FAQ

What is this?

Improve My Trades is an online-video course. It's 10 chapters with about 40 hours of content.
It's designed to teach someone how to improve their psychology in trading/investing in the stock market.

Most people think that in order to "Improve My Trades", they have to tweak their trading method.
You could have the best trading method on the planet,
but if your psychology is not under control, you can't capitalize on that superior trading method.
You will get in your own way.

BMW claims to build the ultimate driving machine,
but they fail to mention one critically important detail:
In order to fully exploit the ultimate driving machine, you must be a skilled driver.

In order to excel at trading,
you MUST have your psychology under control, regardless of your trading method.

Want a preview of what's covered?
We have included hours and hours of course excerpts on this site...listen to them.
Find us on YouTube;
Find our podcast.

While listening, you get to determine:
1) If what is taught makes sense to you;
2) If you like the teaching style;
3) If this will help your results.

Bottom-line: see if it resonates with you.

What is the tuition?

The online course is $3,000;
this give you access to the materials for 36 months.
After that, there will be a $30 annual fee to continue to access the materials.

Some hear the tuition and say, "That's a bargain! "

Others hear the tuition and say, "That's a lot!"

Watch the excerpt at the bottom of the homepage -
We show you how to calculate the value of the materials for your personal situation.

Everybody will have a different value.

Do you guarantee results?

We can not guarantee results.

There are two reasons why:

1. I don't know what your issues are (and btw, neither do you, otherwise you'd already be at freedom)

and

2. I don't know if you'll do the work to change your behavior.

What I can promise is this:
The psych class WILL get you CLOSER to freedom.

Will it get you all the way to freedom?

I can't answer that - and neither can you...yet.

Having said, that, you have 30 days to review the materials.

Will you see improvement in 30 days?
I don't know.
I don't know what the issues are.....and I don't know if you'll do the work.

You have 30 days to review the materials.
If, within 30 days, you don't believe the content will get you closer to freedom, let us know and we will refund your tuition.

Wait, what - - Refund? Absolutely - 100% refund.

THAT should show you how strongly we believe in what we've put together.

The real question is....Will you put in the effort to achieve your trading goal?

The tuition seems high!

That’s good! I like hearing those words! After having taught over a thousand people to trade, I’ve learned to be concerned when someone tells me that it is NOT a hefty investment in their trading education. The vast majority of our best testimonials felt it was expensive when they first enrolled.

If this IS a hefty investment in your education, then you will value it more and you will try harder. I’m comfortable that you’ll get closer to the desired result because this investment is sizable to you.

Realistically, IS the tuition high?

Listen to the excerpt at the bottom of the home page where we show you how to calculate the impact on “your” results. Do the calculation for your situation; it’s an eye-opener for many.

Think about why you are trading - I’m assuming it is to reach time freedom. If this can move you closer to that goal, would it be worth it? Most people will say yes.

In my experience, the actual issue is not “expensive tuition”.
The issue is whether you believe the psychology class can get you closer to freedom.

I understand the feeling of hesitating and uncertainty.
In the past, you may have bought a trading class that didn't work.
You may have bought some trading-psychology books that you didn't keep your attention.
As a result, you are hesitant to try something else.
No one wants to get burned twice.

Here’s a different way to think about it:
I remember my first girlfriend in high school.
It didn’t end well, I got crushed.
Thought I could never go through that pain again.
Thankfully, I was willing to risk it again; I’ve now got a great wife and a great son as a result.

We can’t guarantee that you will reach time freedom by taking this course.
However, if you are willing to put in the effort, we believe that you’ll get closer to the goal of time freedom.

Try it for 30 days –
If you can’t see how it will help you, we’ll refund your tuition.
We’re not saying you’re going to get to freedom in 30 days, we’re saying that you’ll see how it can help you get closer.
We are 100% certain that it will help; if you disagree with our belief, we’ll refund your tuition.

Refer to the testimonials.
Some students are already at freedom.
The rest are closer to freedom as a result of this course.
If you’ll do the work, it would be unreasonable to think it can’t happen for you.

I'm too busy for the next few months

That’s false logic. You’re assuming that to succeed in trading, you need to wait until you are not busy in order to learn and improve your trading psychology.

