|  SEP 1990

The Keys To Technical Conditions by James S. Gould, Ph.D.

The Keys To Technical Conditions by James S. Gould, Ph.D. In the beginning, before personal computers routinely made trading decisions, there were traders who were able to decipher the language of the markets and earn trading profits. Today, traders have more electronic tools to analyze the markets than those of yesteryear could have imagined. Given the availability, power and diversity of those electronic tools, one would expect traders to devote more time analyzing market conditions prior to making trading decisions. Ironically, machines and associated paraphernalia (that is, software) have become master rather than servant for many traders. Traders who rely exclusively on off-the-shelf trading systems and mathematical manipulations (usually of price) have become deaf and blind to many signals imparted by the market —the very information that traders of previous years relied upon extensively. Market prices are determined by underlying demand and supply, reflecting buying and selling motivated by traders' hopes, greed and fears. Each electronic ""blip"" on the trading screen reflects a microcosm of these components and, when aggregated, provides a composite of the market's current internal strength or weakness and an indicator of future prices.

by James S. Gould, Ph.D.