Author: Lawrence Chan

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TLC Weekly Update April 16, 2021

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This option expiration Friday is something worth taking note of. We have all 3 major stock market indices at all time high while the expected worldwide “recovery” has turned into more lockdowns and vaccination nightmares. Is it optimism or it is pure animal instinct to bet everything on the stock market to make a few more bucks? I don’t know the answer but I am sure that if this is optimism it will have to face reality soon.

I love eggs. I eat eggs everyday. However I hate peeling egg shell. Funny that I read this article on how to boil egg that will make the egg shell easy to peel off. I will give it a try and report back next week.

Weather here in Toronto finally settled down to above zero. Trees are covered with green sprouts everywhere. And the birds came back too. I saw a bird the other day that looks very special so I tried to find the name for the bird online. Instead, I learned something fascinating about the birds and their annual migration.

Lately, I am trying to add the skill of lock picking to a long list of things I like to master. As I watch through youtube videos about the subject, I find this video on Master Lock very funny, in a dark humour way. It is a very short video and if you need a pad lock make sure you watch it so that you will never buy a Master Lock ever.

After past few weeks of intense catch up to complete multiple projects, I have completed a major milestone while setting up for the next leg of building my proprietary trading business. There are things that I have to wait for the results before I can proceed so I am stuck in a way giving me some extra time. I hope to either write or record some videos for my premium members.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update April 9, 2021

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Another week of record new all time high for S&P500 but not quite with Dow and Nasdaq 100. This is definitely an environment that we rarely seen in the past. As far as I remember from my long trading career, this is the second time we see this all-time-high phenomenon. Last time it was the end of year 1999 to the beginning of year 2000.

I warned in my newsletter for my premium members that this year we are going to see problems with essentials. Here is a video from a youtuber contractor telling us how bad things have been with the renovation / construction materials. Things will go way worse before it gets better.

Unlike a growth driven inflation, what we are experiencing is a supply side limitation-driven price hiking. There is no limit to how far such price rising wave will go. It all depends on how desperate the buyers are. If this continues for a long time, it will damage the internals of a economy beyond repair.

I just watched another video from DoubleLine talking to Louis Gave of Gavekal Research. Mr. Gave has unique insights about the long term economic changes that will affect everyone who have an investment portfolio.

A very interesting video about Ireland’s Vitamin D report. For those of you who are told by MDs that you do not need Vitamin D supplement, it is important for you to watch it.

Since it is the beginning of a quarter, I have a lot of paperwork to catch up on. This is also the tax filing season for Canadians. Getting all these accounting work done and then I will be able to relax, say, for an afternoon, before getting back to work on other pressing tasks.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update April 2, 2021

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Today Easter Friday is the last day before another round of lockdown imposed on people living in Ontario here. I still do not understand why the government continues to act the way it is without paying any attention to solve the most important issue, namely, increasing the capacity of critical care. Seriously, China already demonstrated what can be done to create temporary critical care units. The whole province is being held hostage to this is beyond my limited understanding of problem solving …

Anyhow, I guess this could be the final fatal blow to many small businesses here. By the end of the second quarter of 2021, the real impact will be felt by those who are not directly affected by these lockdowns. It will be extremely difficult for small businesses to navigate this new era of lockdown happy world.

I bumped into this interesting article about a legendary fabric that no one knows how to produce any more. This lost of a well known technology reminds me of the Antikythera mechanism. Even now, we are still not sure how ancient civilization was able to produce such fine astronomy tool. Here is a link to a discussion about the mechanism.

Since this is a holiday long weekend, it is a good time to enjoy something funny. Chess Grand Master Hikaru did a video of him playing against other players with 7 queens. Enjoy!

So much more work I like to get done this week but thanks to the re-lockdown, many planned projects cannot proceed again, like hardware upgrade and test drive new real-time trading tools. I guess it is best to stick with things I can do by myself over the coming few weeks.

