I haven't checked the price recently.. but last I checked yup it was pretty high.. that was during the silly MLM thing that someone was promoting, which involved buying gold. Wonder what happened to that.

Trading short term in the market is normally accomplished with the aid of charting,aka technical analysis.There r many different charting techniqs but the final aim is to try to determine the best opportunity to enter and exit the mkt based on past history of price and volume.

I consider my self a long term trader and seldom trade shortterm .

Trading in any market is an art,not a science,so,a techniq that worked now may not work in future.

In short term trading,you may get it right 9 times,but when u get it wrong 1 time,the losses may well exceed you cumulative gains.Of course,if u r part of the syndicate ,then the reverse will be true.

Again,the various breakouts and indications can actually be "manufactured" in a illiquid mkt.This is especially true if there is no proper enforcement.

So,I leave it to u to ponder whether u want to trade short or long term

Er,u mean trading in paper instruments pegged to gold etc or actually buying the physical commodities from a shop like Tiffany or Poh Kong?

If you were interested in gold, you could try opening a brokerage account in the US/Aus/Canada ... there are alot of quality canadian /aus gold mining/exploration company worth buying into..

or you could try gcitrading.com which you can speculate on gold with leveraging ...
in times of inflation, gold/diamonds are good hedge against your paper currency losing its value.

Malaysia is slowly suffering from the ringgit peg as inflation is starting to bite. If the gov doesn't change anything, the ringgit will just slowly lose its value...

If you wanted to talk about long-term stock market trend, alot of stock markets are uptrend in the long term ... you just gotta have patience and ride out the bad times as well..if you are thinking of investing, you should consider learning how to read a company's annual report/etc.

derivatives = futures/options/swaps/forwards/warrants .. etc ... google it ..

I'm an advocate of short-term trading ... so I do believe in it. It is all about risk management, position sizing, and discipline ...

Im not familiar with the Malaysian sharemarket, so I can't comment on it, except I do believe there's not enough disclosure, too much insider trading, and the 30% bumi equity rule on the companies will just hurt the KLSE in the long term.


JUST MY OPINION.

In short term trading which I presume you mean day trading, scalping trading or swing trading.



Depends largely on which instrument and strategy you are using.

I am not sure what you mean. Did you mean the pegging of Malaysian is counter productive? Please explain.



I second that.

Oh yeah,I was referring to stock,not futures.Sorry abt the ommission.

Hi,

Ringgit was unpegged with USD the same day that China was.


Dreamer

Good question. Where to store it? Does that mean securities with gold as the underlying asset is a better bet?

Unless I'm super richlar, then got my own safe with super tight security. But that time, no need to talk about investmentlar..



A bit of a problem rite? Overseas investment?

Hmm.. I think investing in gold is not a good idea for average earners like me.

Hmmm, for beginners who are interested in trading, I think that they should at least have a good understanding before going for margin trading and leveraging

By the way, lklatmy, as you said you're a long term investor, do I need to know technical analysis if I wish to trade in long term? Short term trading is not really the thing for me as it requires tremendous amount of energy ...



There's always other forms of investment availble for average earner like us ... We can always start small and slowly accumulate ...

Is it difficult to learn technical analysis? Have you ever made money from short term trading using technical analysis?

Appears to be many questions .. I shall try my best ..

1. Ringgit peg
At the start, it was probably good because it provided stability ... but now?.. I'm not so sure anymore ...
A managed float, is in effect a 'dirty float' and in reality really is no difference than a peg... I could go on and on about this, but this comes down to Malaysia not developing its economy and reforming its policies and keeping the ringgit artificially low and remaining a predominantly low-skilled manufacturing economy. when it should be moving up the services chain...
Uncontrollable inflation is the direct result of the peg...
Inflation is already rearing its head, have you noticed things have been getting more and more expensive?

2.Investing ...
Investing in anything is good, doesn't matter how much $$ you have as long as you've done your research, and have a LONG term time frame for your investment to materialise ... some ideas such as bio-tech/healthcare, islamic banking, gold/silver, uranium, etc ... I can see Islamic banking booming hugely in Malaysia, as Malaysia's ties with the Middle East grow...
As for overseas investing, that's something you have to work out and find out, unfortunately I can't help you on that dept because I'm not based in Malaysia.

2. RE: About trends in a market ...
http://www.seykota.com/tribe/TSP/Trends/index.htm
may be hard to read, but summary is, a trend can be what you want to see at a time frame that you pick ... So is the KLSE in a long-term time frame? That's for your interpretation....

3. Short-term / Long-term trading / technical analysis
There is such a thing as long-term trading, but its more like 'investing'.. Too many definitions here .. You can be 'trading' for the long term when you intend to get a position in something for a longer time frame say 5 years .. you can then use technical analysis to enter into positions at 'price dips', think the lowpoint of a sine-wave that's moving upwards...

When you talk about trading, it becomes much more specific .. you can enter a trade for a few hours to few days to a few months ... Trading can very much become a job in itself.. if you're not willing to commit, then you should stick to 'investing' for the long-term..

Yes you can make money with technical analysis, I hang out with a lot who do, as for me I'm barely breaking even, but I'm giving it time and intend to make it work.. If you think its a skim-cepat-kaya, its not ... but as with everything in life, if you give it time,effort,energy it will be rewarding.

If anyone would like to discuss anything I've just said in private, you're welcomed to PM me ..

Bottom line for all the negativity and 'No' and 'Can't and 'not for me' ... Here's a line for you to ponder ..

