# Day trading, anyone know anything about it??



## terrysgirl33 (3 Nov 2015)

I have a friend who is looking into this, and I'm curious as to what more experienced investors think/know about it.  I think they are getting their information here: http://thedaytradingacademy.com/ 

I don't know anything about this, but I do get a certain vibe from it, and I'm wondering what other people think...


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## Jim2007 (3 Nov 2015)

There are four kinds of people who consistently make money out of day trading:
- The tools vendors (I was one in a past life)
- The data feed providers 
- The educators
- platform providers

As for the rest some to well, but most don't.


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## Bronte (3 Nov 2015)

terrysgirl33 said:


> I have a friend who is looking into this, and I'm curious as to what more experienced investors think/know about it.  I think they are getting their information here: http://thedaytradingacademy.com/
> 
> I don't know anything about this, but I do get a certain vibe from it, and I'm wondering what other people think...



So you haven't a clue! Then it's best avoided, isn't it?


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## galway_blow_in (4 Nov 2015)

i wouldnt say ive day traded sincoe 2010 but ive certainly made a trade a few times per month on average , had i simply stuck everything in an s + p etf on the very first day , id be every bit as well off but my broker would be poorer

most people are not smart enough to day trade , its incredibly time consuming too


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## Bronco Lane (4 Nov 2015)

I did it for a few years and I was averaging about €600 profit per week. I only dealt in 10 shares on the Ftse. Knew them inside out.  All good companies. They all traded within some sort of pattern on a daily/weekly basis and around ex dividend dates. I bought when low and sold when high within a tight price range. Also did some short selling when high and bought back when low. Then I got bored and greedy and started trading some shares I hadn't studied properly and started trading on gut instinct rather than on fundamentals. Lost a big chunk, lost my nerve. 
There are the people who get the news first. There are people who get the news second. There are people who get the news later in the day. There are people who get the news in the next day's newspapers or in the Sunday papers. I thought I was getting the news in the first batch but there were already layers of people who had bought and sold before me.


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## Brendan Burgess (5 Nov 2015)

Bronco Lane said:


> I did it for a few years and I was averaging about €600 profit per week. ...Then I got bored and greedy and started trading some shares I hadn't studied properly and started trading on gut instinct rather than on fundamentals. Lost a big chunk, lost my nerve.



Let me paraphrase this 

"Due to entirely random events I was making profits of €600 per week, which I thought was due to my own brilliance. Then due to similarly random events, I reverted to the average of losing money on day trading. As always, the brokers and industry generally got rich on me." 

Brendan


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## Bronco Lane (5 Nov 2015)

Brendan you are being unfair and cynical and looking at things from the Brendan point of view. Just because you believe in holding shares long time please don't make out that others who don't are stupid. Look at those people who held bank shares. I can assure you that many people made a fortune out of those falling bank shares and they weren't just short sellers either.
No in my case they were not entirely random events and there were consistent patterns which allowed me to trade and make multiple small profits. Most shares will rise before the dividend date and fall immediately after the share price goes Ex. If the Dow closes on a strong note, quite often the Ftse will open on a strong note. Traders often sell off the Ftse from about 4 p.m, take their day's profits. Lunchtime trade can often be lack lustre. Breaking news, budgets etc and world events can impact on a share price. Unfortunately you have to be very disciplined when day trading. You are dealing in timeframes of seconds, within the space of an hour within the space of a day. I had a live trade platform. It's hard work.
You have told us in the past that you are a holder of Ryanair shares. If you have a look at their share price graph. You will see a pattern of a rising share. However it does not rise in a straight line. It is constantly moving up and down. If you look at the intraday price it is constantly shifting. When Ryanair announces that it's annual profits are going to be at the higher end of expectations, this has an immediate impact on the share price. Those with the news first can get in and out with a small profit. 
If you look at the share price graph of Ryanair between the 29th October and the 4th November you will see multiple changes in prices throughout the timeframe. Why do you think that this is happening?
In my case I often made 30 profitable trades in a row. Unfortunately I couldn't keep the discipline going and began to trade other shares on sentiment.

