time to blog

Timetotrade got another mention in Shares Magazine (Vol 8, Issue 51, 21-Dec 06 to 03 Jan 07) this time by Nick Sudbury. Another big thank you to Nick for including timetotrade in his selection of best investment software. It is really cool to see timetotrade included in the mix with other excellent trading software packages.

The markets may be quiet at the moment but for most of the year it can be extremely difficult to keep track of everything that is going on. Good investment software can be a big help and save both time and money. The best packages provide a reliable source of data as well as the functionality to monitor existing positions and identify new opportunities.

Timetotrade

Timetotrade from Sensatus is a charting and alerting service that allows traders to stay in touch while on the move. Members can use the website to create rule-based alerts to identify buying and selling opportunities on the major UK and US stock exchanges. Whenever these are triggered, a warning can be delivered immediately to their mobile phone, email or instant messenger accounts.

The majority of people who have signed up to the service are professionals with a day job, who use technical analysis to judge the timing of their entries and exits. Timetotrade allows them to set alerts based on simple price or volume movement, or move advanced triggers using technical indicators such as the RSI or MACD.

Dary McGovern, MD of Sensatus, says that one of the most reliable triggers is a combination of support/resistance and MACD. Barclays is a classic example.

‘Between July and October [2005] Barclays tested 588 three times, pulling back on each occasion. After breaking through this area of resistance, the shares fell back and tested 588 once again. When it held firm, this became an established level of support,’ he says.

‘Since then there have been four occasions when the price has pulled back to 588. Each time a positive crossover on the MACD has signalled a change of trend and successfully signalled a change of trend, [which could have been used] as an entry point for a long position.

So development of the beta carries on. As a small pre-christmas treat I’ve just added a little bit of “AJAX” to the site.

Now when you click on the chart zoom in/out icons or choose different font sizes, the page should update without needing to reload. Hopefully that will make using the site quicker and easier.

For anyone who does browse with javascript turned off (that’s what the J in AJAX stands for) you’ll be glad to know that we made sure that everything still works as “normal”.

Don’t forget as we add new features we’ll keep a track of them on our wiki here.

it’s not this kind of ajax

The following article was published in the Vol 8, Issue 50, 14-20 December 2006 edition of Shares Magazine. Polly Fergusson from Shares Magazine suggests some ways of cheering up any budding traders in the family this Christmas with a variety of ways to improve their chances of success. A big thank you Polly from everyone in Sensatus, for including timetotrade in your top four trading software Christmas selection.

Get your trading right and it’ll be presents all year round - not just at Christmas. So why not kick start a wealthy new year with a few stocking fillers that should inspire and help traders on the path to success? Shares has cast its eye over a selection of gifts for traders and come up with the best of the bunch.

The soft approach

There is a vast array of trading software on offer and the choice can sometimes be confusing. It depends on who you are buying it for and what they will be using it for. The best ones have a user friendly interface and most importantly give good analysis results.

Many offer free limited trials before making a purchase. If you come across some seemingly good software that doesn’t offer free or inexpensive trial sessions, check for reviews from independent users - these can usually be found on the internet. Be wary about rave reviews that seem over-enthusiastic as they could all be part of a marketing ploy.

Timetotrade

A new charting and alerting service that allows traders to stay in touch while on the move. The website allows members to create rule-based alerts identifying buying and selling opportunities. Once triggered, the warning can be delivered immediately to your mobile phone, email and instant messenger accounts.

Users log on to the website and select from a drop-down menu of different technical indicators and specify trigger criteria. It is available on a free 30-day trial and then on a monthly basis.

It is amazing the combination of words that people can string together to form sentences. As mentioned before, my wife is able to put the words ‘Shoes’, ‘Clothes’ and ‘Investment’ in the same sentence, however not to be out done, the guys at showmedo are able to string together a sentence containing the words Python, Linux, Java and Ruby.

No it is not some story about a big snake called Linux, having one to many espressos before going out shopping for priceless jewels; although that would be interesting. The guys at showmedo have a great site that has made the front page of del.icio.us not once, but twice, through providing educational tutorial videos made by people with a variety of skills.

The first video was about how to make the perfect cup of coffee, and from there the content has grown to include a series of tutorials on programming languages, car maintenance etc, with the most recent addition being investment timing educational videos from timetotrade

A personal favourite was the showmedo video about a website called GeoSense, titled ‘Learn Geography with GeoSense‘. If you would like to improve your geography, or improve your kid’s geography, it is worth checking out.