Australian (ASX) Stock Market Forum

For bottom pickers and knife catchers

Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Ok 2 ways it could possibly be done:

1. Have a column and record members nominations if they are catching the knife or bottom picking. Then have a set time frame for each of these, say 3months for a knife catch and 6 months for a bottom pick.

2. Have members nominate their timeframe for their selection.
Have 8 columns each with quarters for the next 2 years and then members choose what quarter they want the stock to be evaluated in, and just put a mark in that column
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Ok 2 ways it could possibly be done:

1. Have a column and record members nominations if they are catching the knife or bottom picking. Then have a set time frame for each of these, say 3months for a knife catch and 6 months for a bottom pick.

2. Have members nominate their timeframe for their selection.
Have 8 columns each with quarters for the next 2 years and then members choose what quarter they want the stock to be evaluated in, and just put a mark in that column
Let me sober up before I can undersatnd that P..

Some time tomorrow.

:eek:
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Bottom pickers? Shouldn't that be bottom 'guessers'?
Let's be realistic.....nobody can consistently pick bottoms in advance - it's nothing but guesswork. The only way to reliably pick a bottom is after the event.
"Not good enough", I hear you all say, "we want to know where the bottom is now so we can buy at or near the lows."
I say forget about trying to buy at the bottom. Pull up a chart of any strongly downtrending stock. Take note of the number of times it rallied briefly before once again heading south. These rallies were caused primarily by buying pressure from bottom pickers. Why were these rallies short-lived? Because there were many investors who bought the stock at higher prices over past weeks or months, and a rally gave them the opportunity of bailing out for perhaps a break even result, or at least for a smaller loss than they were facing before the rally took place. When enough of them bail out en masse, their selling pressure forces the stock lower, the downtrend resumes, and the latest bottom pickers cop a pounding.

Rather than guessing where a bottom might be, a far more effective way to play bottoms is to wait for conclusive evidence that a bottom has in fact occured. This means waiting for evidence that the downtrend is over and a new uptrend is underway. Then and only then can you say with any degree of confidence that the stock has bottomed out.
Once a new uptrend is confirmed you'll have loads of opportunities to get a piece of the action. You won't be buying at the bottom, but you'll still be buying at relatively cheap prices. And after you've bought, at least there's a pretty good chance of the stock going the right way to make you some money. Afterall, the stock is uptrending at this stage, and uptrends usually go further and last longer than most people thought they would.

Having said all of the above, let me assure you that I have nothing against you bottom pickers. In fact I'm eternally grateful to you and I hope you all keep doing it. The temporary rallies you help to create are just the right medicine to cheapen the price of Put options. When the rally stalls and the downtrend resumes, the alert options trader has an ideal opportunity to grab some Puts at discounted prices, and reap the benefit of their rapidly escalating value as the stock heads south with a vengeance.
This pattern can be exploited over and over again with Put options on the bearish stocks in the bearish sectors of the market.

Long live bottom pickers!
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Bottom pickers? Shouldn't that be bottom 'guessers'?
Let's be realistic.....nobody can consistently pick bottoms in advance - it's nothing but guesswork. The only way to reliably pick a bottom is after the event. !

A good fundamental analysis can give you a > 70% chance of picking when a stock should have bottomed. I guess you can call that an EDUCATED guess. After the event can often be very costly. Guessing or picking, doesn't matter for me, I like trading that way.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Bottom pickers? Shouldn't that be bottom 'guessers'?
Let's be realistic.....nobody can consistently pick bottoms in advance - it's nothing but guesswork. The only way to reliably pick a bottom is after the event.

Long live bottom pickers!
bunyip, that is the point of the analysis aspect.

We all have opinions of the market and where it is heading.

Some FA and some TA.

A bottom needs to be judged, which it will. Both in FA and in TA. There are quite a number of criteria to judge both.

You're not up to it?
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

I would like to add KBC-Keybridge capital ltd to the list.
n.t.a per share $1.54 against a current price of $0.70
Estimated net profit for the full yr of $20 mill. or e.p.s. of 11c
Keybridge is involved in structured financial products which include aircraft and shipping leases,infrastructure,property and natural resources.
Currently a fully franced yld of 9%
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

bunyip, that is the point of the analysis aspect.

We all have opinions of the market and where it is heading.

Some FA and some TA.

A bottom needs to be judged, which it will. Both in FA and in TA. There are quite a number of criteria to judge both.

You're not up to it?

No Kennas, I'm definitely not up to picking bottoms. Been there, done that. I realised long ago that it's far simpler and more productive to simply find a trend, hitch a ride on it, and jump off after it's finished.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

No Kennas, I'm definitely not up to picking bottoms. Been there, done that. I realised long ago that it's far simpler and more productive to simply find a trend, hitch a ride on it, and jump off after it's finished.

Once again it depends on your style and timeframe.

I know many fundy people who have made a motza picking low valued stocks.

If you have the patience and the conviction to stick to your analysis then you can catch huges moves, rather than catching a small part of a big move. By the time a trend is confirmed a big proportion of the gains can be gone.

Horses for courses. Each to their own etc etc
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Once again it depends on your style and timeframe.

I know many fundy people who have made a motza picking low valued stocks.

If you have the patience and the conviction to stick to your analysis then you can catch huges moves, rather than catching a small part of a big move. By the time a trend is confirmed a big proportion of the gains can be gone.

