GPS vs. Road Map: Which Works Best? (Part 2)

By: Elliott Wave International

Think of Trading and Investing as a Trip

Here's my advice: View the Elliott Wave Principle as your road map to the market -- and your investment idea as a trip.

You start the trip with a specific plan in mind, but conditions along the way may force you to alter course. As I mentioned earlier, alternate Elliott wave counts are simply side roads that sometimes end up being the best path.

Elliott's highly specific rules keep the number of valid wave-pattern interpretations to a minimum. Usually, you would consider the "preferred count" to be the one that satisfies all three of Elliott's rules and the largest number of guidelines. Your top "alternate" is the one that satisfies the next largest number of guidelines, and so on.

There are only three hard-and-fast rules with the Wave Principle: Continue reading "GPS vs. Road Map: Which Works Best? (Part 2)"

GPS vs. Road Map: Which Works Best? (Part 1)

By: Elliott Wave International

Some of the best stories about global positioning systems (GPS) are the weird detours they sometimes recommend.

A while back, while on a family trip through Great Smoky Mountains National Park, I decided to use my GPS to drive around the park's western boundary to see the wildlife. My old-fashioned map made it look like it would take the better part of the day. But my GPS said the trip would only be about 20 miles long. Little did I know -- until I got there -- that the road from the GPS was only the remnant of an old wagon trail. I had to backtrack and take the path my paper map had originally suggested.

Sometimes, the old-fashioned way of doing things is still the best way.

I believe that's true when it comes to analyzing markets, too. Financial markets can also make you take weird "detours" -- just when you expect the price to go straight up or down, depending on how you've positioned your trades. Continue reading "GPS vs. Road Map: Which Works Best? (Part 1)"