http://www.iii.co.uk/investment/det...ator4=&chartwidth=500&buylines=on&triggers=on


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## Fella (5 Nov 2015)

That's a good description very similar to what I do with gambling , information is key and time , it's possible to make money if you get the information ahead of the rest and can analyse it quickly yourself and understand the consequences of this information, a lot of the time people have information and don't know how to make it work for them. It's very hard to be in that bubble constantly and very draining mentally but I can imagine its possible to make money day trading. If you are just buying and selling randomly you will lose out by the cost of the spread and commission long term.


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## Brendan Burgess (5 Nov 2015)

Bronco Lane said:


> If you look at the share price graph of Ryanair between the 29th October and the 4th November you will see multiple changes in prices throughout the timeframe. Why do you think that this is happening?



It sounds very easy. Buy low and sell high. But these inter-day movements are random.  Humans tend to impose patterns on random events. 

Of course, a particular news event can drive a price up or down. And maybe the very first to hear can exploit it.

Over the years, I have met many day traders who had similar explanations to yours about how to make money. They are egged on by the investment industry which is gradually fleecing them. A few people make money for a while.  They have some simple rule : "buy on falls or sell on rises" , "Buy on Mondays, sell on Tuesdays" or whatever. 

Of the many people I have met, and read about, who were making lots of money, none is still at it. They all lost money which is the expected outcome in a negative sum game.


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## Brendan Burgess (5 Nov 2015)

Bronco Lane said:


> In my case I often made 30 profitable trades in a row. Unfortunately I couldn't keep the discipline going and began to trade other shares on sentiment.



This is just an extraordinary retrospective rationalisation for your losses. 


In retrospect, you are classifying profitable trades as rational and loss making trades as sentimental.

I might as well say "I made money backing horses when I was careful. But unfortunately I lost money overall because I wasn't always careful."


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## cremeegg (5 Nov 2015)

Brendan Burgess said:


> But these inter-day movements are random.  Humans tend to impose patterns on random events.



While I am also very sceptical of day trading, the point that share price movements are random, rather than rational, supports the idea of day trading.

If a share price moves down randomly, then in the absence of any news flow, there should be an opposite random move upward.

If there were consistent moves downward then it would not be random.


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## Bronco Lane (5 Nov 2015)

No Brendan I am not. I stated in my opening post that I only traded 10 shares. I lost money because I didn't stick with my 10 shares. I got bored and greedy and started trading other shares on sentiment and without doing my homework on them. As I admitted it is very hard to discipline yourself when you are looking at a screen all day. That is why many people opt for mechanical trades. Sentiment stays out of it.

Incidentally Ryanair has already traded in the price range 14.70 to 14.60 to 14.73 to 14.64 to 14.71 in the past hour and a half. 1,460,000 shares traded.

It is possible that this share could open at €14.70 and close today at €14.70. Those people who might check the opening price and the closing price will say that the share price didn't move at all today. That is completely wrong it has moved countless times within each hour throughout the day. Some people can exploit that price movement.

A pal of mine inherited €200k of Bank of Ireland shares. I remember him saying to me that he would never sell them. He didn't.  There is always a time to buy and a time to sell.

I remember you telling us all years ago to "fill your shoes" when the Bank of Ireland share price was falling. Did you ever hear the saying "never catch a falling knife". Why did you tell us to "fill our shoes? Sentiment or something else?  Are you prepared to tell us now all these years later or are you going to delete my post?
Believe it or not it was exactly the outcome of your comment that got me involved in Day Trading. I remember thinking that this guy actually believes this. There has to be some way of making money from people who believe this kind of thing. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2q7bBVAo74


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## joe sod (5 Nov 2015)

Good personal insights here. I wonder how the traders got on a month ago when the markets changed direction after months of turmoil. All the technical analysis were saying markets would continue to fall so shorting everything was an easy trade. But then the market changed direction out of nowhere and against the technical analysis. I think this is the worst aspect of stock markets in that the trading in shares distracts people from the businesses underlying those shares.


