Gary Williams Wall Street Basics

My reply was not addressing you (BCT) but those who find in necessary to dis what others have found to be the best method for them. So please don't take my statement as if it was directed to you. It was not. I am not a fan of negative waves.





Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/28/2014 08:17PM by Darcy2.

Darcy is right in that you have to find a method that works for you. You have to look at it like this: GW spent over a decade learning something that worked for him and is imparting that knowledge to anyone who wants to learn how he did it. There are lots of traders who make money in the market, a few offer their process. Some are easier to grasp than others, all require you to work at it.

Finding people to chat about this is difficult because once you finally get it, you tend move on to other topics of discussion. I'm grateful to Darcy for sharing so much of her process, but even that takes time to learn, and much longer to master. I'm following GW's methods, I'm still a ways off yet from being confident in it, but I am seeing progress and I do see how his method can work. I'm sure by the time I'm confident in my ability, everyone on here will have moved on to better results with their method or stopped trading.

I went to Gary's class in 2005 1-5 and bought the cd's. For my first 3 years I studied my A off 7 days a week trying to figure it out. I read as many books as I could. Except for the Christmas Cross everything that Gary teaches are in the books. He has pulled the most important Info out for you. It takes time, years, to learn to trade. Discipline is the primary focus. I would say over 90% give up because of mental capitulation.
It takes a certain mind set of "I will never give up" to learn to trade. Even the best traders in their books say and feel that they have never arrived. All the best traders have washed out and lost big. Gary gave me an outline, a place to start, so I could learn how to trade. There are many ways to trade. I have found what works for me. If you work at it every day and do not quit you will eventually find a trade that works. When you do, trade that trade over and over. Then you start practicing and looking for another trade that will work. Sometimes it is good to get a way from the market for a few days. That is how I found my first trade. Out of all the classes and books I have read or looked at, Gary's classes and info were the most helpful in teaching me to trade.

I never attended any of Gary's Classes. My mentor bought the entire CD collection for me a few years ago. He was able to purchase the CD's they were not being sold to the public anymore. He was one of Gary original students who has taken success in trading to a multi million dollar status. I worked to learn the material. I asked questions. I have the Dennys sessions, Getting Started, 1-5, and manuals. He bought me the Steve Nison's videos-all of them. I assume there are probably 40-50 hours of Nison's videos. I have viewed them all-several times. That was like listening to grass grow, but I learned more about candlesticks and trading techniques than I ever could have learned by reading books books on candles. I read the books on the booklist. I practiced. I failed. I practiced. I failed again. I was about to fail for a 3rd time before I stopped and went back to practicing until I got it. I am the first to admit, it is tough for me to hear people discount this approach when I am a living witness that it works. Some will allow failure to be an option. Was not an option for me. When my son graduates from college in a few years, I hope I can send him through Gary's classes. Sounds like he might stop teaching again.

I wrote the post above yours. All your son needs is to listen to the CD's, read, read, read, and practice, practice, practice. I also purchased
Steve Nison's videos. I love Nison and once a year go through the CD's.They were excellent! Everything you need to know is on Gary's CD's. The market has changed. I trade the market different then I did in 2006-2008. But, again the market does the same thing over and over. I am glad you hung in there. I laugh at the one's that are mad at Gary. They just didn't have what it takes to be a trader.

Hey guys,

Thought I would tack on to everyone here. I took the basic and advanced class. I have not taken RTP. I am interested in learning about DE and proper exit strategy.

Question: Do you think it is worthwhile for me to travel and take the new Survivor Weekend classes?

For me to do so, I will fly from coast to coast so it would not be as simple as a weekend driving trip.

Thanks in advance!

Sonicwave,

My five cents.....
I did the 1-5, advanced and RTP. I've learned in the seven years I've been doing this, that this is very much an individual thing. GW gave us a starting point and a base from which we needed to do the work, do the work and do the work (repeat previous steps).

There is no doubt that this is a "solo" sport in which each of us have to grab the knowledge and run with it and continuously add to it. You have to expand your knowledge of the stock market yourself and go outside of the things GW teaches. You can see in this forum that many traders have expanded and added to GW knowledge and appear to be successful.

I too toyed with the idea of doing more GW classes but I think I have to further perfect what I have learned. Personally I think that having gone to RTP was a mistake (maybe because I did it 6 months after 1-5). I did not give myself plenty of time so soak in the information before adding the RTP stuff.

