Mar

11

Mass Psychology Introduction

Posted In: Investing Tips

Is an old phenomenon but one that has only been brought to light recently. It is something that is encoded in all beings, we tend to feel comfortable doing things together. One can even see this in other animals, a flock of birds a herd of beasts, a shoal of fish etc they all seem to follow a leader.

In essence mass psychology is nothing but group behaviour, where by the masses feel comfortable doing something simply because they are able to draw comfort from the fact that there are many others like themselves doing the same thing.

The way to profit from this phenomenon is to do something that is contrary to our upbringing and most of our cultures and that is to resist the herd mentality and try to be a leader. In any crowd, or group behaviour situation, the ones that lead are the ones that draw all the benefits, while the ones that follow blindly are the ones that take all the risks. This is very clearly illustrated in the stock market. Lets take the internet era of the 1990’s.

The leaders who had vision knew immediately that this was something that would revolutionize the way information was transmitted and the way the consumer would finally move from the passenger seat to the drivers seat. They took positions in these stocks as early as 1994 to early 1995, with the majority taking stakes in 1996, the masses only began to awaken to this phenomenon in mid to late 1998, by 1999 there was a feeding frenzy as everyone simply piled in.

The leaders were alarmed at this behaviour, as they should have been, since this frenzy was not sustainable. Knowing that the end was near they started to sell by the end of 1999 and move their assets into cash and bonds, while the feeding frenzy continued. In march 2000, we started to correct by the end of the year the main up trend line was violated and the market was ready to crash. By 2002 the market had lost more than 70% of its value and many of the masses who had momentarily tasted wealth were reduced to a state of a poverty that they could not have envisioned a few months back.

1) The leaders represent less than 2% of the population yet take in more than 90% of the profits. Getting to this stage is not easy as it involves changing ones ingrained modes of.

2) You have to learn that whenever something is popular the end is very near

3) That the time to take a position or start something new is when it is viewed with extreme negativity and disdain.

4) You have to learn how to fight the fear of selling out to fast after taking a position, remember it won’t just go up., most likely it could even go down a bit more or move sideways for months or even a year. The one area you can draw comfort from is this , the longer the sideways action the more powerful the upward move will be when it finally transpires.

5) Keep extra money to take additional positions.

6) In all likelihood you will have a 50-100% retrenchment in the first stage of the bull market, meaning that your shares could double only to fall back to the original value you purchased them at. This is usually known as the shake out stage, whereby the weak hands are forced out of their positions and end up selling at rock bottom prices. Hold and the rewards are extremely huge

7) When the investment suddenly becomes popular be on guard and perform simple trend analysis on all your holdings, once the super main up trend. Wait patiently for the next opportunity to show up, there is always another opportunity.

This is meant to be a brief introduction into the very esoteric but highly rewarding field of Mass psychology, to do an in depth analysis would take months. When one combines Mass psychology with Technical analysis you truly have a very potent weapon that can be used very effectively to position oneself in the right investments and consistently be on the right side of the market.

The term contrarian investing was most likely derived from the study of mass psychology as it basically means taking a position that is completely at odds with the masses.

With that in mind, mass psychology has once more provided a new opportunity in the financial markets for the astute individual willing to take an early position and wait. The sector that is going to explode in the next few years and which has already seen very nice gains will be the commodity sector, which will be spear headed by Gold and Silver.

Click on the following link for a more in depth look the coming silver and gold raging bull market . As they say a picture is worth a 1000 words. Be sure to read the section on why Gold Is the Ultimate Currency and why the powers to be fear Gold so much.

Now that you know the basics of how to profit by using Mass psychology to your benefit, make sure you also read the section on contrarian investing and one key factor which is important to all stock market traders and investors, portfolio management. Without portfolio management., even the most successful trader is doomed to fail.

Sol Palha is a self-taught market guru, having widely read conventional and non-conventional texts on all aspects of technical analysis and market timing.He has been studying the markets for over 16 years.

www.tacticalinvestor.com

Article Source: Mass Psychology Introduction