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## Brendan Burgess (5 Nov 2015)

joe sod said:


> All the technical analysis were saying markets would continue to fall so shorting everything was an easy trade.



This technical analysis is just bunkum. 

It's not limited to the stock market. The bookies are full every day.  Paddy Power.com and betfair.com are very profitable companies, because people believe in gambling, day trading and technical analysis, despite all the evidence. 

brendan


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## Fella (5 Nov 2015)

Brendan Burgess said:


> This technical analysis is just bunkum.
> 
> It's not limited to the stock market. The bookies are full every day.  Paddy Power.com and betfair.com are very profitable companies, because people believe in gambling, day trading and technical analysis, despite all the evidence.
> 
> brendan



That's not really correct , the reason paddy power makes money is because they ban consistent winners from online and shops , if it was not possible to make money gambling why would they need to do this ?


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## demoivre (5 Nov 2015)

Brendan Burgess said:


> This technical analysis is just bunkum.
> 
> It's not limited to the stock market. The bookies are full every day.  Paddy Power.com and betfair.com are very profitable companies, because people believe in gambling, day trading and technical analysis, despite all the evidence.
> 
> brendan



The vast majority of people don't understand the critical difference between gambling on horses or greyhounds in Paddy Power and trading financial markets, which is why most lose at trading.


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## Brendan Burgess (5 Nov 2015)

Fella said:


> the reason paddy power makes money is because they ban consistent winners from online and shops



I suspect that this is very rare and is part of PaddyPower's PR to make punters think that they can make money. I was part of a syndicate which made a lot money through betting on golf and tennis,but the cost of collecting the information exceeded the profits on the bets after Betfair took their stake.

What is the ratio of these consistent winners to the losers?

Brendan


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## Fella (5 Nov 2015)

Brendan Burgess said:


> I suspect that this is very rare and is part of PaddyPower's PR to make punters think that they can make money. I was part of a syndicate which made a lot money through betting on golf and tennis,but the cost of collecting the information exceeded the profits on the bets after Betfair took their stake.
> 
> What is the ratio of these consistent winners to the losers?
> 
> Brendan




Your opinion is similar to many others especially the older generation , my own father and mother gave me the old mantra "you never see a poor bookie etc" or "house always wins" , it is incorrect to think that way though , this has been going on for years and it doesn't get much media attention although it is picking up a little now. I don't know any succesful gamblers who are not restricted or barred at almost all the bookmakers. In shops after a few wins your bets are called into head office or sometimes you are flat out told no we wont take that bet. I have tried to place bets and been told no only to hand the slip outside to another person who is unknown and they can bet it no problem. I have used problem gamblers in the past to place very large stakes for me as the bookie is happy to take money off these people. 
I have no stats on amount of people restricted here is a recent extract from the times where a paddy power trader spoke and suggested 100 a week restricted and 15 a week closed , I agree thats probably a very small % but there are only a very small percentage of shrewd gamblers in the first place , so if your cutting out all the people who know how to make money then your giving yourself a huge advantage in making money. If gambling was a mugs game and everyone lost there would be no need to limit anybody. And I would be free to walk into Paddy Power shop and bet like you are. As a consumer champion Brendan maybe you can take the bookies on and make them treat all customers fairly ? 