All of that said, I'm a self learning type of person and I have no problem doing the work and studying on my own, besides I could never see myself being a GW groupie but I guess different folks different strokes...

Hey but if you got the time and the money...you can always come and visit the friendly south....Grits, fried chicken, corn bread, sweet tea and more awaits...

WNQ

Just come in the Winter.
These mosquitoes are murderous :-)

I would refer to them as little buggers, but some are so big they can stand flat footed on the ground and kiss a turkey :-)

Sonicwave,

Willnotquit is so correct, and I agree with those statements 100%. If you have taken Gary's basic course, you have what you need. You just have to work, work, work. I am not sure if I am a Gary's Groupie-lol. I have a level of respect for what his program taught me far and beyond what any college professor or instructor has ever taught. This has changed my life-FOREVER! If that places me in the category as his groupie, then I am the first to stand up and scream, "I am proud to say, I am a Gary's Groupie and no longer a slave to debt".

I am up this morning at 4AM working at this thing. I refuse to go back to that old life. You just have to want it and understand that the market is only going to give what it wants. You just have to figure out ways to know when it is going to give. You dive in, take a chunk of the pie and gracefully step away.

Before going into trades, I watch very closely. My palms still get a bit sweaty because it is a challenging game to me that I do not like losing. I view this as, a ton of smart folks sitting at computers, trying to find ways to take each other's money. I am forced to stack my little pea brain and what I have learned against all those high tech computers, fancy indicators, advanced traders, etc. All I have is, Strategy Desk, TOS, RTT, and my Wall Street Basics training, but a hell of a lot of confidence. I am like, "Come on you SOB's. Let's do this". I see my trade, watch for my perfect entry, and pop the trade. I sit and continue talking to myself, saying, " Come to daddy baby, come on to big daddy". Sometimes, I find myself say, "Whoaaaa! Where are you going? Are you trying to trick me? Are you playing games with me? Yeah, you are trying to test my love for you. I am not going anywhere-for now!" If it continues to go against me, I am like, "OK, you are starting to get a bit sassy. What are you doing? You are going to far away from home. I have seen you run this far, but you have about reached your limit". At that point, I am usually reaching a support or resistance point, so I am looking for the bounce. That is what normally happens, but if for whatever reason, it thrusts through that point, I am out with a small loss-if needed. When I have those rare moments, I get upset with myself and find out where I missed signals. My comments are, " They got me. Damn, I lost to those jokers today. They just took my lunch money and laughed at me. I got something for them tomorrow". At that point, I go and bust my butt, finding out reasons I lost the trade. It becomes personal for me, and I tend to feel swindled and defeated. Just know, I keep all of this in perspective. I am not going to do something crazy if I lose big in a trade. I knew I was going crazy when I was having loses in practice, and I was affected as if I lost real money. I was like, " I just lost $500 damn dollars. Then I am like, " Hold up, I lost $500 virtual dollars". I told my wife about my ordeal. The first thing she said was, " Have you been taking your meds-EVERYDAY". I had to think about it for a second, and said, "Nope. I missed yesterday and the day before". She said, " PLEASE, PLEASE TAKE YOUR MEDS-EVERYDAY! I asked, " If I were normal and not crazy, would we be together? She said, "No because you would be boring and broke!" Man, I love that woman!

For me, these mind games are really, really good! Fortunately, in this game, if you win over and over again, you become financially independent. Not a bad trade off.

GWNO

I will run you though a Widows and Orphans trade. Before I get started, I just made a 44% return in just one month trading a stock I follow and everyone was talking down (JCP). I was not all in on it though because I already had my W&O trade going on and I used some extra cash that I recently put in my account because I just couldn't pass on this trade. I got called out on it last Friday, 3/7/14 on the $8 calls. I dollar cost averaged into the trade from 1/30 through about a week before they came out with earnings (yes I broke the rules, but had a good gut check because of management changes made). Check the chart. See the double bottom in February? That is why I got in, so I guess it is not a classic widows and orphans trade, but it is a good example of what one can do if you do the practice trades every day for years, and follow about 30 to 60 stocks, and watch the news, and read the books.

OK. Here we go. The stock we will trade for this month (middle of March) is MTW. Check out the daily chart, it is trending up and has broken out of its resistance below 30 over the past few years. For this paper trade we are going to buy 1000 shares at the closing price today, March 13, 2014. So we are investing in 1000 shares of MTW at $31.43 a share. Our total investment is 31,437.95 ($7.95 trading fee included). A 5% gain will be $1571.90 in one month, so the stock plus my gains from selling CCs needs to be approximately $1.58 a share. If I go beyond one month on this trade, I likely stand to make more than 5%. Let's see how we do.