Horses for courses. Each to their own etc etc

Who says that a trend-riding approach only catches a small part of a big move? A well planned trend-following system, and the discipline to stick to it, can put you into a new trend early and allow you to harvest the bulk of the trend before you exit. I and other trend traders of my aquaintance have often made hundreds of percent profit from a single trade. It also enables you to avoid exposure to massive erosion of your portfolio value when a stock turns bearish.
Furthermore, it's business as usual for trend riders during bear markets......those who know what they're doing continue to make good money with shorts, or Put options.

As for the 'fundy people' who have 'made a motza' picking low valued stocks.......I don't doubt you, but on the other hand, there have been many poorly performing funds as well over the years, and they also were attempting the value approach.

Nick Radge, who is generally well-regarded on this forum, gave an interesting presentation to a Brisbane ATTA meeting, during which he put up numerous charts of downtrending stocks, and marked on the charts the levels where various brokers had recommended the stocks as 'good value at these levels'.
Time after time the stocks fell much, much lower after the broker's buy recommendation.
The large broking firms employ professional analysts who look into every aspect of a company's business. Yet they still have an abysmal record of picking bottoms and/or value stocks.
What chance do you think the average player like you or I have?

Yes, it's horses for courses, each to their own etc etc. I sincerely hope you fellers keep trying to pick bottoms. I really do. You do me a very valuable service and I appreciate it..
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

For a short term (may be for a single day!) my choice is ANZ. seems to be hit hard today. I think it is more sort of dead cat bounce opportunity than bottom for this stock. But the yield for this stock is really good 7.6% for fundies. Remember it is one of the big four.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

And by jumping on board when you do, you push the price up and in turn do us a valuable service because we are already in. If everyone follow TA it would be a self fulfilling prophecy and no stock would ever break out

Im not talking about brokers here, im talking about individual fundamental investors. We all know brokers have motives other than SP which to consider when the reccomend something.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

And by jumping on board when you do, you push the price up and in turn do us a valuable service because we are already in. If everyone follow TA it would be a self fulfilling prophecy and no stock would ever break out

Im not talking about brokers here, im talking about individual fundamental investors. We all know brokers have motives other than SP which to consider when the reccomend something.

Yes, if the stock you attempted to bottom pick does in fact go up, then the buying pressure from the trend traders will indeed push it higher, to the benefit of you early birds. And we don't have any problem with that.....we're happy to help you out. You scratch our backs, we'll scratch your's.

However, you make one very broad assumption.....that the value stock you attempted to bottom pick will actually go up. Very often it goes further down, much further in fact. Every day on this and other forums you can read stories from investors who are bemoaning the fact that the stock they thought was a value buy at $10 is now down to $3.
During my years of involvement with ATAA I've spoken to hundreds of 'value investors' who were sitting on big losses because, in spite of their best fundamental analysis, their value stocks plunged downward. Not only was their money tied up in dogs, (some of which never recovered and actually ended up dying, e.g. PAS, SGW, HIH), but at the same time they were missing out on huge profits from growth stocks that they could have easily got into simply by hitching a ride on the trend and sticking with it as long as it continued.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

And im sure there are a heap of trend traders who also make losses, for various reasons.

Point is, everyones different. Get used to it and stop trying to make yourself and your method look as though it is better than others
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

This must be the smelly finger thread. I like it and I have no problem walking a round with smelly fingers(but my girlfriend hates it) But seriously I think this is where the money is ATM. Trade the situation that your in. Alot of bargains out there, no doubt about that. Change to the situation that your in, like a chameleon does and success will always be there.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Bottom picking and knife catching is very hard to do on fundamentals alone Trend analysis and trading patterns is the best way to do this dirty job
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Someone must pick the bottom and that is through shear ass if they do.In my opinion if one enters a downtrending stock on `under valued` and `cheap stock` reasons they are playing a low probability game.
Well that`s a mistake I made anyway.:cool:
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Someone must pick the bottom and that is through shear ass if they do.In my opinion if one enters a downtrending stock on `under valued` and `cheap stock` reasons they are playing a low probability game.
Well that`s a mistake I made anyway.:cool:
If its down trending it doesnt have a bottom...so you cant pick it.
first wait to see the bottom then maybe even a slight recovery or change in trend and there you have it. You cant pick something you cant see. If you try to pick some thing you cant see ...you might pick someone else's bottom
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

And im sure there are a heap of trend traders who also make losses, for various reasons.

Point is, everyones different. Get used to it and stop trying to make yourself and your method look as though it is better than others

Yes indeed, trend traders do have losing trades. But if they know what they're doing then they use stop losses and sensible money management to ensure that losing trades doesn't seriously damage their trading account. They live to fight another day after a losing trade. And they clean up big when they get aboard a trend that turns out to be powerful and long lasting.
Bottom pickers, however, don't always live to fight another day. I have three friends who were wiped out by buying 'value' stocks, then adopting the HAH (hold and hope) approach while their stocks plunged to oblivion. I know of many other people who suffered the same fate.
 
Re: Bottom pickers and knife catchers

Kennas
Here is another plunger ,MAP was $4.60 oct 07 , now $2.03 .Just off its 52 week low of $2.00 div yield 13% being smashed because related to Mac bank and airports (fuel costs),seems to be another infrastructure stock going backwards:D
 
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