Disqus - Latest Comments for KeithShepard

Re: How Much Transparency is Enough in the Markets

Keith Shepard — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 11:25:43 -0000

[...] but I have learned a few things in my investing career and one of the big ones is…you can’t be all things to all people.

As Bill Cosby once said, "I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."

Transparency is nice, but culpability of said transparency is rare. For example: I liked the way Phil (@ppearlman) spoke about the recent Chart.ly data loss in a StockTwits blog post ("We Goofed on Chartly"). You guys didn't try to bury the incident and took responsibility for it.

That's how it should be done professionally and personally.

Re: Twitter Attacked

Keith Shepard — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 22:02:08 -0000

Here you go. Here's the reason for the DDoS (Denial of Services Attack):

- Twitter, Facebook attack targeted one user
- http://news.cnet.com/8301-2...

A pro-Georgian blogger with accounts on Twitter, Facebook, LiveJournal and Google's Blogger and YouTube was targeted in a denial of service attack that led to the site-wide outage at Twitter and problems at the other sites on Thursday, according to a Facebook executive.

Re: There Is No Holy Grail

Keith Shepard — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:43:55 -0000

Beyond oneself, I believe the Holy Grail of trading is simplicity. Complexity is nothing but an Ego trip and is far too intractable in times of panic, decay or growth.

=^.^=

Re: Marijuana First, Then the Oil

Keith Shepard — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 14:50:34 -0000

Good points as always, G. I appreciate the open dialogue. Looking forward to MacroTwits at 9 PM tonight. Cheers.

~Shepard
=^.^=

Re: Marijuana First, Then the Oil

Keith Shepard — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 12:40:01 -0000

It's always struck me as odd that nobody brings up Cancer (lung and others) when speaking of legalizing pot. Of course, you don't have to "smoke" pot. Vaporizing can cut down on lung aliments and some people claim eating pot is a fine buzz. But let's face it: I bet most pot is smoked.

A 2008 study out of New Zealand published in the European Respiratory Journal found that "one joint was equivalent to about 20 cigarettes" in terms of lung cancer exposure.

In the high-exposure group, lung cancer risk rose by 5.7 times for patients who smoked more than a joint a day for 10 years, or two joints a day for 5 years, after adjusting for other variables, including cigarette smoking.

"Cannabis smokers end up with five times more carbon monoxide in their bloodstream (than tobacco smokers)," team leader Richard Beasley, at the Medical Research Institute of New Zealand, said in a news release.

The scientists also noted that marijuana could be expected to harm the airways more than tobacco since its smoke contained twice the level of carcinogens, such as polyaromatic hydrocarbons, compared with tobacco cigarettes.

"There are higher concentrations of carcinogens in cannabis smoke...what is intriguing to us is there is so little work done on cannabis when there is so much done on tobacco,” said Beasley.

- http://www.dailymail.co.uk/...

Now let's assume that the study is flawed somewhat. Let's cut in half and say one joint equals 10 cigarettes. Isn't there any thought to the overall health impact of legitimizing yet another smokeable "vice"? It seems to me the cigarette companies are being driven to extinction for this reason: lung and other cancer problems. How does the government go about parsing that message?

Gov: "Cigarettes are bad, but pot is okay because it's a "safer" smoke?"

Hate to say it but I doubt there is a "safe" smoke in terms of cancer. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe there is something we can burn and inhale and our lungs, liver and kidneys will be fine with any residual affects. I'm willing to be wrong on that.

Outside of medical marijuana, I just can't figure out how the US Gov. is going to drop 90 to 100 years of miscalculated ignorant demonizing of marijuana, change public policy by claiming "pot is now okay because we're fucking broke" AND save face.

A few recent (within a 2-3 years) headlines to ponder:

- "Marijuana Damages DNA And May Cause Cancer, New Test Reveals"
- "Marijuana Use Linked To Increased Risk Of Testicular Cancer"
- "Heavy Marijuana Use May Damage Developing Brain In Teens, Young Adults"
- "Marijuana Use Takes Toll On Adolescent Brain Function, Research Finds"

I'm not against the legalization of marijuana ... I just don't understand how marijuana's role in cancer is being overlooked while society is in the process of a world wide tobacco prohibition.

/Edit: Before I'm eviscerated by the Pro Pot crowd: I'm not against the legalization of marijuana. Just would like further health studies done.

/Edit 2: Someone just sent me this study done in 2006: Study Finds No Cancer-Marijuana Connection

~Shepard
=^.^=

Re: On your mark, GO, get set

Keith Shepard — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 10:58:55 -0000

Good post. I disagree with your comment here:

Flip a coin to determine your directional bias on a trade.

Simply pulling up a yearly chart of any symbol and looking left to right will tell you what you need to know about directionality (without knowing any charting alchemy that you so loath) and it takes about 5-10 seconds.

They have charts on StockTwits.com. People should use them. Maybe they would make money.

Re: Welcome Abnormal Returns to the StockTwits Blog Network

Keith Shepard — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 13:14:58 -0000

Congrats @abnormalreturns on the new blog. Grabbing the RSS feed in 3, 2, 1...

Re: Tickerville Taking Hiatus from StockTwits Brunch

Keith Shepard — Fri, 29 May 2009 15:17:46 -0000

Thanks for all your great Saturday brunches Quint. Your time and sharing of your knowledge was (and is) greatly appreciated. Many of us totally understand the time constraints gig as well. Good luck and good trading.