Have a fantastic weekend all!

p.s. there are indeed quite a number of bunnies living in the park nearby …

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TLC Weekly Update March 26, 2021

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Another week of roller coaster ride with Dow shot back up near all time high while Nasdaq 100 resumed its sell off. S&P got caught in between and could not decide which one to follow. This makes life difficult for many pro traders I know.

For those of you wondering where the market is heading, Michael Burry of “The Big Short” fame has made a series of tweets and then stopped talking about the markets all together. Business Insider made a summary of what he said, enjoy!

His point of view on Bitcoin and Tesla are very interesting. I do not know enough about crypto to say that they are “fads”. However, I am very sure every car company will catch up with Tesla eventually. And I agree with Mr. Burry on EVs being a fad because EVs are not good for driving under many conditions from extreme coldness and a post apocalyptical world with no electricity.

I have a friend being diagnosed with excessive iron in her blood. Well, most people do not know that cast iron pans can overload people with iron even if you are on a diet with insufficient iron. Read this article to understand why.

Last weekend I spent it all on hardware upgrade. This weekend I will be on turbo mode to complete some coding. Just don’t understand why something always pop up that require emergency attention. Must be some damn astrology setup on my chart … LOL

Jeff Gundlach, the “bond king”, has a new webcast made for his clients and released to youtube about a week later. It is packed with proprietary data models and analysis. If you are interested in understanding the current economy, this video is a must-watch.

Here in Toronto the weather finally goes back up to above zero and the huge piles of ice on the streets are melt away over the last few days. It is very nice to be able to walk outside without putting on layers of clothes. Being able to stroll around while tackling difficult programming problems helps a lot.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update March 19, 2021

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Another hectic week is over with Dow hitting 33200 for the first time in history. For investors and active traders, where the stock markets are heading from here can be tricky. Multiple factors from inflation to no more stimulus can disrupt this gravy train suddenly. It will be very interesting to see where the stock market will be in a few weeks.

I watched this interesting video about a fiverr freelancer who grow her business to making more than $300,000 a year over a few years time. It is definitely an inspiration to anyone who want to do better financially. It is another example of hard work and persistency that pays off.

For Jordan Peterson’s fans, it looks like he is recovering and this podcast from Bret Weinstein with Peterson is delightful to watch. It is rare these days we get intelligent discussions these days let alone open discussions among experts.

It is fascinating to see what cells actually look like. And it is nothing like what I imagined. I didn’t know the technology has been there for sometime already. This busy schedule I am keeping seriously affected my ability to keep up with the latest development in medical science.

More work to be done this week including some hardware upgrade I have planned late last year. The whole project was on hold due to shipment delay from pretty much everywhere in the world. Once this is taken care of I can happily cross it from my “must-do” list.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update March 12, 2021

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Another interesting week is about to end. First we started the week with panic on interest rate spike up. Then the market spent all week going higher with Dow minting a new all-time-high today while Nasdaq 100 dropped 200 points. The narrative of the stock market being represented by the indices looks very much broken to me.

It looks like nothing can stop the stock markets from going higher. That’s what I was told by the Robinhood crowd. That Tesla will be the most important company of the future.

Once upon a time there was the belief of a better future build by calculators. Those leading companies making calculator back then are now all gone. Calculators no longer something of importance. No matter how transformational the technology is, they will all be just part of a bigger and better future. Tesla may contribute to a better future for the world but that does not translate automatically that its stock price will keep going higher and higher.

Since I can’t deliver the message properly without going into hours of lecture on finance, I guess I should just wish this generation of momentum traders, who call themselves investors, good luck.

I am experiencing the seasonal f$#k up of my internet connection again thanks to Rogers. It is very frustrating when you need stable internet connection but there is no real options available. The fake competition between the two biggest infrastructure companies here in Ontario Canada is kind of funny in a dark humour way.

As usual, youtube found me some videos that is totally unrelated to what I am searching for. This time, a video on robots from Veritasium. It is a good one though.

For those of you looking for a way to improve your finance or, simply to find some way to squeeze more money out of your income, it can be as simple as what this video says. I am not sure if anyone would follow the advice though.