YOU ARE WHO YOU THINK YOU ARE, AND WHO YOU THINK YOU ARE NOT


Ken

1. Did Malaysia copy China?



2. Trading or investing overseas does have an edge because the goverment don't tax when you move money back. If you profit that is.
Where are you currently based?

2. Isn't that Trend following? And Trend following judge the speed of the trend. I am not familiar with Trend Following. What I know is what I read here Turtle Trader. Are you part of his group?



3. Like my previous post
short term = day trading, swing trading, scalping
Very true the learning curve to be a trader or an investor is high. Many hour is need for the education and trading stage.

My questions.
What are your trading style day, swing or scalper. What instrument do you specializes in?

Wow!this topic is getting very interesting and I can see many sifu such as whtrader and khoong25 giving their learned views ,I believe some r based out of Malaysia and is trading actively in the futures market.

To answer u Geminist,I must first clarify that am giving my view base on the Malaysian context and is on the local stock market only.I hv to make this very clear because as mentioned earlier ,the Malaysian stock and futures market still lack the depth presently and is not that suitable for short tem trading.So,if other forumer read my reply without knowing my basis,they may get the wrong impression.

If u want to trade long term in any stock market (ie,investing)some basic skills u must hv r, u must be able to assess the worth of the investee co.U need to know to read and interprete financial statements,cash flow statements,director's and auditor's report ,u need to be able to assess the main biz of the investee co to see whether it is growing or dying(eg,stockbroking),u need to be able to compare the financial results and growth potentials with cos in similar biz activities,u should know what is earning per share,dividend yield,NTA etc and u should also read and compare research reports by different research hses on the investee co.A mouth full yeah?

Coming back to u Geminist,I think it is really no harm to learn Technical analysis.The Malaysian stock and futures mkt do,once awhile ,though rare ,provide good trading opportunities.However,if u hv the patience to go long term based on fundamentals,u can invest without knowing Technical analysis.

Haha, we now have both short term traders and long term traders here ...

Well, thanks alot for your detailed explanation and information ...

I guess the fundamentals of long term investing you're talking about is that, we must understand what we are investing in?

About the stock market in Malaysia, right now, I really have little, or should I say very little confidence in the PLC of Malaysia ... It seems to me they have very little ethiques when it comes to running their business ...

The reason I'm more interested in long term investing now is because I'm still a student and I'm doing some freelance work so therefore, I have very little time left to devote to short term investing ... However, it seems that it's not easy to spot an investment oppurtunity and even mutual fund doesn't seem to be the best place too for long term investing ...

I have just started to look at this https://flagship4.vanguard.com/VGApp/hnw/HomepageOverview

By the way, about the technical analysis part, do you have any books to recommend me? I have little confidence in books that boast about reading their book to earn from trading and etc ... It seems to me those are just some marketting gimmicks and seldom live up to the name ...

Besides, I'm interested to learn more about accounting and therefore, I'm looking for some books which is more about how to read financial statements and etc ... Right now at this moment, I can only understand simple accounting stuff

No point having the most detailed financial reports when I can't actually read it properly ...

Thanks many ...

I think we still need to time the market even if we are investing for the long term, am I right? This is because you'd rather buy when the market is low and let it grow to its peak. Sell it off at its peak and wait for another "low". Errr... now this sounds a little bit like short term trading...

So do you actually time the market if you invest in long term? I feel there is still a need to time the market...

And do you believe in "dollar cost averaging"?

Yes you are right. Timing one of the key factor in a successful trade.



It depends on the instrument you are currently using. If stocks you can short if you think the price will decrease. But you have to wait for an uptick to cover.
If Options you can buy puts.



Actually I have a negative conception of dollar cost averaging. My logic,why add onto a losing trade just close the trade. You can always buy later at lower. This are my views as a short term trader. But if you have the conviction that the underlying will move your way ,only that your timing was off then why not.

This post has been edited by whtrader: Nov 2 2005, 11:43 AM

Like everyone I am still learning, but I do take trading seriously.

In long term investment,my strategy is to pick the co.with the best growth in terms of profit and consistent dividend record over the past few years from the sector/industry i deemed growing.I will then look at the management to exclude cos with not so good records in the past.I do share your concern that many PLCs in Malaysia hv little or no concern of corporate governance

After deciding on the potential investee co.I normally take my time to accumulate the stock bcos company of this nature is normally thinly traded. If subsequently,my assessement turnout to be wrong(I follow my investee company's announcements closely )which do happen quite often,I will not hesitate to cut my losses.In summary,there's a lot of work to be done before investing.

Mutual fund is never my liking as the entry and exit cost is quite high,on top of that,one hv no say in the investment decision.Bursa is now coming out with new instruments such as ETF(Exchange traded funds)and REITS(real estate investment trust) which is very similar to mutual funds but the entry and exit cost is very much cheaper.Again,be forewarned that know what u r buying before investing .There r only very few ETF and REITS listed now with the latest being Icapital Biz Bhd which is a closed end fund .

With regard to the books,I afraid that I am not able to help u on this as I picked up my little understanding on Technical analysis from trainings that we r required to attend as a prerequisite to renew our license.Hopefully,other forumers can help u out on this.

If one were to invest in equity such as shares in the stock market. How do they do the initial screening of thousand of stock in the market?
Is it by looking at the ROI, dividend yield, credit ratings first.
And then with further analyse the financial statements of the company picked?

I think the first step is the hardest. Any thoughts?