I am not a professional trader, nor do I offer trading advice. I am a private individual investor. If you do this trade yourself, I have no responsibility or liability for your results. There is no guarantee this trade will work. Just covering my butt here.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/13/2014 08:37PM by NC77.

GWNO - update on the pre-announced widows and orphans trade.

OK, assume I got into this W&O trade on Friday morning 3/14/14. It is about 12:30 p.m. and MTW is now trading around $31.94 and $32.06. In just one trading day I could sell the April 32 calls for $1.25 and that would give me a $1.82 profit for the trade. That equates to about a 5.8% return in just 1.5 trading days. But according to the rules for trading W&O, I need to sit on the piano some more and I feel MTW will continue to rise more. With the next earnings report coming on April 28. I have time to ride this to expiration Friday in April and do much better. But at least you can see, I already made more than 5% in just 1.5 trading days using the widows and orphans technique. Not bad eh?

I am also in this trade with real money. I got in at $31.30 on Friday, 3/14/14 and could sell the March 33 calls with more than a 5% return if the stock rises some more on Tuesday and Wednesday and hits 33. That would give me another trade going into April after pocketing my gains in less than a week. Or I could just rake in the change from the out of the money calls and keep going for April.

The trade is still on for now, so let's see how it goes.

Hello NC77,

I applaud your having the guts to post this - thank you! However, I don't think this is the proper setup for the W&O trade and the application of the gain isn't a fit either. You are banking gains on the option and stock that aren't there yet. First of all, the W&O trade is only made when the Daily and 233 chart meet certain and strict criteria. There is some flexibility on the daily (bottom bband or support) but the 233 MUST be showing straight line information - 3 of the 4 or 4 of the 4 indicators crossing going up. That was not the case with this trade from what I saw in looking at it. All that has happened so far is you have made a trade, it went up 0.55 cents (1.76%), and you have moved to sell an option on the stock you own. Should the stock falls from here, you will have only gained the premium from the options you sold but would then be stuck with a stock at a lower price - potentially much lower - while getting none of any potential gain. This trade has a HUGE risk around how you have executed it.

Again - my hat is off to your positing this. But the trade isn't even close to a W&O and the return is yet to be seen. You would need to close both the stock and the option to make that calculation.

Maybe this will spark some debate as to how others trade the W&O and some of the entry rules for doing so.

Best,

GWNO



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2014 08:54PM by GWNO.

Thanks GWNO,

So you are losing money using the strategy you just outlined for W&O trades? I think you would be very successful if you were that meticulous in placing trades.

The trade is still on. My post from yesterday was to show the gains I have made in just one day of "sitting on the piano." Do you remember that from the class? As of 11:56 a.m. today, I am up $1.02 on the trade and the out of the money call options for the April 34 calls, I could sell today for $0.55.

If I were to sell those calls today (but it is way too early, so I won't, as Gary said to sell the calls one to two weeks out from expiration Friday) and the stock is $34 or above on April 19th, then I will have a successful Widows and Orphans trade and will make 3.24 a share. Since I bought the shares at 31.31, my gain is 10.34% in one month. That is how widows and orphans works and I am showing it to you ahead of time.

When I took the class in 2005, the only criteria for Widows and Orphans was the stock was trending higher. The entry point was not an issue. I can go back and look at my classroom workbook, but I do not remember needing to be picky on the entry point with W&O trades.

So, outside of further discussion on how to do a widows and orphans trade, I will wait to post my successful trade (if it is successful) when I sell the calls in April. And that is of course, if I don't get out with a 5% gain or more in one week by selling the OOM calls tomorrow or Thursday. I would either be called out on Saturday or still have the stocks to sell more CCs in April. If I don't get called out, then I do not make the 5% in one week, just pocket the change. If I do get called out, I make the 5% in one week, and I consider getting back in on the dips for another W&O trade for April.

I am curious GWNO, have you traded with real money successfully? What are you favorite techniques? I used to do the 5-minute trade every day on options because I enhanced what Gary taught about it and it was a pretty sure thing. Small money though. Most of my options trading have been using the charts only and from familiarity of the stock through practice trades. I no longer trade options, I only do W&O trades. Plan to retire in a year doing it. And all my retirement will be tax free, so I will keep all the Social Security money I collect.

How about you, how do you trade? How well have you done trading in practice and with real money?

