My Background
I was a young man working for an Insurance company and being a quiet trouble-maker with a healthy affinity for analysis of numbers, I was thrust into a position that fed this desire to the max. My boss then told me, "Runya in this job you must have a sixth sense, insurance agents earn commission and if they get a chance to falsify numbers to get paid they will do it, you are the gate keeper". Those days insurance agents would put fake business through, get paid and the claw back (recouping paid commission) would be few months later. Some would then abscond starting a lengthy process or using current commission to recover the monies. It was at this point that I also became interested in representing workers, Zimbabwe at the time was going through hyper-inflation so salary increases were a seriously contested area, the employees needed me for my analytical skills, to corner the employer and show why they could afford the 100-200% salary increase. It is in the debates with company executives that we always ended up scrutinizing what money was invested and where. The bulk was in the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange, those days shares were moving hundreds of percent. With our meagre salaries we jumped into the money making machine, everyone was trying to beat inflation and beat the exchange rate. Buy today, sell a week later with 2000% profit and hope by time funds cleared you would be able to buy the US dollar making a gain. I remember the adrenalin rush, it was insane. Often we lost the battle waiting for funds to clear forcing us to buy again.
The Money Lesson
See as a child my father died, I could tell at his funeral that he was a notable employee at the national airline, pilots, general managers all came to pay last respects. Later I learnt he had worked hard, to each child he left a sizable amount of money. We all had bank accounts where funds were put, the bank was called Post Office Savings Bank (POSB). In today's money it would have been several thousands. We let that money sit in a savings account and at that time the economy was undergoing structural adjustment guided by IMF, inflation was ravaging this money so much that within 2 years it was all gone. What followed was substantial suffering to near destitution. Though I was young, the experience from plenty to nothing was rather intriguing. Trauma leaves a mark on all of us, with me being introverted meant I digested things long after they had reason to be at the back of my mind.
Back to insurance, I was now able to piece together how money worked. The confusion of childhood was now finding answers. It was like the universe conspired to put me in a place where my confusion would be solved. I also got a front row view of the monster called inflation and the unfairness of the pension and retirement management companies. While we argued to be paid fairly, management would tell us the money sitting on the balance sheet was for policy holders. On the other hand the same policy holders who had put hundreds of dollars, some from as far back as 1980s, were being told their policy value was not enough to afford a loaf of bread. Many would not travel to claim the matured policies for they would spend more in transport charges that the payout. So it happened that insurers saw the paper obligation go to zero, while the assets purchased by premiums from those paper contracts multiplied to match inflation. Long story short, policies got wiped out, insurers gained assets with no obligations tied to them, it was a sad situation.
Into the Markets
I started doing analysis, the very basic, buy low and hold, sell at a profit. I have analyzed some great opportunities where I could have turned $200 into $20,000. But I saw them and said I would act on them later, later I never got the change but serious regret as that money would have saved me a recession. I lost my job abruptly during the Great Financial Crisis. By 2017 I went back to the markets, I knew my greatness was in there, I strongly believed I could teach people to be careful, to think of their pensions and manage them differently especially in Africa. I put a lot of time into studying, listened to many hours of Anton Kriel, he sounded convincing being an ex-Goldman Sachs employee. I listened to the likes of Lance Beggs who traded by the minute and the likes of Rayner Teo whose ways were an adrenalin rush. I thought I was ready, read the candle patterns and bed on them. It didn't turn out so well, I lost something close to $10,000. Being an introvert, adrenalin was not doing me good, blood pressure spiked. I was losing more than I was gaining, everything was complicated on the right side of the chart, history is easy to read, telling the future was a wild animal, untamable.
