Golden Cross and Death Cross in Context
Few technical events attract as much attention as the golden cross and the death cross. The names are dramatic; the reality is a lagging signal that means far less in isolation than the headlines suggest.
ATR and Sizing Positions to Volatility
Average True Range is unusual among technical indicators because it doesn't even try to guess direction. All it measures is how much an asset typically moves over a chosen stretch of…
Trendlines and the Discipline of Drawing Them
A trendline is the simplest tool on any chart and the easiest to abuse. Its honesty depends entirely on the discipline of the hand that draws it.
Stochastic Oscillators Explained
The stochastic oscillator answers a precise question: where does the latest close sit within the recent range? The answer reveals momentum, but only for those who understand what it can and cannot say.
WT_LB: Reading the Wave-Trend Lower Band
The wave-trend oscillator distils momentum into a single smoothed line, and its lower band marks the territory where downside exhaustion tends to gather. Read with discipline, it identifies condition rather than command.
Leading vs Lagging Indicators
Every indicator falls into one of two camps, and the camp it belongs to determines both its strength and its flaw. Understanding the trade-off between anticipation and confirmation is the key to using any of them well.
The EMA Crossover System and Its Hidden Costs
The moving average crossover is the first system most new traders adopt, precisely because it is so simple. That simplicity hides costs that only become visible after the strategy has quietly drained an account.
Support and Resistance as Memory, Not Magic
Support and resistance levels are not mystical lines drawn by the market. They are the visible imprint of collective memory, the places where past decisions continue to shape present behaviour.