Congratulations on finding the Trading Mint's Edge Trading Strategy. This strategy is extremely robust and with practice and diligence you should be able to achieve 75-80% accuracy on your trades.

The Edge Strategy is unique in that it is one of the few strategies that works equally well in virtually any time frame and in any market, whether that be futures, FOREX, stocks, mutual funds or index funds. Throughout this training module you will find many examples of the strategy used on one-minute charts for futures, three-minute charts for day trading stocks, 30-minute charts for swing trading stocks or futures, and daily and weekly charts for trading index funds, mutual funds, longer-term stock positions and FOREX.

If you are a new trader, you will find this easy to learn as there are only a few indicators involved and it will not take long to master the art of seeing the set ups on the charts that these indicators make. If you are a seasoned trader, you will be amazed at the simplicity of the strategy and you will see indicators used in ways that you likely have never seen before.

Ironically, the novice trader often does better at this strategy right away than the pro, because the pro who has become a student of technical analysis, will be tempted to change or improve the strategy until he finally capitulates and realizes that "yes," this “really” is all there is to it, and it cannot be improved on! So my advice to the novice and the seasoned trader is this:

If you have been looking for a profitable strategy, take a month to learn The Edge, paper trade it, and try to be as exact as you can. Study the set ups you will see here and learn to spot them easily on your own charts. Nothing beats “chart time” if you want to become a successful profitable trader. Finally, study the section on The Psychology of Trading. Then, and only then, should you commit money to the market. If you start trading too soon and lose, you will become discouraged, lose faith in the strategy, and start looking for something “better”. Soon you will not be trading a strategy, you will be gambling.

This strategy is extremely accurate. It never has a loser that is greater than the average of the winners. If you are day trading and you stick to the set up and exit rules, you will find that almost every day is profitable. Losing days are rare. On the Dow, NDX, ER2 and SP mini’s there are 6 -14 trades per day and as many as 10 a day on the FOREX. The strategy is easy to trade in that most trades work right away and there are no agonizing drawdowns so you soon become encouraged to take every signal and trade as perfectly as you can.

You can use The Edge to trade your retirement funds and achieve much higher returns than the traditional buy and hold approach. Moreover, your risk will be reduced substantially because you will be in the market for much shorter periods of time. You will likely be sitting in money market funds most of the time during bear markets, waiting for an opportunity rather than watching your retirement evaporate in an equity fund or a basket of stocks picked by some “expert.”

Before you start to trade please read this document in its entirety including the section on Money Management, When Not to Trade and most importantly The Psychology of Trading.

I have been a student of technical analysis for over 20 years and have used this knowledge in my career as an investment adviser. Over the years I have read dozens of books on technical analysis and in my search for the “Holy Grail” I have studied under many of the well-known experts in the field of technical analysis of the stock market. I have used virtually every technical indicator, developed some technical indicators of my own and studied some pretty esoteric stuff like Gann, Fractals, Elliott Wave, Fibonacci, Chaos Theory, and Moon Phases.

What did I really learn from all this?

I learned that most indicators are “lagging indicators” that tell you where the market has been. The Edge uses “leading” indicators that forecast where the market is likely to go next, and therefore gives you an edge. I also learned that the most successful trades happen when there is "divergence" between price and those leading indicators. Those leading indicators and the divergence between them and price is the crux of this strategy.

I must say that I have been most impressed by the work of Constance Brown and George Lane. George, who died in July of 2004 at the age of 82, made the stochastic oscillator popular with traders. Constance Brown has done extensive work to improve the stochastic as well as other oscillators such as the Relative Strength Index and the Moving Average Convergence/Divergence indicator. The RSI was originated by Welles Wilder and the MACD was developed by Gerald Appel. I also have the utmost respect for Linda Rashke who taught me the importance of “chart time.” Spending time looking at the indicators on your charts trains your brain to see the set ups and they eventually become so obvious they almost jump off the screen at you.

The stochastic oscillator and the MACD are the two most important indicators of The Edge Strategy.

The Stochastic oscillator is a momentum oscillator – it measures the velocity of price movement. Because of this, it is a LEADING indicator – it always changes before price does.

Momentum may also be seen in the difference between two moving averages as in the Moving Average Convergence/Divergence or the MACD. Because of this momentum the trend of the MACD is often a leading indicator of price change.

We use the RSI to tell us when the market is oversold or overbought and we use the exponential moving average to keep us in a trade during trending market conditions. We use the ADX to tell us when the market is trending.

Traders who use the well-known rules to buy when the stochastic goes up through 20 and sell when it goes down through 80 and to buy when the MACD goes up through the signal line and sell when it goes below are eventually doomed to failure. The Edge uses the stochastic and the MACD, but in a very different way – one that you have likely never seen before.

I encourage you to study the following material in depth. Become so familiar with it that you can spot the entry and exit points easily. I believe that The Edge is the best trading method to achieve consistent profits, but I also believe that the real secret to being a profitable trader is knowing who you are as a trader. Please do not skip the sections on Money Management and The Psychology of Trading, as I believe that those two components are 90% of the game. It doesn’t matter how fantastic your strategy is, if you don’t follow strict money management rules and be disciplined and consistent every day in your trading, you will lose in the long run. The sad fact is that most traders don’t take the time to learn these very important aspects of trading.

Let’s get started!