The world of trading is complicated, one must find where their personality fit, some prefer to be glued to many screens constantly. I was not cut out for that clearly. I wanted some certainty so I can relax and not bother what price was going, if ever I did I would look quickly and finding a convincing reason why things were so. I started learning cycle analysis, I began solving for time rather than price. The things I learnt through earlier traders were great, I credit Lance Beggs for his comprehensive tutorial and candlestick patterns. But I felt I arrived when I came across Malcolm the cycle analyst. It was hard learning cycle analysis, having had many failed attempts, I was skeptical. The more I dug into it, the more it made sense. Today I use mostly cycle counts to determine price direction. In my trading ideas, I simplify it leaving out technical jargon so that the man on the street or just starting can follow, confirm and profit from the ideas.
Conclusion
The goal is to build a trading and investing system that anyone can use especially the financially illiterate. The misfortunes I suffered, I am certain I can save many from that kind of calamity. I have spent the past 3 years building data into Google Sheets, some semi-automated updates here and there. I like what I am building and by end of 2023 I want to be covering JSE, NYSE, ASX & LSE (FTSE). I believe what big corporates have made a complicated process, we must make it simple and if possible make money from there. In Africa money must not be dormant, it must not be subjected to buy and hold where one does Dollar Cost Averaging (DCA) & pray after 10 years it will be twice or more. In Africa one must ensure money is always on a voyage, moving from profit in one market and into cheaper alternatives but ready to move towards profit. This is because the challenges in Africa tend towards economic bust, if one can use the limited time to build a war chest spread across major bourses, they can save themselves and many from poverty. I believe in innovation and that it can lift Africa somewhat from poverty, however only when we can turn our dollar into ten dollars can we think of putting five dollars into innovation. It begins with getting good returns relative to time. Slow but sure can work for others, we need speed to catch up. The ideas I share, I usually go over them and ensure I share where confidence levels are high. I used to share ideas before I was good, I saw many were not going as planned, I quit. It is great discomfort to share something that can lose a person money. So stay tuned as we try to disrupt the markets for Africa's sake. It's possible!
I was a young man working for an Insurance company and being a quiet trouble-maker with a healthy affinity for analysis of numbers, I was thrust into a position that fed this desire to the max. My boss then told me, "Runya in this job you must have a sixth sense, insurance agents earn commission and if they get a chance to falsify numbers to get paid they will do it, you are the gate keeper". Those days insurance agents would put fake business through, get paid and the claw back (recouping paid commission) would be few months later. Some would then abscond starting a lengthy process or using current commission to recover the monies. It was at this point that I also became interested in representing workers, Zimbabwe at the time was going through hyper-inflation so salary increases were a seriously contested area, the employees needed me for my analytical skills, to corner the employer and show why they could afford the 100-200% salary increase. It is in the debates with company executives that we always ended up scrutinizing what money was invested and where. The bulk was in the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange, those days shares were moving hundreds of percent. With our meagre salaries we jumped into the money making machine, everyone was trying to beat inflation and beat the exchange rate. Buy today, sell a week later with 2000% profit and hope by time funds cleared you would be able to buy the US dollar making a gain. I remember the adrenalin rush, it was insane. Often we lost the battle waiting for funds to clear forcing us to buy again.
The Money Lesson
See as a child my father died, I could tell at his funeral that he was a notable employee at the national airline, pilots, general managers all came to pay last respects. Later I learnt he had worked hard, to each child he left a sizable amount of money. We all had bank accounts where funds were put, the bank was called Post Office Savings Bank (POSB). In today's money it would have been several thousands. We let that money sit in a savings account and at that time the economy was undergoing structural adjustment guided by IMF, inflation was ravaging this money so much that within 2 years it was all gone. What followed was substantial suffering to near destitution. Though I was young, the experience from plenty to nothing was rather intriguing. Trauma leaves a mark on all of us, with me being introverted meant I digested things long after they had reason to be at the back of my mind.