There are 2 flaws to this logic.
One: this assumes you’ll never get busy again in your life, which is highly unlikely.
Two: If you start now (assuming you’re not busy now), you will stop when you get busy again.

Think back to your goal: Time Freedom.

If you truly want the goal, you need to learn how to do this when you ARE busy.
So, as odd as it sounds, a busy time is the best time to start.
When you can learn how to do it when you're busy and life seems hard, the rest of your life will be easy.

I don't have enough hours in the day

I used to think the same way;
When I was first learning to trade, I was crazy busy in a tech sales job;
I was pulled in 14 different directions; high pressure; big quota.
That was until someone pointed out to me where and how I could cut unimportant stuff.

In today’s world, people spend a couple hours most days on social media and on cell-phone games.
To this day, I can get bogged down with unimportant emails; spend too much time on the phone listening to people vent, etc. I’m much faster to recognize it now and am able to nip it quick.

We all have the same 24 hours in a day.
The world’s greatest investor, Warren Buffet has 24 hours in his day.
There are about 15 traders showcased in each of the Market Wizards books.
Each of them is legendary; they get phenomenal results.
Each of them has 24 hours in their day.
So, the issue isn’t time,
the issue is prioritizing.

If you feel you don’t have enough time, it’s because you are not managing your time well.
Simply cut out a good chunk of the time you spend that is not productive – not all of it, just a chunk of it.
You’ll be amazed at what you can find.

You’ve seen people with less time than you be successful in their career, or in better shape.
So, if it’s possible for them, it’s possible for you; you just need to have the right tools.

Lastly, if you truly are that busy every single day,
then you definitely need to spend time to get to Time Freedom,
you are missing out on life.

When I'm consistent in trading, then I will attend

That’s like saying, “When I’m healed, then I will go to the hospital.”
Or “When I’m in shape, then I will eat right and work out.”
The order is backward.

You go to the hospital, then you get healed.

You eat right and work out, then you get in shape.

Same thing here – You learn and manage your psychology, then you make consistent $ in the market.

Should I spend $$ on psychology tuition or something else?

Over the next 12 months, you’re going to spend the money.
Will it be spent on something that will improve you?

No matter what you decide to do,
you ARE going to pay for the lessons from this course.
The question is whether you are going to spend time and $$, or just $$.

As humans, we spend the thing that we value the least.

So, if you value your time more than the money,
then it’s much faster to pay to learn what someone else spent their time figuring out.

If you value the money more than your time,
then read the booklist;
given enough time, you can figure it out yourself.
However, if the average book cost $20, you’ll spend as much on the books as for the course.

Here’s another way to think about it:
If you don’t want to invest your $$ on tuition,
then you are saying you’ll spend $$ on “something else”.
Is the “something else” more important to you than reaching time freedom?
Keep your eye on the prize.

At the end of the day, both choices are risk-free;
Only one of them will get you closer to your goal of freedom.
So, if you have no risk with no upside,
or
no risk with potential upside,
which would you want to do?

Best case: you get the trading result you are looking for.

Worst case: you try it, and then believe that the course will not get you the result you want – you get a refund.

If you decide to do nothing, you are guaranteed to NOT get results.

At least with enrolling, you have a shot.

I'm not sure if this is for me

Short answer – not a problem.

Real answer: you are avoiding the problem!
You have 4 choices.
1) Enroll in this course. We believe your results will improve. We offer a money-back guarantee.
2) Do nothing. You'll get more of the same results that you're already not pleased with.
3) Find another trading psychology course. We looked, but couldn't find what we wanted - that's why we created this.
4) Figure it out on your own by reading a ton of books. We gave you the booklist; it's going to take years & years.

We want to see you make a decision;
We want you to succeed.

Longer answer: I recently heard this story, it makes a great point.
It’s about your new identity.
A guy was in Sephora (a make-up store) with his wife.
He sees 2 teenage girls buying make-up.
Saleswoman told the girls that now as they are entering womanhood, they need to plan for make-up (make regular purchases). With this new identity (womanhood) comes new priorities (buying makeup on a regular basis).