One other question, why do you think the stock is going to fall from here? Perhaps it may on a global disaster or catastrophe. But, from what I have been seeing over the last five years is that the market is pretty indifferent to the stuff the naysayers are always putting out there. For MTW, I see 17 candlesticks riding up the Bollinger Band on the weekly chart since the end of last November and through January earnings. That gives me about 3 more weeks before I should be expecting a reversal. I will have sold the cover calls before then. Count in that MTW blasted its earnings out of the park in January and gave good guidance for the next quarter, most analysts are leaning towards another good quarter of earnings on April 28, and they have new products coming out that are well received by the market, so I am confident the stock will trade higher going into earnings. This is the art part of the trade, and the chart part looks fine to me also.

Thanks for the discussion, I am willing to hear back from you and others on how you do it, but this is how I do it, and I have not had a losing W&O trade yet since 2007. Some trades I sat on the piano for several months. One trade almost a year sitting on the piano, but I didn't lose money.

NC77

GWNO and NC77 - I appreciate the W&O discussion!

I have been very picky with my W&O entries in the past, but have had a hard time finding a good W&O trade each month because of that.

NC77 - for the MTW trade you describe, I would have passed since the daily chart is on the top bollinger band, which sometimes limits up-side potential. Your MTW trade is working so far...I will continue to follow it with great interest!

NC77

Awesome results on the MTW trade. If it works for you please dont let others detour you.

However, this being a Gary WIlliams thread I would assume the correct rules would need to be transparent for W&O.
Usually(9/10) it would be post stock split with the stock on the bottom bollinger band ready to rise. This is the way I learned it anyway.

I prefer "chunky Money" Widows and orphans and if Im not mistaken since the last we spoke Gary does to.

Im not telling anyone to trade it but the OTEX set up is from what I can tell a proper set up for the post stock split w&o.

Again I applaud the being able to retire and make the return you have made on MTW. COngrats.

BCT

Thanks BCT,


I will check out OTEX tonight. Some of the terms you mention I have not heard of. I took the basic course and the advanced course back in 2005 -2006. Now I am curious about how well I have remembered what I was taught back then and will check my book and notes to go over it again. It appears Gary has modified some of the trading techniques over the years.

I was comfortable with trading MTW here because it is an expert stock that I follow. It has been range bound since it hit bottom in 2008, and so I see this as a major break out. Fundamental stuff not taught in Gary's class I guess. I have tweeked some of his techniques to fit my trading style.

TrendTrader1 -

I also find it difficult to find good stocks to W&O trade every month. Sometimes I get lucky when watching CNBC. When I see a big or unusual move on a particular stock on the ticker, I often check it out to see how it has been trending over the last 3 to 6 months. Most of my W&O trades ore from a very small basket of stocks that tend to move in an Ocean Tide manner. I am not good at OT trading so I just do the upside, get out, and wait for the stock to come back down to a certain range I am willing to get back in on.

Look forward to hearing more from those on the forum.

BigChartTrader Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> Im not telling anyone to trade it but the OTEX set
> up is from what I can tell a proper set up for the
> post stock split w&o.
>

BCT - do you look at the weekly chart for a post stock split w&o? In your example of OTEX, I don't see weekly indicators turning up yet and no strong support. Does the fact of this being a post stock split trade make the weekly evidence less important than for non-split trades? Thanks!

I dont remember the weekly being in the equation from a monthly post stock split widows and orphans trade. Again, let me clarify, that I trade "chunky money"(only fall winter). from what I understand the rules on monthly widows and orphans on deal with the daily chart coming off the bottom bollinger band beggining to rise at least a week after the split has taken place.

BCT

Concerning trading stocks that ride up the upper Bollinger Band. Check out SNDK on the weekly chart from July 2005 to Jan 2006. My friend and I watched this stock ride up the upper Bollinger Band while we were taking my first classes, and my friends were taking a repeat. It went from about 25 a share to 80 a share in a year. Multiple W&O trades over and over again all year if one follows one basic rule. The stock is trending higher. No splits were needed, no entry points needed. I don't think Gary taught it that way back then. If I remember correctly we were allowed to start trading W&O from day one without a year of practice. Were you allowed to do the same?

BCT

OTEX looks good to me, but I (myself personally) would not get in until it drops some. It is too close to the 52-week high (that is a rule of mine, not Gary's). I would definitely put it on a watch list for future trades. Thanks for the tip.

Do you do any technical writing by chance?

