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Many investors are trying to time the markets, especially lately with concerns over low oil prices, global woes, and Chinese growth in the headlines.
I totally get where they're coming from. The idea of picking market tops and bottoms is very seductive.
But they may as well try to catch falling knives...
The most recent DALBAR data shows that the return of investors trying to time the markets is a pathetic 1.9% a year over the past 20 years. Worse, they would have to be right a staggering 82% of the time just to match "buy and hold" returns, according to Nobel Laureate William Sharpe.
Clearly market timing is one tactic that does not build Total Wealth. But here's the secret.
You're much better off trying to understand sentiment - because that's how you identify the best and the worst times to put your money to work and rack up the biggest gains.
Today I want to teach you how to do that...
Sentiment Tells You Where Things Are Going
If you stop and think about it for a moment, tracking sentiment makes a lot of sense.
The financial markets are a construct that embodies the collective wants, desires, and aspirations of millions. As such, they reflect emotion. Therefore, if you understand what kind of "mood" they're in, you can make the right moves ahead of time and gain the upper hand when it comes to building wealth.
One of the best ways to do that is via a technical tool called the "Put/Call Ratio."
It's the only tool I've seen in more than 30 years of analyzing markets that works consistently and accurately to predict every single one of the market's major turning points.
The Put/Call Ratio measures sentiment by calculating the difference between thousands of put and call options traded in the United States stock markets.
Viewed as a proportion, the ratio can be calculated on any given stock, ETF, index, or other investable instrument for which there are options traded. So you can apply it to individual securities, too.
Generally speaking, higher readings reflect more calls being traded, which suggest traders anticipate higher prices ahead. Conversely, lower readings suggest that there are more puts being traded so lower prices are more likely.
The problem is that when you look at the data in isolation, it looks like either an EKG from hell or an earthquake tremor map.
To get around that, most traders "smooth" the data over a period of time using a moving average to get what's called a "normalized" ratio that's not so spikey as to be useless. Day traders with short attention spans seem to like 10 to 15 days. Position traders may push out to 200 days or more.
About the Author
Keith is a seasoned market analyst and professional trader with more than 37 years of global experience. He is one of very few experts to correctly see both the dot.bomb crisis and the ongoing financial crisis coming ahead of time - and one of even fewer to help millions of investors around the world successfully navigate them both. Forbes hailed him as a "Market Visionary." He is a regular on FOX Business News and Yahoo! Finance, and his observations have been featured in Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, WIRED, and MarketWatch. Keith previously led The Money Map Report, Money Map's flagship newsletter, as Chief Investment Strategist, from 20007 to 2020. Keith holds a BS in management and finance from Skidmore College and an MS in international finance (with a focus on Japanese business science) from Chaminade University. He regularly travels the world in search of investment opportunities others don't yet see or understand.
Being a Market Trader for many years has taught me one thing – ANY attempts to 'guess' where PRICE is headed is an attempt to act like a fool.
If one is serious about their craft – trading for REAL profits – and wants ANY credibility whatsoever, the FIRST thing one does is to STOP acting like a market chasing fool.
The only indicator worth ANYTHING to a real trader is PRICE – where it is NOW compared to where it WAS.
Using proper strategy, a real trader can clearly determine if Price is positioned to give out profits or not.
So, the SECOND thing one needs is to develop a quality, no nonsense trading TOOL – the 'profitable' strategy.
A profitable strategy follows price action by using logical, strategic, and specific actions that extract profit from the markets' price movements.
In other words, the market is a VICTIM of its own natural inherent movements. It CAN'T help but give profits to an alert trader using their 'tool' – the profitable strategy.
All a trader is doing is waiting for those natural inherent price movements to occur.
When they do, you take the profits it gives you – and you say THANK YOU!
I never say PLEASE. Why? Because the markets are there to please YOU, if you'll let them.
Have a look at 12/12/14 Tasty Trade. They did a large sample analysis on the put call ratio's predictive qualities, and conclude there is no stat diff for the predictive results when the put/call is in the tails. This is why TOS didn't put it on the platform. As myth busters would say "Busted".
I read your article with great interest at this time especially, Mr. Fitz-Gerald. I am a babe in the woods here, but it has been necessary for me to grow my funds rather than let it sit in the dimwitted savings accounts.
The article indicates sound logic absolutely. The problem is, someone like me does not have access to the buy/sell information of the active participants in the securities arena. It is clear there is a sell-off, and my first intuition was that "it is the end of the year". I hesitate to place any trailing stops on my portfolio, because the ones I have were so highly recommended by Money Morning, Oxford Club, and my own personal contacts in other arenas, en totale. Like in a card game at this point in time, I had decided to just "hold'em", because in reality I believe honestly they are not "losers".
What would be some of the other cases made for trying to get out, so long as we have known the groundwork reasons why any companies are recommended at this time. I did not buy any that should be worked as "short sells". Just wondering if there is any feedback concerning this month's situation. I am at ETrade. Thank you very much for sharing what you do!
This article makes no sense if you are really talking about the number of puts divided by the number of calls. You say that a higher volume of puts relative to call volume is a negative indication for stock prices. If put volume is up, the ration would be low. That is not what is shown in the chart comparing the P/C ratio with the S&P.
Is the put/call ratio meant to be a contra indication or are you talking about a call/put ratio?
"Generally speaking, higher readings reflect more calls being traded, which suggest traders anticipate higher prices ahead. Conversely, lower readings suggest that there are more puts being traded so lower prices are more likely". Shouldn't it be the other way round? More calls being traded than puts would lead to a lower put/call ratio and vice versa?
Very interesting,worth further follow up.
very informative article. Do any of you know about OTC:GLAG? if yes please do share the information about the company.
Well done, Keith . . .
Glad that I discovered your column.
Many thanks,
Paul