If your goal is to reach time freedom,
that means you identity is that of a consistently successful trader.

To become a consistently successful trader, trading psychology must be addressed.
It can't be avoided; it's a crucible; it has to be dealt with.
The longer you wait, the more costly it gets.
Waiting will cost you a lot more time;
waiting will also cost you a lot more money.
If this sounds like sales pressure, it is not.
What this sounds like...is the truth.

We vote with our $$ and our time on things we care about.
The goal is to achieve time freedom.
Look at where you spend your time and $$;
are you investing toward achieving your goal?

There is a "pain of change"
and there is a "pain of staying the same".
Based on observing thousands of traders,
People change only when the “pain of staying the same” is greater than the “pain of change”.

To put it bluntly:
You can continue to struggle with more of the same trading results for another few years, then revisit this class.

I need my spouse/partner's buy-in

When you say this, you are saying that another person (spouse, partner) controls you.
That is a victim statement.

If you don’t see yourself as a victim, think about it this way:

Does your spouse/partner approve of your current struggle?
The answer is likely no.

Then why would they be against something they don’t approve of?
Said differently, why would they want you to continue to struggle with your trading?

Reverse the roles.
If your spouse/partner is struggling with their trading,
and they found something that could help them,
would you be against it?

Then why would it be different for you?

Play this out – fast forward a few years:
A few years from now, you are still struggling with your trading.
You have not gotten closer to your trading goal.
All the while, do you blame them because they never let you enroll in the course?
Is that fair to them?
Is that fair to you?

You might have thought you were looking for permission.
The reality is that you are looking for support from your spouse/partner.

When you talk to your spouse/partner,
they are not going to say that they want you to continue to struggle in trading so that you never reach your goal.

What you actually fear is that this may not work for you.

And we have addressed that with a 100% refund policy.

I'm a smart person; I'm in control of my emotions; I don't believe my psychology affects me.

I've learned that a statement that people don't like hearing is:
"You do stupid things because of your psychology".

If you don't think this applies to you, because of your superior intellect,
here are 4 stories that will open your eyes.
It's a 5-minute read and well worth your time.

Long Term Capital Management (LTCM)
In February 1994, the most revered hedge fund in history up to that point, opened for business.
The fund’s mathematical trading method was extremely secretive.
In fact, the hedge fund's existence was secretive.
But, it was widely known that the fund’s partners included top traders and leading academics.

Amongst the fund’s stars were John Meriwether, one of the top traders on Wall Street at the time.
It also included Myron Scholes and Robert Merton.
Both are Nobel-Prize winning economists who were renowned both on Wall Street and in the academic community.

And yes, if you know options, Myron Scholes is the Scholes in the Black-Scholes options pricing model.

LTCM’s launch was the largest in history at that time.
The fund raised $1.25B of assets under management.
By 1998, on net-after-fee basis, $1 invested at fund inception compounded to $2.85.

Unfortunately, over time, LTCM’s mathematical genius couldn't sustain the consistent profit from prior years.
Other traders figured out LTCM’s strategy, piggybacking on their trades, and eroded LTCM’s profit.

The “smart” Nobel laureates, and mathematicians at LTCM started to apply their quant model in other markets;
they made certain assumptions which were largely incorrect.
For example: they assumed new market behaved like the old market.

This was just the start of LTCM’s downfall.
Gradually, the “smart” people at LTCM grew greedier, took larger risks through borrowing and leveraging.
After April 1998, LTCM experienced performance drawdown.
In the 5 months from April to September 1998, LTCM lost 90% of its assets and could not make margin calls.

Many large Wall Street banks loaned securities to LTCM on very small margin.
How severe was LTCM’s downfall?
LTCM’s collapse almost caused a meltdown of the global financial system.

Postmortem analysis by experts determined the root cause of the LTCM debacle was psychological.
After experiencing initial success, ego, arrogance, greed, and hubris impaired the fund partner’s decision making and communication.

The moral of the story:
In trading and investing, mathematical genius is no substitute for emotional intelligence (aka managing one’s psychology).

Harry Markowitz
You may have heard the phrase “modern portfolio theory” used by the financial industry. Harry Markowitz, an economist, won the Nobel Prize for this theory.