I am trying to learn more about cryptos and the more I learn about it, the more they feel like a elaborate scam to me. I am not dissing crypto here though. What I am saying is that they are as good as the government printing schemes. Check out this video on ethereum from Tim Ferriss having Vitalik Buterin to talk about his vision about cryptos and where things are heading.

So many things I like to get done yet it is already Friday … never enough time!

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update March 5, 2021

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This week the stock markets worldwide zoom in to just one thing – the spike in US T-notes yield rate. It dropped a bit below 1.5%, we got that Monday mega rally. The next day it edged higher to 1.5% again, Nasdaq 100 higher flyers all hammered. And then yesterday Powell said nothing to calm people down, next thing we know yield just spike through the roof and collapsed S&P back below year 2020 close. Watching the markets move feels like watching a drunk doing all sorts of crazy things.

Got to wonder by next Friday will the markets remember what happened this week.

I watched a video about Turkey’s real estate trouble. The trouble there looks to me already happening everywhere else. Real estate investors should pay attention about this.

I came across this video recommended to me by a friend on tendon training. He is so surprised that what is said in the video confirms what I told him decades ago that the classic martial art training if done correctly it does not focus on training your muscles but your tendons. Sometimes it is important to not slap the words of “not scientific” on things you do not understand. I have seen first hand how one of these very old master martial artists with a thin and flimsy frame who can punch lightly and destroy a concrete wall …

No magic. No tricks. Pure hard work over several decades.

And obviously his disciples could not achieve the same level of power due to “demand of modern life”.

Jordan Peterson’s new book Beyond 12 Rules for Life is just released. Accompanying that, of course, are internet media exposure in place of the old world book tour. One of the conversations that stands out and worth watching the whole thing is the one Peterson did with Tom Bilyeu. The conversation leads to interesting explanation by Peterson on several psychology concepts that would take years to learn. Be warned – it is two hours long.

I am extremely busy working on multiple fronts and that stalled my effort on producing videos / short lectures for my trading courses. I can foresee that by end of March my marathon push to setup my prop trading firm will reach the milestone of completing the work on laying out the foundation. There will be few mundane tasks left and back to a more regular schedule to focus on research and development. I will then be able to pick up from where I left off on producing the videos.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update February 26, 2021

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This is last trading week of February. Many people are wondering why the sudden selloff in Nasdaq 100 big techs while the know nothing media b.s. all the way from blaming this on the Robinhood crowd to mythical creatures manipulating the markets. Gee, I told my premium members in the February newsletter than last week of February has a seasonal correction coming.

I am not using esoteric analysis whatsoever. It is the fact that the big caps all have such a spectacular rally last year majority of the longer term players have not unloaded their stocks. And people has to book at least partial profit to utilize their tax break this year. Nothing voodoo, just common sense.

But telling people there is nothing special can’t attract clicks, likes and viewership … I get that.

I have a very busy week all week dealing with technical issues as I am testing one trading account with a new brokerage connection. Encountered all kinds of odd issues and have to solve them one by one. Anyhow I think I have done everything necessary to ensure the smooth transition of my main trading account over to the new routing path. Will see what happen next week.

I am not a big fan of going to the theatre to watch the latest movies. However, I came across this article on Zack Snyder’s new director’s cut of the movie Justice League and stirred huge interest in me. The theatre release was like 2 hours while the upcoming director’s cut will be 4 hours is already fascinating enough for me to squeeze time out to watch it in the future …

For those of you who are interested in marble machines (or that you just want to kill some time) you may like to watch this video of having 1000 marbles run thru this machine.

I was in the market for a air purifier lately and did some research before I made my final decision. I need the purifier to ensure the room that I have my computers would be near dust free. It is very hard to do that in Canada effectively. I am very glad I found this video reviewing the common air purifiers available on the market here in North America. If not for this video, I would make a very bad choice choosing the machine that I thought to be the best and it would make me very miserable.

