[thehun69]

Barron, as always, great posts,,now let's get to the meat..

1)Price action is price action. Lookit, there are many ways to skin a cat here, just as there are many ways in which a fundie looks at a company, is it overvalued based on price/book, or price/sales, or doing debt analysis, there are many different tools in a fundie's toolbox to look at a company and assess what their investment decision is regarding that particular company. The same feeling goes for the TA side. There are thousands of different tools and studies you can do and have it semantically considered as TA. Here is the definition: TA is the valuation of stock price based SOLELY on the study of stock price (btw, that is how it should be defined, whatever wikipedia or any other reference source has, shouold be updated to this). Any study of price is TA. As I see it, TA is based on price action regardless of outside fundamental forces and factors. Now, yes you are right, there are hazy areas where the two collide, but once can easily say that that hazes the FA definition as much as it does the TA definition.

2)"similarly, the buying pressure comes from somewhere. traders are simply the expression of it in the market imo."

Agreed. Now the question is WHY ARE THEY BUYING? To that, there is no predictive answer. That was my comment to Dessert in the sense that he felt that for whatever reason, people would miraculously come to their senses in a couple of years time and realize that this stock is trading significantly underbook, here comes the buying pressure, and Dessert makes a nice profit as the price is driven up to par. My critique of that point is the fallacious assumption that people would realize the stock's undervalued quality (which would have to be based on a clear consensual and mutually agreed market model, which is a wonderfully amazing assumption)and then flock to it. I brought up that point for the purpose of demonstrating that as a TA I don't care why people buy stocks. I only care what the stock action is currently demonstrating. I don't think it is reasonable to assume that everyone would agree on a valuation based on some economic model and then flock there, the price action on the charts show you EXACTLY the valuation that the public assumes.

3)I have seen tests done on FA and tests done on TA. My biggest qualm of test done on TA is that they are done by people who have absoluetely no clue how to effectively use TA. I have seen analysis on simple moving crossovers, and such, but the problem is that with TA, it is not all encompassing, that is the TA that works in one market will get you killed in another. That is, some markets tend to trend nicely, other are inherently choppy and will trade in channels (yes just like that gorrilla on tv). To use a moving average study over choppy markets will get you whipsawed and your lunch chewed out. Just like using an oscillator in a trendy market will be extremely costly. These studies are all encompassing and thus seem ineffective.

4)With Buffet, yes, let's move on. While there were no recent offerings, the point I was brining up was that Buffet along with the other famously wealthy fundies have shown strong results with their trading, but their billionaire status is a function of the trading and as a function of their investment company and having a crapload of shares of those companies. Yes, he did grow those shares, but he wasn't some joe blow that took a td ameritrade account from peanuts to bling.

5)As for Mendle..this is one of those fooled by randomness points. To be honest, I haven't seen the documentation, and don't know much about this, but I will read into it in order to give a better formed opinion.

6)Lastly, I really think this contention should be put to rest and let's move on with our lives, trade the way we like, be wealthy and happy.

THE HUN.