"I believe the very best money is made at the market turns. Everyone says you get killed trying to pick tops and bottoms and you make all your money by playing the trend in the middle. Well, for 12 years I have been missing the meat in the middle, but I have made a lot of money at tops and bottoms." --Paul Tudor Jones
The concept of fading a market is, by definition, a contrarian approach. Simply stated, one is said to be fading the market when trading against the original, or prevailing, trend.
Before we move on, however, we need a system, or methodology for determining what the prevailing trend is. In my view, it's entirely a function of one's own investing or trading timeframe. For example, if one trades off weekly charts, then the prevailing trend in the S&P 500 has been higher for the better part of two years. If, however, one trades off a one-minute or three-minute chart, the prevailing trend might change from bullish to bearish and back again a dozen times over the course of a five-day trading week. As with most things in life, it's all a question of context.
Regardless of time frame, the techniques and inputs one might use for identifying an appropriate time to fade the market aren't all that different. For example, one might consider the distance price is from a key moving average. Another consideration might be whether or not divergences (in momentum) exist in such indicators as the stochastic, Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) or Relative Strength Index (RSI). Other worthwhile inputs might be investors' sentiment figures, market breadth readings or something as simple as the determination as to how price is reacting to economic or company-specific data. Is good (bad) news being met with the expected response?
Another approach that isn't as readily used is the study of price and volume via the volume profile. As many of you know, I rely heavily on the volume profile in my own trading. And I can tell you without a shadow of doubt that the way in which data are displayed, via the profile, can offer the astute observer strong indications of when a contrarian approach makes a ton of sense.
One more under-appreciated consideration is tempo. Tempo is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as "rate of motion or activity." Put into trading terms, one must gauge whether higher (or lower) prices are being met with an increased level of activity. In market profile parlance, one would try to determine whether higher prices are cutting off demand (buying activity), and/or lower prices are cutting off supply (selling activity). The bottom line is that as price approaches a new swing high or low, traders want to see an increase in overall tempo (excitement) to suggest that the prevailing trend is likely to continue. No such increase might be an indication that the underlying momentum is waning.
In the end, all one is looking for is supporting evidence that price, as it relates to one's specified time frame, is nearing a turning point. One is looking for a time-frame-specific shift in the supply/demand dynamic.
What about fundamental factors? Should one be concerned with price-to-earnings ratios, book/value levels, PEG ratios or overall valuation? When it comes to trade initiation, especially when one's time frame is measure in anything other than months (if not years), I would argue that they don't matter a whit. An understanding of the tangible worth of a company or index might give the trader a higher degree of conviction. But when it comes to trade initiation (more specifically a short sale), valuation should never be the primary reason to initiate a trade.
The study of technical analysis, pattern recognition and auction market theory are not the witches' brew. They are related disciplines that share a common goal: to identifying where supply, demand and value are located. And not value as determined by the opinions of 20 Wall Street analysts, but rather value as determined by the recorded buy and sell decisions (trade volume) of the market's participants.
Read Jack Schwager's various Market Wizards books and you'll find that while some of the greatest traders and money managers have an understanding and appreciation for a company's fundamentals, they are also well aware of the roll that technicals, sentiment and tape reading play in the area of trading.
If you have any questions related to fading, my daily Real Money Pro E-Mini S&P 500 trade plans or trading in general, feel free to reach out to me via email me at parkcityyeti@gmail.com, or on Twitter @ByrneTSCM.