Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Seeking Alpha with SPY...1.8.14

Alpha refers to the incremental value that can be added to a benchmark portfolio by engaging any variety of money management tools and tactics.  For almost all of our tested models SPY has been used as that benchmark...generally the highest volume ETF on any given day and indicative of the performance of the the biggest 500 S&P companies measured by capitalization.
Its a hard act to follow, as they say, and the question is often asked..."why not just trade SPY?"

This question is, in fact, the underlying reason that the M3 platform was developed.  Its momentum and relative strength algorithms are faster than the M6 platform and much faster than the M11/T11 platform.  M3's pairs charts are configured somewhat differently than M6 and the overall time frame is just 6 months to reflect the trading versus investing intent of the platform.

While all the platforms benefit from close observation of money management stops, with M3 its absolutely critical to follow the signals....that's due in a large part to the increased volatility risk incurred by trading XIV and SSO.  Caveat emptor!!!!

Here's the current report with the AUTO STOP turned on.  Recent results have been stellar based largely on the almost bizarre behavior of XIV relative to SPY...but M3 successfully saw through the market fog and showed the path.