Trader Rick Redmont
Trader Rick Redmont has become a role model for thousands of traders and investors around the world. His skepticism and distrust of graphical analysis, his lack of perception of various figures and lines, made him famous as the main skeptic of the most common approach to market analysis at that time.
Despite his distrust of graphical analysis, Redmont managed to build his own trading strategy and achieve unprecedented heights in trading options and stocks.
First exchange experience
According to Rick's recollections, he got his first trading experience as a teenager, when he was in college. He purchased his first shares back in 1961 during the era of the reign of the bulls.
So, using the Chartcraft method, Rick purchased shares worth 10 thousand dollars. Of course, at that moment, the manual and the choice of stock had practically no meaning, since the market was practically growing, and all trading came down to competition between peers to see who earned more.
After some time, Rick managed to double his deposit and earn 20 thousand dollars. However, 1962 brought some adjustments to the market, and the bullish trend practically dried up and was filled with bears. Intoxicated by easy money, Rick completely lost control of the situation and literally in a couple of months turned 20 thousand dollars into 2 dollars.
At that time, 20 thousand dollars was simply a huge amount of money, so such a drop led to pressure from relatives. Rick once recalled in an interview that all his relatives gave him books in the style of “I’m a Bankrupt Teenager” for Christmas.
Self-development and career
Most teenagers would probably lose all interest in the stock market after such a crushing defeat. However, the very thought that in a short time an inexperienced newcomer who knew nothing about stocks could turn 10 thousand dollars into 20 made Redmont think and fall in love with the world of the stock exchange forever.
Rick Redmont began actively raking in literature from all libraries whose publication date began in 1900. The first book that caught Rick's eye was called Technical Analysis of Stock Trends. This book was an ordinary classic manual on graphical analysis, which examined various patterns such as Head and Shoulders, triangles, trend lines and resistance and support levels.
After reading this book, Rick had more questions than answers. The first thing that seemed strange was that graphical analysis it’s too simple and if everything were exactly like that, then everyone would become millionaires.
Desperate skepticism towards classical methods of chart analysis forced Redmont to progress at tremendous speed, as he further studied all kinds of sources of information. One day he came across a course of lectures from the Stock Market Institute, where D. Wyckoff’s trading methodology was described in great detail.
Thanks to reading the book, Rick was able to finally understand the relationship between market volume and price and understand the banal rule of supply and demand. According to Redmont, he noted that demand fades on its own and in order for the market to fall, it does not need any strong fundamental data. After studying D. Wyckoff's theory, Rick enrolled in a course on Eliot's wave theory.
After graduating from graduate school, Rick worked as a stockbroker for many years. Having gained enormous experience, Redmont became a completely technical trader. His market analysis was based on wave theory and supply and demand analysis. When he was done with brokerage, Redmont moved to the OEX exchange, where he was successful in options trading.
As Rick states, there is no one-size-fits-all strategies, which could bring profit to everyone, simply does not exist. In his opinion, everyone chooses their own tools individually, and as proof he cites the example of Schwager’s book “Market Wizards”, which contains interviews with 40 people who have achieved success using completely different approaches.