Please keep in mind that I AM NOT saying to make that trade or add the stock your basket. I have no idea what the company does and I believe one of the criteria to be widows and orphans would be "not to mind owning the stock". INMO that would mean that I know what the business does. I was simply pointing on that it was post stock split and rising off the BBB.

My recommendation for anyone would be to reserach a stock that moves and buy that stock off the weekly around August/Sept. and hold it untill March/April for widows and orphans. Its one trade a year. I dont have to look at the splits calendar although the stock could certainly be a split (i.e. MA). Instead of buying the stock, I would buy the LEAP option. Example would be PCLN. THe option is still expensive at around $250 a contract but much less than the $1,000+ stock. THis past fall winter PCLN went from a 900 stock to a 1300 stock. I feel certain that a 100% return could have been collected there. FOr those that feel PCLN is WAY to expensive to purchase then AMZN would be another option. Its LEAP would run you about $65. It went up $100 this past FWTZ.

I have no clue how to write code. If my workspace went down I would be in trouble bc I couldnt tell you how to build it back

How is this trade working for you? Did you sell the calls?

GWNO

No haven't sold the calls yet. It is too far out from epiration Friday, 4/19 to sell them. Still sitting on the piano.

BCT...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/29/2015 09:27AM by Darcy2.

This is what I am talking about. Not one person can post a trade that works - because they don't. I would give this some serious thought folks. To blame yourself for not following some set of rules that don't work doesn't make it work.

This trade is toast. And it would be with your retirement dollars! Worse would have been if you had sold the options and been stuck with a big loss on a stock you were not able to sell without first unloading the options.

Gwno

Please don't speak for everyone when you say no trade works. I don't know how long you have been trading or what type of trading you do but Gary's "rules" are exactly that. Gary's rules. There are a lot of different methods and classes that work. A lot of people get angry with Gary and whatever class they took but fail to realize they have not followed that system to a T. Even on this forum there are rules that have been adjusted and phrases that lead others to think that they is flexibility in Gary's rules. Since this thread is regarding Gary I feel like you are a GW student. If that's the case I would ask you to start from the beggining and practice. Most make the mistake to practice untill they are confident they have it. I would urge you to practice untill you feel like its second nature to trade/invest. One year of bad or inconsistent practice doesn't make you a good trader. It makes you bad and inconsistent. Practice a full year and make sure you are correct 90% of the time. Even if that means making 50 cent a trade.

BCT

You guys need to stop feeding the trolls. GWNO (Gary Williams NO) is NOT here to seek help or advice. Look back over his posts. He is here ONLY to bad mouth Gary Williams. He is looking for any and all reasons to point out the failures of others.

Ignore him.

WOW!!!

If a cup is filled with water it can't possibly hold more water. The water will first have to be emptied before new water can be added. So to; you must do with everything you know about trading and investing BEFORE you took GW's class.

I have a question for you GWNO.
If GW's stuff is sooooo wrong for us... do you have a better system "for sale"? You seem determined to save us from our ignorance, which I must admit, I could use some saving. So to that, do you have something as a "proper replacement"?

If you do, then I'm afraid that puts you in a tough spot. Seems to me it would cause you to put water on your own fire.


R

GWNO
Here is for you $UNP. [www.youtube.com]

GWNO

Did you actually take Gary's course? Have you actually traded with real money? How long have you been doing practice trades? Are all your trades in practice or with real money losers? I am not being sarcastic here, just wondering why you are so down on trading. You can be successful trading if you do the work.

I am still sitting on the piano, so it is premature to declare the trade to be toast. I also bought some insurance puts on the trade on Monday 4/7, so I am covered if we are heading into a big market correction which could knock down many stocks. As I see it, the volatility in the trade is market driven, not stock driven (i.e., nothing in the fundamentals of the stock have changed to believe it is now bearish), so I am going to ride the market until I close the trade.

The notion that I would need to buy back the CCs to sell the stock at a loss is somewhat laughable. Once the CCs go down, I could buy them back if I was doing a printing press trade, but I am not. If the CCs go to zero, I wait until expiration and pocket the money, and look forward to selling the CCs again next month. In the meantime, I still own the stock and can determine what I am going to do moving forward.

Most of my Widows and Orphans trades run more than one month of sitting on the piano. I said in a previous post. I have never lost money on a Widows and Orphans trade. Perhaps this will be my first, but I doubt it. I will keep you posted and don't let your trades be driven by stock price.

1



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/08/2014 08:23PM by GWNO.