Playing with Crayons

I received a question in a tweet this weekend that I thought I would address in a blog post. The question was from @_cbarr:

The more I thought about the question, the more I realized that I have several distinct reasons for putting the energy into generating a chart. My reasons can be summed up:

1) To make the chart available to the community, to share it. Since I view many charts at CHART.LY myself, it only seems fair that I do my part to contribute.

2) If I am in the middle of trading a stock, long or short, I will typically post an update to the chart when an event happens to the stock price. Possible events are:

• Gap down or up
• Falls through TL (Trend Line) or Horizontal Support
• Breaks above TL (Trend Line) or RES (Resistance)
• Makes some other material move that causes me to adjust my trade. This could be to scale in or out, or even exit the position. This would include a buy trigger as well.
• There are times, like in the case of a "coil" trade, that I will post a chart update just reflecting that.
• View changes from bullish to bearish, or vise versa.

3) There are times where I run my scans and a particular stock shows up with an indicator that is one of my "sweet spots". For example, if the MFI (Money Flow Index) is down with the Titanic. I will post a chart reflecting a specific indicator reading.

4) One final reason is because the posting of the chart will generate feedback to me. This is very valuable to me for many reasons, even if it is criticsm. I am a good listener, and welcome it regardless.

5) Bonus Reason. I like playing with Crayons.