_Paddy Power uses data to routinely screen out winning customers and to entice losers to bet more, former traders have claimed.
Two former employees at Ireland’s largest bookmaker alleged that the company’s risk management team monitored gamblers through the use of customised technology. Winners have restrictions placed on the amount that they can bet, while losers are offered free bets or, in some cases, taken to sporting events as guests of the company, they claimed.
“When a customer wins a significant amount in a particular bet, a risk manager will go into the account and see if they have had other similar winning bets. If they did, they’ll be restricted on that market,” one of the traders, who asked not to be named, said.
The former employee, who worked for the company’s risk management team, said that software was used to monitor specific criteria such as bets over €100. “They use algorithms and they can literally tell after four or five bets, ‘He’s X type of customer’. It is highly sophisticated and the biggest thing is that it’s not a fair game on both sides. People have no problem losing money, but others are prevented from winning it,” he said.
The trader estimated that while he worked on the risk management team, 100 customers were restricted on average each week and up to 15 would have their accounts closed.
Punters who regularly lost were also profiled and encouraged to bet more or to try out online casino games that offer bookmakers a guaranteed return, it was claimed.
Customers of Paddy Power told The Times that when they switched bookmakers and opened new accounts they were restricted after a small number of bets. Others said that family members had had their accounts restricted. Both traders said that risk managers used social media to link restricted customers to family and friends who may be betting on their behalf.
One of the traders said that when Tony O’Reilly, the An Post employee who was jailed in 2012 for stealing €1.75 million to fund his gambling habit, was betting €40,000 a day employees in Paddy Power searched online for his address and images of his home.
“If a brand new customer loses €10k overnight everyone in the office will be saying, ‘Bloody hell, who’s this guy who is willing to give us all his money and hang himself?’ Everyone does that. If a guy is betting a lot you want to see where he lives,” he said.
The second trader said that losing customers were ranked from 1-5. As they lost more, they would earn a higher number and be more likely to be given betting incentives.
Paddy Power said that it primarily restricted customers who had inside information or who were “arbing” — simultaneously betting on every outcome of an event, while making a calculation that the combined bets will lead to a guaranteed profit.
It said that it limited certain gamblers on specific markets so that the prize pool could be shared between more customers.
Irish-based bookmakers are boosting their profits by singling out, restricting and effectively banning successful gamblers.
Paddy Power, Boylesports and Ladbrokes, the three biggest bookmaking companies in Ireland, severely restrict some of those who win regularly.
Former employees of Paddy Power claim that the company uses specialist software to monitor gamblers and detect regular winners.
The same software can also pick out losers, and two former employees said that less successful gamblers were often encouraged to bet more or to switch to online casino games, which offer the company a guaranteed return on bets.
The former Paddy Power traders said that customers were tracked from the moment they registered and that the information was used to build a profile.
A gambler who won €25,000 in a single event had his Paddy Power account restricted so that he could win just 10 per cent of the amount the bookmaker was willing to lose to other gamblers on any sport bet. The company held a file on him noting that his bets were very occasional and that he was a careful gambler. The file was obtained using data protection law, which allows anyone to apply for all the information a company holds on them.
“I don’t blame bookmakers for trying to weed out the big winners but that’s not what is happening. Fun punters who have had a few wins are finding themselves restricted when they come along with their €40. I’ve heard of people who’ve had three or four bets and their accounts have been practically frozen. They are absolutely monitoring winning accounts,” Paul Kealy, betting editor of the Racing Post, said.
Paddy Power announced pre-tax profits of €167 million for 2014 in March and recently confirmed a merger with Betfair, the online betting exchange.
The Times has obtained images of betting slips that clearly demonstrate the extent to which gamblers have been limited. In certain cases restricted gamblers found that accounts owned by their families or relatives were also limited.
Some winning gamblers received emails from Paddy Power, Boylesports or Ladbrokes telling them that they would no longer be able to bet or that their accounts had been restricted from using the same services as other customers.
Kevin Blake, a broadcaster with the betting channel At The Races, said that bookmakers had recently started targeting customers who researched odds online, even if they were losing money overall.
“Morally it is wrong to shut down guys who are winning when another guy who quite clearly has a very serious gambling problem and is losing money just continues on. I know of losing gamblers who are given free hospitality at events and treated like kings,” he added.
Gambling in Ireland is still regulated under bills from 1931 and 1956. A gambling control bill was published in 2013 but it has not been implemented, meaning that the rapidly changing industry is still largely unregulated.
Paddy Power and Ladbrokes Ireland said that they promoted responsible gambling and restricted winning customers to offer better value to others. Boylesports denied restricting customers on the basis that they won bets. All three declined to comment on specific examples sent to them by The Times.
Irish gamblers have called for bookmakers to be regulated so they can no longer single out and restrict successful punters.
Regulations were introduced in New South Wales, Australia, in January to force bookmakers such as SportBet, a subsidiary of PaddyPower, to take all bets that can result in up to $2,000 wins on horse races.
“It is not fair to have operators profit from gamblers’ losses but then bar or restrict successful punters,” Troy Grant, the New South Wales gaming minister, said at the time.
Richard Irvine, the founder of Fair Wagering Australia, said that minimum bet laws should be required in all regions where governments financially support the horse racing industry.
“The Irish government hand out licences to bookmakers, so its their responsibility to make bookies take bets from people,” Mr Irvine said.
PaddyPower and Ladbrokes Ireland have said that they restrict some customers to offer better value to others. Boylesports has denied restricting customers who win. All three have said that they promote responsible gambling.
Wayne Bailey, an Irish journalist who covers the betting industry, said that gamblers were looking for a level playing field.
“A chap I know lost €30,000 and it destroyed his life. He never got a tap on the shoulder or an email. When you ask the bookies, they’ll tell you it should be a bit of fun but they don’t turn away customers who they know will lose serious money,” Mr Bailey added.
Numerous gamblers shared online betting slips with The Times that showed the maximum bet they were allowed on some races was less than €1. Others were restricted so they could win no more than €50 on a single race.
“I know people who have been shut down after one winning bet. The majority of people lose money anyway, so the bookmakers seem to be cutting off their nose to spite their face,” Gerard O’Gorman, an Irish gambler, said.
Kevin Blake, a broadcaster with the betting channel At The Races, said that bookmakers had started to limit the number of winning customers on their books so that they could offer more to new customers.
“The big two words among bookmakers now are ‘account acquisition’. They’re basically giving free money to get the accounts in. They want to attract guys in and then steer them into casino products that they can readily control. Bookies can’t lose on casino betting. In horse racing they have an edge but punters with skill can still beat them,” he said._