The lockdown in my area is relaxed since the beginning of the week but somehow I do not see much changes so far even though restaurants are now open for dining indoors with limited capacity. The places with most number of people going to are, not surprisingly, Home Depot and Canadian Tire, the home improvement and maintenance stores. Looks like the trend for people to work from home is definitely going to stay.

Back to work on other projects.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update February 19, 2021

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This year 2021 is definitely at least as bizarre as year 2020. Looking at the extreme weather we experienced this week, I wonder what else is in store in coming few months. I will not be surprised if it gets any colder here in Toronto, the polar bears will come visit us.

One good news I got this week is that Big-Game Hunter ES, the fully automated trading strategy I have created, made it to the Top 10 List at Striker Securities. BGH is the only day trading strategy made it in the list.

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BGH had some tough time over the past 2 years from technical issues to dealing with Trump’s tweet storms. I am confident that with fewer disruptive events, BGH will do fine going forward.

When I was searching for performance evaluation methods online, I came across this interesting video about the origin of minesweeper and solitaire that extends to a talk about performance feedback and evaluation. Understanding this is useful for anyone, traders included, who are trying to improve their skills of any kind.

For those of you interested in building your own PC, here are some good news for you – the Intel iCore series CPU prices just crashed hard. And in fact, if the momentum tells anything, it may persist for a while. The pressure on price came from multiple front, including the leak of the pricing of the next generation iCore CPUs.

In my case, I don’t need the latest and fastest computers to do my work which is mainly research and development of trading algorithms. Due to limitations of the trading platforms available in the market, there is really no point to pay top dollar for the top of the line computer models. Instead, I use multiple cheap computers at the same time. If one computer is doing some heavy duty optimization work that can take hours to get the results, I simply continue to work on a different set of trading algos on another computer.

Every famous investor going on TV or other media these days are talking about how unreasonable the stock markets are at the current price level. However, majority of them are also experienced enough to not going short against the markets. Not that I believe in the bullshit of Elliot Wave Theory, but trading legend Paul Tudor Jones really sums it up nicely,

“There is no training, classroom or otherwise, that can prepare for trading the last third of a move, whether it’s the end of a bull market or the end of a bear market.”

There is no shame to take profit or lock in gains on some of your long term holdings given the current high valuation of many stocks and the indices. Not protecting your capital is very irresponsible for your financial well being.

Have a great weekend all!

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TLC Weekly Update February 12, 2021

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Today is the official lunar new year. Well, technically it was Feb 11th 2:03 pm Eastern Time for the new moon to take effect. However, lunar calendar is limited by human ability to call a day two different ways (i.e. too complex for normal people) so the next closest day has to do it.

There is absolutely no celebration of any kind visible in various areas in the city where Asians having stronger presence. The lockdown is not over. Restaurants can only sell take outs or do deliveries. Even family members not living in the same household is technically not allowed to visit each other unless “absolutely necessary”.

Psychologically, lockdown is taking a toll on many people. If you are one of those who got depressed by lockdown, please try to do some exercise and learn to do meditation to counter the effect. Even simple breathing exercise can help. Don’t let the world crumble around you just because of the dumb decisions by the government officials.

For Bitcoin fans, here is an interesting story about a bitcoin billionaire. The rise of bitcoin’s status from not recognized by the banks to the point that the banks stating that they must be involved now means a lot to the BTC crowd. What holds in the future though is anyone’s guess.

Lately Goldman Sachs did an interview on Stanley Druckenmiller. He is one of the best minds in the investment world. His take on the current market environment is useful for anyone having investments in the markets.

I came across this video of a 12-year-old kid who built a nuclear fusion machine. This makes me wonder … all these hypes on electric cars that ignore the fact that making an electric car has a front load of environment pollution equal to the amount of pollution generated by a normal car over 20 years time span. Serious research effort should be made to power cars by nuclear fusion, not electricity.

Another week just fly by so quickly I find it hard to believe it is already mid February. I have so many things I need to get done yesterday. I guess I will be busy as usual in foreseeable future.

Have a great weekend all!

Oh …

Happy Lunar New Year!