It's known as “asset allocation model”. In simple terms, Markowitz showed mathematically if one diversified a portfolio between stocks and bonds, one could theoretically obtain potentially more return with lower risk.

Years after winning the Nobel Prize based on his work on asset allocation, Markowitz shared he was thinking about how much he should allocate between stock and bond for his retirement portfolio. In his own words – “I should have computed the historical co-variance of the asset classes and drawn an efficiency frontier. Instead, I visualized my grief if the stock market went way up and I wasn’t in it, or if it went down and I was completely in. My intention was to minimize my future regret so I split my contributions 50/50 between bonds and equities.”

The morale of the story: Harry Markowitz won a Nobel Prize for the mathematical breakthrough of his work, yet he was incapable of applying it to his own portfolio because of emotion.

Sir Isaac Newton

If you took physics in high school or college, you heard the name Isaac Newton. Newton formulated the basic physics laws regarding motion and gravitation. He was one of the most influential scientists in history. He laid the ground work of classical, aka “Newtonian” physics.

By any measure, Newton is regarded as one of the most brilliant (aka “smart”) thinkers of his time. However, his brilliance did not immunize him from losing much of his wealth in the largest stock bubble of his time.

Like many in the British aristocracy in the early 1700s, Newton purchased shares of the South Seas Trading Company in 1720. The South Sea Trading Company was a legitimate, successful & profitable business. It had monopoly power over British trade with Spanish colonies in America; it also had monopoly power to convert British government annuities into long term debt.

Public enthusiasm grew, and a price bubble formed for the shares of the company. In mid-summer of 1720, Newton sold his shares of the company for a very healthy 7,000 pound profit.

After he sold his shares, Newton watched the stock price continue to rise. Newton decided to buy back in at a higher price (yes, this is FOMO...aka greed)

History buffs know how it ended. Just like the 2000 internet bubble and the 2007-2008 financial crisis, Newton remained invested as the stock experienced a horrendous price decline. When it was all said and done, Newton lost 20,000 pound of his personal fortune.

Newton famously stated “I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people”.
His greed, or fear of missing out, resulted in a devastating loss for him.

Being “smart” did not save him.

Benjamin Graham
Benjamin Graham is called the father of value investing;
He taught Warren Buffett.
Graham, when asked what it takes to be a successful investor, said,
“People don’t need extraordinary insight or intelligence.
What they need most is the character to adopt simple rules and stick to them”

We cover a concept called blind spot bias in the psychology course.
It’s a systematic error in thinking that we all have.
Briefly, we can easily spot the “flaws” in thinking by others,
but when it comes to our own thinking, we are blind to it.

What’s worse is that the better you are in math, the larger this bias is.
It's evident throughout history, including our stories of Issac Newton and Nobel Prize winners in economics.

I need to think about it

When you tell yourself, “I need to think about it.”,

that’s like saying, ”I am going to avoid making a decision” because of the fear of making a mistake.

What you’re saying is you want to give up the power of making a decision (a victim),

that way, if it doesn’t work, you can blame someone or something else.

The Latin root of “decide” means “to cut off”.

So, the question to ask yourself is:

Which future are you going to be cutting off?

One future is to make no change and continue with "more of the same".

or

Another future is to make a change and move closer to the future of everything you said you wanted.

Which future are you cutting off?

If you say you need time to think about it, that’s not true.

You actually need information.

So, ask yourself,

“What are the criteria in terms of how you make decisions?”

Most people have no idea how to answer that.

The reality is that you just need to be able to make an informed decision on whether or not to enroll.

However, how can you make an informed decision without doing it?

The correct way to think about it is to get started.

In 30 days, if you don’t think this has what you need, let us know, we’ll refund your tuition.

You'll then know that you made an informed decision,

rather than the one in your mind in terms of what you’ve read, or what you think it is.

The real question to ask yourself,

“Will this course get me closer to what I want?”

Alternatively,
you could do nothing.

Will you get closer to what you want if you do nothing?

We firmly believe this will help you get closer, assuming you are willing to do the work.

There is zero doubt in our minds.

FAQ