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## ant dee (5 Nov 2015)

Fella said:


> Your opinion is similar to many others especially the older generation , my own father and mother gave me the old mantra "you never see a poor bookie etc" or "house always wins" , it is incorrect to think that way though , this has been going on for years and it doesn't get much media attention although it is picking up a little now. I don't know any succesful gamblers who are not restricted or barred at almost all the bookmakers. In shops after a few wins your bets are called into head office or sometimes you are flat out told no we wont take that bet. I have tried to place bets and been told no only to hand the slip outside to another person who is unknown and they can bet it no problem. I have used problem gamblers in the past to place very large stakes for me as the bookie is happy to take money off these people.
> I have no stats on amount of people restricted here is a recent extract from the times where a paddy power trader spoke and suggested 100 a week restricted and 15 a week closed , I agree thats probably a very small % but there are only a very small percentage of shrewd gamblers in the first place , so if your cutting out all the people who know how to make money then your giving yourself a huge advantage in making money. If gambling was a mugs game and everyone lost there would be no need to limit anybody. And I would be free to walk into Paddy Power shop and bet like you are. As a consumer champion Brendan maybe you can take the bookies on and make them treat all customers fairly ?
> 
> _Paddy Power uses data to routinely screen out winning customers and to entice losers to bet more, former traders have claimed.
> ...



Fella, bookmakers will never stop restricting players with half a clue about betting.
If some law comes up to make them give out equal stakes to all players, then the winning players will be barred completely.
Or their account frozen for ''investigations'' which will have no time frame.
Investigations with no time frame, that can go on for years, trust me I know.
They will find a way, claim suspected match fixing, criminal financing, money laundering, you name it, they will find a way to make winners unable to bet with them.


