Replies to post #37962 on A.I.M. Users Bulletin Board (AIMUSERS)

[SFSecurity]

Hi Grabber,

Thanks for the reply. All good points and exactly my thinking. I'm having a h#$% of a hard time trying to find EFTs or stocks that meet the standards that I understand would be a good fit with AIM. The relative long, relatively steady up trend in the market it makes it hard to find something that won't kill me in the current minor ups and downs or in the coming down market.

BTW, I got some conformation yesterday that we are headed for a down cycle ~18-24 months out. A fellow I know does foundation settlement work and back in February/March they had 10-12 weeks of work lined up for the four crews they have. Now they have 3-4 weeks worth. He's been at it long enough, 20 years, that he sees his potential workload in relationship to the business cycle as a leading indicator. Also I was in a class and as an aside the instructor mentioned that real unemployment is a lot higher than the ~6.5% that is the public figure. While the class had nothing to do with the market, he did seem to know what was happening in tech recruiting and some allied industries.

I've been playing with several formula approaches to EFTs and stocks and some seem to fit one approach better an another.

One system, Market Trend Signal, seems to do well on the whole, but when I did a backtest with it against Buy & Hold for the DOW, B&H beat it by almost 3 to 1. So I started to look at other approaches and stumbled on AIM in my bookshelf and now have been playing with that and others.

Out of all the time I've spent it seems clear that a fundamental key is selection. That seems to make much more difference than the exact system one uses if one is methodical about using the system. Clearly emotional trading is flighty and for the birds.

Tom's look at ValueLine from years ago is useful but then there were no EFTs so clearly one needs to change one's approach given that things have changed in the marketplace.

Given all that I would love a clear explanation of W%r and how it relates to volatility and how to find good AIM positions. Any tips?

Best,

Allen