Technical Analysis is NOT What the Majority Thinks It Is
One of my favourite activities during my free time is sitting on the sofa and finding analyses on TradingView that resemble the one portrayed on the left-hand side of the illustration. My goal is to try deciphering what a given author is trying to convey to us, the audience. As you know, the more noise there is on the charts, the blurrier the picture becomes. The blurrier the picture, the more there is room for curiosity and discovery.
Over the years, I’ve become more convinced that less is more and that you don’t need to clutter your charts with an abundance of instruments while conducting a technical orchestration. In fact, most people have false expectations regarding how proper technical analysis should be conducted. Many think TA is all about lines and boxes when, in reality, it’s about understanding price behaviour and making educated guesses with pre-calculated risk. Therefore, the aim of this brief educational article is to contrast two types of traders – let’s call them Average Joe and Experienced Joe – and provide professional insights into how technical analysis really functions and should be practiced.
Let’s start by scrutinising the scenario on the left. The author has identified some critical regions, drawn a few lines, and highlighted a Fibonacci retracement level of importance. Then, they sketched a game plan using arrows to indicate how the price might behave next. What’s wrong with this approach? In short, everything. The longer answer: there’s a lack of necessary technical interpretation combined with unnecessary efforts. Although some analytical tools are present, they don’t offer any depth in terms of what the price behaviour might be orchestrating. Nor do most of these instruments serve any purpose when applied in a scattered manner.
Now, let’s analyse what Experienced Joe – the trader behind the right-hand side of the screen – has put together. He has identified key regions and utilised a few tools for mapping purposes. However, his primary focus is understanding price behaviour by interpreting movements on the weekly-timeframe chart. Since he has traded the same handful of financial securities for years, he is experienced in reading charts like a book and grasping the logic behind price action. After understanding what’s unfolding, the trader finalises his game plan and executes positions.
Comparing the two traders, we can see a significant difference between using technical instruments in abundance without comprehension, and using them in moderation with the real goal of understanding price behaviour. With that said, here is a 3-step guide on how to properly utilise technical analysis when studying a financial instrument and entering trade positions:
Step #1 - Read the chart like a book.
Where is the price potentially headed?
What has been happening recently?
What economic event caused the massive candle spike?
Does it look like the price is correcting a recent impulse?
Take a glance at the graph and try to understand the overall situation.
Step #2 - Highlight key zones and sketch a game plan.
This is a crucial level that the price has respected for a significant amount of time. Here, the price printed a liquidity grab, so I’ll mark that. The price is forming a reversal bottom, so I’m preparing to go long from here. The 0.84 region looks like a solid initial target.
Sketch a preliminary game plan based on your analysis and focus on execution.
Step #3 - Execute a trade position at pre-calculated risk (usually, 1-2%).
Set your entry.
Place your Stop Loss.
Execute the trade.
In conclusion, technical analysis is not just about drawing some lines and shapes. It’s time to change the stereotype and emphasise the real utility of technical analysis. After all, trading without trying to understand price dynamics—especially if you are a technical trader—is like blindly memorising driving rules without understanding their purpose. Of course, there’s no secret recipe that works 100% of the time, including technical analysis. However, by sticking to a consistent approach and being patient, we can aim toward achieving long-term profitability.
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