I have come to doubt the veracity of Phil’s professed performance returns, as well as the usefulness of his strategy. Caveat Emptor – k1
"The will to win means nothing without the will to prepare." – Juma Ikangaa
Welcome friends to a journey I began this past summer, to understand how a trader and blogger who kept coming up in my Quicken news source (by way of SeekingAlpha) was consistently producing the kinds of returns I had been taught to believe could only be snake oil. I can’t honestly say what prompted me to bite the bullet and pay for a 3-month subscription to PSW, except that reading Phil’s daily posts, along with the published results of his trades, led me to believe his performance was something other than snake oil, puffery, or luck.
Upon joining, I was overwhelmed by the action through the daily comments, and disappointed by the performance of my plays when I dipped my toe into the water. It quickly became obvious to me that I had a lot to learn before I became successful. However, by this point it was also obvious to me that there was something of value here, a new set of skills to tease out of PSW and develop within myself.
My approach was to begin with Phil’s standard assignment for new members, to go back and read the previous month’s posts. I learned so much, and got such a charge out it, that I began digging deeper into the archives, reading month after month of posts.
Before long I was saving links to important topics, organizing and re-organizing, creating a set of bookmarks to important concepts. Finally, one day another member asked a question I had the answer to. I popped the link into comments, amazing one and all.
Thus was born the k1 project (and here’s where it got named). I started this effort purely for myself, unsure of its usefulness to anyone else, and yet it’s become a collection of information that is so much more. I may never become an ace trader or supply insightful stock research to the PSW community (although I will certainly try), but I’m happy to share this part of my journey, my path through the PSW archives. I hope the links and commentary shared here prove useful to you on your own journey.