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## Fella (5 Nov 2015)

ant dee said:


> Fella, bookmakers will never stop restricting players with half a clue about betting.
> If some law comes up to make them give out equal stakes to all players, then the winning players will be barred completely.
> Or their account frozen for ''investigations'' which will have no time frame.
> Investigations with no time frame, that can go on for years, trust me I know.
> They will find a way, claim suspected match fixing, criminal financing, money laundering, you name it, they will find a way to make winners unable to bet with them.



Yeah I know this I was just trying to explain that to Brendan and others who say it's a negative sum game , it's very possibly to win and lots of customers do but they then make it impossible by stopping you betting.


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## RobFer (6 Nov 2015)

Bronco Lane said:


> Your state that share price movements are random. Do you not think that your comments caused an anomaly to the randomness that you speak of, to the banks share price fluctuations?
> 
> For some people holding shares for years is the norm. For some people holding shares for a few months is the norm. For some people holding shares for one full day would give them palpitations.
> Some people only want to hold them for minutes.
> ...


Price movements are not random but they unpredictable especially in the short term so might as well be random. Day trading is not impossible but it probably won't beat buy and hold as a strategy.


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## Brendan Burgess (6 Nov 2015)

I have moved the "Fill your shoes" discussion to a separate thread so that this can focus on the day trading issue.

http://www.askaboutmoney.com/threads/fill-your-shoes-revisited.196482/


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## galway_blow_in (7 Nov 2015)

Bronco Lane said:


> I did it for a few years and I was averaging about €600 profit per week. I only dealt in 10 shares on the Ftse. Knew them inside out.  All good companies. They all traded within some sort of pattern on a daily/weekly basis and around ex dividend dates. I bought when low and sold when high within a tight price range. Also did some short selling when high and bought back when low. Then I got bored and greedy and started trading some shares I hadn't studied properly and started trading on gut instinct rather than on fundamentals. Lost a big chunk, lost my nerve.
> There are the people who get the news first. There are people who get the news second. There are people who get the news later in the day. There are people who get the news in the next day's newspapers or in the Sunday papers. I thought I was getting the news in the first batch but there were already layers of people who had bought and sold before me.



your obviously quite skilled in the area of numbers and moving trends , me , i cant get past simple moving averages , 50 day dropping below the 200 as a bearish sign , 50 moving over the 200 as a bullish sign etc , as such , when i thought stocks had bottomed in the past , id buy only to see them drop even more , anticipating another leg down is tricky as when it happens , what you thought was support , becomes resistance


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## galway_blow_in (7 Nov 2015)

demoivre said:


> The vast majority of people don't understand the critical difference between gambling on horses or greyhounds in Paddy Power and trading financial markets, which is why most lose at trading.



i dont think investing in financial markets is akin to placing a bet on a horse with paddy power but for many people , trading the financial markets can leave you just as poor as sticking a tenner on the 3.30 @ cheltenham , only minus the fun


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## galway_blow_in (7 Nov 2015)

joe sod said:


> Good personal insights here. I wonder how the traders got on a month ago when the markets changed direction after months of turmoil. All the technical analysis were saying markets would continue to fall so shorting everything was an easy trade. But then the market changed direction out of nowhere and against the technical analysis. I think this is the worst aspect of stock markets in that the trading in shares distracts people from the businesses underlying those shares.



the traders themselves were shorting the market all summer off the back of the greek situation and after that the chineese slowdown , oil was a huge short all summer , the professionals in the industry actively short companies who are perfect , its just that in a nervous enviroment , the good gets flushed with the bad , the insiders knew that retails would panic sell over greece and china , the german dax  was in possibly the shortest bear market in history from around late august to less than ten days ago , it dropped around 21% off its yearly high ( which was set in march ) and is now up over 20% from that low in august , so is now technically back in a bull market,  this was entirely orchestrated by the big guns who exploited the greeek and chineese situation 

this is why for the vast majority of retail , buying and holding is the only sensible option


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