Jay

$LWLG incredible move. Make it part of your process to track HVE/HVC candles. Also, take note of the candle structure and location that started the advance on 4/2.

Hey Clement, I was thinking of doing the same. Mind sharing a little more what you automated? All good if not, no pressure. I'm thinking of getting a lower timeframe, and tight stop loss system going. A simple bot, but when I tried in the past with IBKR execution speed left a lot to be desired. Thanks in advance!

The Path to Trading Mastery: Research and Pattern Recognition By Qullamaggie 1. Step-by-Step Market Research The easiest way to start is to research the markets thoroughly. First, get a platform like TC2000 and set your charts to the monthly timeframe. Create a watchlist of all US stocks and filter them by dollar volume instead of just share volume. Aim for liquid names—those with at least $1 billion to $10 billion in monthly dollar volume—to avoid "super thin" or illiquid stocks. 2. Identifying the Big Movers Go through the entire database (roughly 5,000 stocks) and identify the outliers. Look for stocks that: At least doubled in price within six months. Increased 200–300% within a single year. Gained 400–500% over three to four years. Create a separate watchlist for every single stock that has made these massive moves. You will likely end up with a few hundred highly liquid, historical winners. 3. Studying Chart Patterns Go back as far as the 80s or 90s and study their chart patterns. Stocks move in very specific ways. These same patterns occur over and over again—there is nothing truly new in the markets. While there are variations, the patterns that worked in the 90s are the same ones you see today. Focus primarily on price action. You can add a few indicators if you wish—I recommend moving averages—but don't use too many. "Too many indicators is for suckers." Study how these big winners acted during pullbacks: Which moving averages did the best stocks respect or "obey"? How did they behave before the breakout? How did they act once the move was underway? 4. Building Your Mental Database (The 2,000-Hour Rule) Your goal is to build a database in your head. Spend 1,000 hours doing exactly this: printing out charts, studying them, and saving them. (I personally use Evernote to store tens of thousands of these charts). Once you understand the price action, spend another 1,000 hours researching the fundamentals and the news behind those moves. What was driving them? What made a stock go up 500% in a year? If you put in those 2,000 hours of deep research, I promise you: before you know it, you’re going to have ten million dollars in your account.

This was the market in 2015, and 2016 was not exactly smooth sailing too. The big opportunity came Aug/Sept of 2015. From Grok: Sector Rotation: A Core Similarity Current Market (2026 YTD): Early 2026 has been marked by significant sector rotation away from mega-cap technology and growth stocks toward cyclical, value-oriented, and defensive sectors. This aligns with your description of a "challenging" environment with "a lot of rotation." Tech has underperformed (down ~0.4% YTD in January), while energy, materials, industrials, and consumer staples have led gains. This broadening of leadership is seen as a reversal from 2025's AI-driven tech dominance, where large-caps outperformed small-caps by a wide margin (19.78% vs. lower returns for small/mid-caps). Comparison to 2015-2016: 2015 was a flat, volatile year with defensive rotation (e.g., consumer staples and health care outperformed amid global concerns like China's slowdown and oil price crashes). Energy and materials lagged severely. 2016 saw a sharp rotation into cyclicals as the market recovered from an early-year selloff, with energy, financials, materials, and industrials leading. This broadening helped drive overall gains.