I installed Stockwiz 5 but the HELP folder has nothing in it. I'm trying to find documentation on the new formula language. I can't find anything on the web site and there's no HELP menu in the program.

Where's the info?
Thanks
R Virzi

We are still working on the documentation. We should have something simple in the next few days.

Well, here we are two weeks later and still no document posted and no email with documentation sent to me as promised.

Maybe you could email it to me as a late Christmas present - mail@rvirzi.com.

Once I receive something I'll revise this post to say "Thanks"!

Best Regards,
R Virzi

I'm afraid I mistakenly thought I could edit my posts any time, but alas there is a time limit.

I see you guys have posted the "documentation" that comes with the program. If that were sufficient I would not have started this thread. So let me be more specific on what I need.

I'm interested in back testing. You have one example listed so here are my questions:

- What is the purpose of the INIT function?
- I see your STOPIF function will halt the formula if there aren't enough data points. But what if I want to stop on other conditions?
- Do you have function so I can choose the maximum of two values?
- Do you have an if-then-else function?
- Do you have to use 'i' for the index in LOOPCALC?
- What does the first argument in BUYWHEN and SELLWHEN mean (CASH, SHARES, etc.)?
- The VARIABLE function seems to access built in variables. How many other built in variables are there besides PROFIT? What are their names and data type?

And finally...
- How much easier would this be if we could just get a complete list of functions and how they are used?

Thank you
R. Virzi

Raymond,
There is a new version of StockWiz 5 that contains a detailed Help screen. Run StockWiz 5, click on the 'Formulas' tab, then click on 'Edit' to edit a formula and then click on 'Help'. There you get a complete list of all available functions.

I'll send you a private email message with the download link.

I'll also try to post that documentation today to the web site.

--Steve

If Stock Wiz has such a great program, why don't they have a service which will give you their BEST 5 Stock Picks for the day . This would really be a true test of their stock picking capabilities using their expensive $795 program with all those bells and whistles .......But hey .......you know it, I know it and they know it .....they do not wish to embarrass themselves LOL

StockWiz never claimed to give you returns of 1800% and the like you see on late-night TV by our competitors. After all you should ask those other companies, if they are so good with forecasting the market how come they are not investing their own money – then make billions and leave the rest of us alone.

StockWiz is a tool that helps make your job as a stock picker (i.e., investor) a lot easier. For example, if you lost your keys in your driveway and assuming you do not have any lights there and it is late at night - a flashlight can make your job of looking for those keys a lot easier. When it comes to stock investing you can think of StockWiz as your flashlight. It is a tool that makes your job a lot easier.

Now granted that we know what kind of "keys" you "lost" or you are after (namely, profits) we should be able to use our "flashlight" and spot them - and more-often-than-not we do. But our strength is in computer programming and not in analyzing the markets. For example, you should not expect an engineer who designs DNA analysis machines to be able to also find the cause of some genetic disease.

In other words, StockWiz helps those who know what they are looking for, to not only find it faster, but do it daily in a methodical and exhaustive way. "Methodical" because StockWiz does not get tired or stops half-way and "exhaustively" because StockWiz stores data for all actively traded companies and therefore one "looks under every stone".

I hate to disappoint on what StockWiz can do or not do and actually I'll disappoint you even further. When we first introduced back-testing into the software, I guess 7 or 8 years ago, I was so excited I stayed up for two days testing hundreds of often-mentioned trading methods. The results? None worked consistently. I expected a good trading method to produce better-than-random results. This translates to working for more than 50% of the companies in the database or for the companies you pre-selected based on some simple and unrelated criteria.

What our competitors either by design or by ignorance fail to mention is the issue of "statistical over-fitting". For example, if you take 100 trading systems and you apply them to one company, one of those 100 systems is destined to produce the highest results. They then proclaim that system to be a gold-mine. In reality it is the statistical equivalent of "fool's gold". In other words, what they just discovered is a trading system that matched the past behavior of that one stock but not-necessarily any cause-and-effect that one could use for future use.

For me a trading system has statistical validity if it works against thousands of companies more often than pure chance. Over the years, I discovered a few systems that produce better-than-chance results and my own investment returns are above those of the market as a whole and better than most mutual funds. But I'm reluctant to declare myself an investment guru and tell the world to trust me.

But here are some things that you can look for.

1. Liquidity - unless you have some inside information (in which case you do not need StockWiz) you need to be in companies that are frequently traded. Otherwise, your investment may go dramatically down because a single person sold 100 shares at a much lower price.

2. Volatility - this is a statistical term that really means how much a stock price is all over the place (like a boat in a storm) or whether the price lies in a narrow range (like a boat on a calm day). Typically you should expect volatile stocks to have a greater risk and possibly greater rewards - but in either case you need to know when things have changed (i.e., the stock is now more or less volatile in terms of itself or in relation the rest of the market) so you can either realize profits or cut your losses.

3. Trend - Typically, if a stock price has a behavior you can easily identify, such as when the chart looks like a 45 degree straight line (and therefore the volatility is low – since the line is straight) you can statistically assume that that trend will continue for a little longer. How longer though it is hard to tell. That is when you have to research the details of that company and perhaps identify the driving forces behind it.

In other words, StockWiz can identify possible suspects but it cannot be an effective (or optimal) trial-jury. For example, StockWiz a few months back identified for me NOKIA as being a company with a strong up trend. After looking into the company I could not find anything that was company-specific that could justify the strong daily increases. Well, it turns out that Nokia is a European company (that also trades in Europe) and because the US dollar was going down every day, the price for Nokia in the US was being adjusted upwards to make up for the drop in the US dollar. In my mind, US investors saw that as a reinforcement of the trend and bid the company even higher. Finally, the whole US market got the hiccups from the housing melt-down and Nokia (among many other companies) got very volatile and no longer was in a clear trend. I sold at a good profit since the original reason I got in (the strong trend) was no longer there.

So, I guess StockWiz could produce a daily list with companies experiencing a strong up trend (the BUY signals) and another list with companies previously mentioned that no longer have a strong trend (the SELL signals).

But now we are deep into producing the documentation for StockWiz 5 so this will have to wait. Perhaps in a month’s time or so.

Steve Kalhas
StockWiz.com