EWI - a trader's perspective

[John]

What I am amazed at is the lack of a serious trading approach.  No stops, no possibility they could be wrong, full on extremism in the call for a drop in the market dead ahead (and it's been like that for a long time).  They suffer from a complete lack of objectivity.  For them, nothing (or practically nothing) is or has been bullish in many years.  Every market event is seen as bearish, every social feature is seen as bearish.  They seem to practice a cult like message - we are the ones who know, we are the special ones, everyone else is a fool. 

[Steven Vincent]

Thanks John. We learn from negative examples perhaps more than positive. 

[John]

Hi Stephen,

Thank you for the detailed analysis you have done regarding his many calls over many years for ’the top’ and doom.

Yes, Prechter left the bounds of rational analysis long ago.  As we might agree, being wrong is normal, it happens in trading and forecasting.  But, staying wrong with extreme confidence is significantly problematic. 

I like your take on him, I hope I got it correct: that he arrives with a long held view (in this case, economic depression, century time scale market top) and everything that occurs is interpreted in that viewpoint. Everything includes almost all market action, practically every traditional sentiment indicator, and many non-traditional ’sentiment’ indicators.  And as you point out, a remarkable focus on fundamentals, which by it’s quantity is notable for a presumed technical analytical market approach. His objectivity died long ago.  I think their EWI service Short Term Update is partially correctly named.  Seriously, it is always short (bearish), every update is more reason why they are bearish.  3X a week to report a multi decade top for stocks is at hand (overdue!), or a multi year top in metals, etc.  

You have done a remarkable job detailing his long pattern of terrible calls and misleading analysis. Again, thank you.

[Steven Vincent]

Hi John.  Sounds like you are one of the many that have been burned by the chicanery of Robert Prechter.  Like many, I learned about Elliott Wave via Prechter and intuitively saw that RN Elliott was on to something real and useful, and then found that Prechter was simply riding Elliott’s work and exploiting it for his own egotistical edification and personal profit.  

I wrote a two part dissection of the catastrophe that is Elliott Wave International in hopes of sparing some others the pain.  It was supposed to be three parts but I never finished it.

Here’s part 2:  https://www.thebullbear.com/profiles/blogs/the-ewi-argument-a-criti...