Back to insurance, I was now able to piece together how money worked. The confusion of childhood was now finding answers. It was like the universe conspired to put me in a place where my confusion would be solved. I also got a front row view of the monster called inflation and the unfairness of the pension and retirement management companies. While we argued to be paid fairly, management would tell us the money sitting on the balance sheet was for policy holders. On the other hand the same policy holders who had put hundreds of dollars, some from as far back as 1980s, were being told their policy value was not enough to afford a loaf of bread. Many would not travel to claim the matured policies for they would spend more in transport charges that the payout. So it happened that insurers saw the paper obligation go to zero, while the assets purchased by premiums from those paper contracts multiplied to match inflation. Long story short, policies got wiped out, insurers gained assets with no obligations tied to them, it was a sad situation.
Into the Markets
I started doing analysis, the very basic, buy low and hold, sell at a profit. I have analyzed some great opportunities where I could have turned $200 into $20,000. But I saw them and said I would act on them later, later I never got the change but serious regret as that money would have saved me a recession. I lost my job abruptly during the Great Financial Crisis. By 2017 I went back to the markets, I knew my greatness was in there, I strongly believed I could teach people to be careful, to think of their pensions and manage them differently especially in Africa. I put a lot of time into studying, listened to many hours of Anton Kriel, he sounded convincing being an ex-Goldman Sachs employee. I listened to the likes of Lance Beggs who traded by the minute and the likes of Rayner Teo whose ways were an adrenalin rush. I thought I was ready, read the candle patterns and bed on them. It didn't turn out so well, I lost something close to $10,000. Being an introvert, adrenalin was not doing me good, blood pressure spiked. I was losing more than I was gaining, everything was complicated on the right side of the chart, history is easy to read, telling the future was a wild animal, untamable.
The world of trading is complicated, one must find where their personality fit, some prefer to be glued to many screens constantly. I was not cut out for that clearly. I wanted some certainty so I can relax and not bother what price was going, if ever I did I would look quickly and finding a convincing reason why things were so. I started learning cycle analysis, I began solving for time rather than price. The things I learnt through earlier traders were great, I credit Lance Beggs for his comprehensive tutorial and candlestick patterns. But I felt I arrived when I came across Malcolm the cycle analyst. It was hard learning cycle analysis, having had many failed attempts, I was skeptical. The more I dug into it, the more it made sense. Today I use mostly cycle counts to determine price direction. In my trading ideas, I simplify it leaving out technical jargon so that the man on the street or just starting can follow, confirm and profit from the ideas.
Conclusion
The goal is to build a trading and investing system that anyone can use especially the financially illiterate. The misfortunes I suffered, I am certain I can save many from that kind of calamity. I have spent the past 3 years building data into Google Sheets, some semi-automated updates here and there. I like what I am building and by end of 2023 I want to be covering JSE, NYSE, ASX & LSE (FTSE). I believe what big corporates have made a complicated process, we must make it simple and if possible make money from there. In Africa money must not be dormant, it must not be subjected to buy and hold where one does Dollar Cost Averaging (DCA) & pray after 10 years it will be twice or more. In Africa one must ensure money is always on a voyage, moving from profit in one market and into cheaper alternatives but ready to move towards profit. This is because the challenges in Africa tend towards economic bust, if one can use the limited time to build a war chest spread across major bourses, they can save themselves and many from poverty. I believe in innovation and that it can lift Africa somewhat from poverty, however only when we can turn our dollar into ten dollars can we think of putting five dollars into innovation. It begins with getting good returns relative to time. Slow but sure can work for others, we need speed to catch up. The ideas I share, I usually go over them and ensure I share where confidence levels are high. I used to share ideas before I was good, I saw many were not going as planned, I quit. It is great discomfort to share something that can lose a person money. So stay tuned as we try to disrupt the markets for Africa's sake. It's possible!
Disclaimer
The information and publications are not meant to be, and do not constitute, financial, investment, trading, or other types of advice or recommendations supplied or endorsed by TradingView. Read more in the Terms of Use.
Disclaimer
The information and publications are not meant to be, and do not constitute, financial, investment, trading, or other types of advice or recommendations supplied or endorsed by TradingView. Read more in the Terms of Use.