Cheers. =^.^=
@KeithShepard

Re: Stocktwits Introduces Social Stock Charting with Chart.ly

Keith Shepard — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 11:05:20 -0000

Awesome job with Chart.ly. I was getting tired of using TwitPic and looking for something with more options. Great looking site with a clean design.

Re: Stocktwits IS for EVERYBODY…AND Here is How I Use It!

Keith Shepard — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 22:09:03 -0000

Excellent post. Keep it simple, keep it real. Complexity is the death of trading. It's a fact: simple systems, whether biological or artificial, produce consistent results over time and generally survive a surprise cock punch or two. That's what I like about Twitter & StockTwits. Simply effective.

All things change shape eventually.

~Shepard
=^.^=

Re: Attention: Having Content Feed Problems (RSS & Email)

Keith Shepard — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 19:52:48 -0000

Seems to be fixed. I just received all your posts for today in my Google RSS Reader. Cheers.

=^.^=

Re: Futures hadn't turned green since Friday's close..

Keith Shepard — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 20:34:20 -0000

Fade that gap!

=^.^=

Re: A Few Site Updates

Keith Shepard — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 19:11:10 -0000

Sweet! Nice improvements ... especially on the ticker pages. They look great.

=^.^=

Re: Tumblr Hacks - Add comments to Tumblr with Disqus

Keith Shepard — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 13:05:20 -0000

Ah...figured it out. Cool.

=^.^=

Re: Tumblr Hacks - Add comments to Tumblr with Disqus

Keith Shepard — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 12:56:01 -0000

Yeah, how do you add comments to your Tumblr blog? Hmmm...

Re: Is Apple Broken? Nope…Just The Market!

Keith Shepard — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:42:49 -0000

I agree. Apple's stock is at a critical point technically. $80-$82 is my line of demarcation as well.

Trade Shows themselves are ridiculous. No Value. Zero. Period.

Totally agree! I worked many trade shows back in the 90's (video support). Totally worthless drinking boondoggles. Trade shows are about sex and whiskey. And that's about it.

Re: My Twitter Notes

Keith Shepard — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 23:06:30 -0000

Great post and good idea. I should review my Twitter stream more often.

=^.^=

Re: Twins Fun

Keith Shepard — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 15:12:06 -0000

My current system is proprietary.

I began writing it in MetaStock a few years ago. It's a simple trending system based on Ehlers Distant Coefficient filter. Like many trending systems, it's not complex. I believe that systems should be simple and that simplicity will consistently offer potentially good trades year over year. Complex, curve fit systems are too rigid for me. They don't seem to allow for market evolution.

My system scales well to almost any time frame, but some are better than others. The 3 and 5 minute time frame are working well with today's level of volatility. If the markets roll back to their previous volatility, the 10 minute time frame will be the sweet spot.

I ran it on FAZ recently and it didn't do too badly (draw down was huge), but I've got it tuned more for the SPY at the moment so it's probably off a bit. Needs more research on my part. I have to factor in the 3x leverage.

=^.^=

Re: Twins Fun

Keith Shepard — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 12:41:11 -0000

Yowza! Twins rule (but the dinner bill is hell).

I have yet to dive into the 3x ETFs. I'm still testing them against my current system.

=^.^=

Re: Best Brokerages For Index Funds - Episode #16

Keith Shepard — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 10:20:57 -0000

I'm not currently holding any of Schwab's Index Funds although they are quite good. I do a lot of pure day trading and swing trading through them (equities, ETFs, etc.). Schwab does a good job at taking care of their customers. Class organization as far as I'm concerned.

:-)

~Shepard

Re: Best Brokerages For Index Funds - Episode #16

Keith Shepard — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 15:09:12 -0000

Great episode. Schwab is my favorite. Have been using them for 10 years now. Good support.

I find with open wines, you usually have around 2-3 days to kill the rest of the bottle before it goes belly up. It helps to refrigerate the open bottle as well and creating a vacuum by sucking air out helps, but anything after 3-4 days is playing the odds even with a layer of inert gas from a system.

A week is pushing it in most cases. You'd have to punt to a box wine such as Black Box Wines (which isn't a bad wine -- their Cab is decent).

Cheers. =^.^=

~Shepard

Re: CitiSKANK, CitiHANK, CitRUBIN…all Shitty for Taxpayer…and Why These Bailouts are really FAILouts!

Keith Shepard — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 22:35:25 -0000

Accumulating $GM here in anticipation of their Failout.

► http://twitpic.com/nvlo

=^.^=

Re: I was wrong

Keith Shepard — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:43:48 -0000

It looks like you might have been right about Gold (GLD) though. Nice pop today.

Re: What’s The Gameplan for Dow 7,000 in 2008…What Were You Doing at Dow 7,000 in 1997?

Keith Shepard — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 20:20:19 -0000

My game plan is as always: stick with the trend. Don't fight it, don't bottom or top pick and don't gamble (but be aggressive in the direction of the trend). When the market turns, I'll miss the bottom, but that's okay. I want to eat the middle of the sandwich. Fuck the crust.

Re: Why bear markets make me less likely to invest in your startup

Keith Shepard — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 09:16:54 -0000

Well said. Good post. Volatility breeds opportunity for those that survive.