If markets are complex systems, which they are, then traders/investors tend toward 'dimension reduction'. More plainly, causality and narrativity, which both lead to chronology and a perception of events in the flow of time. Often, wildly inaccurate.
This disease, leads to many pathologies in the market. One example is the interpretation (of let's say a price chart) and projecting it forward in time. The expectation (absent any quantitative assessment) that price will perform in 'X' manner. If successful, a causality/narrative is assigned as to why this succeeded: bounced off of VWAP, expansion of vol, etc. This can be very dangerous to our intrepid trader/investor.
Of course this narrative/causality or dimension reduction is present in many different forms, depending on who or what you are paying attention to. Consumption of information must be (preferably) limited or subjected to very stringent cynicism, lest something dirty get through.
A quantitative approach, while not always successful to the highest positive expectancy, nevertheless, is positive or profitable over time, assuming of course that the trader/investor follows their own set of rules and calculations.
I'm not conversant with how Mr Skate runs his strategies, but they have been demonstrated to be successful in real time. I run 2 strategies: (i) is based on simple arithmetic, (ii) is based on calculus. The third is not a quantitative strategy at all, more based on history. Which makes this strategy the most subjective of all. The first 2 are simply based on and executed on, numbers that are generated via market prices and time. There is no attempt to interpret, understand, or apply causality to those numbers. Strategy 3 is all about trying to apply causality and an understanding of the macro-environment.
jog on
duc