What services do you provide?
We provide the Retirement Savings Plan and the Aggressive Trading Plan. The Retirement Savings Plan is a long-term trend timing system that can be used with a 401k, Roth IRA or taxable account. The Aggressive Trading Plan is a short-term plan which offers the subscriber the opportunity to generate returns daily using E-mini futures.
What is the Retirement Savings Plan?
The Retirement Savings Plan produces signals approximately three to five times per year that tells subscribers to buy, sell or go to cash. Additionally, every week subscribers to this plan will get a Weekly Report which covers our current assessment of the market and current performance data.
What is the Aggressive Trading Plan (Turn Key Plan)?
The Turn Key Plan is an aggressive trading plan that allows our subscribers to make large returns quickly by trading futures. Everyday we compute price levels at which we suggest subscribers buy or sell E-mini futures. Every week, subscribers to this plan get a Weekly Report and performance data. This plan can be used daily and can generate great returns. To see the performance of this system, go to our Aggressive Trading Plan page.
Why should I use your service instead of just buying and holding an index?
The market is fraught with peril, and trend timing is a great way to preserve and grow your wealth. In the last 10 years, there have been two major bubbles and two recessions. A Buy and Hold strategy using the NASDAQ-100 index fund from January 3rd, 2000 to August 28th, 2009 lost 55.46%. However, our Long/Cash Unleveraged plan gained 530% over the same time period. This result could have been obtained with a 401k or Roth IRA. Our best plan, the Long/Short Leveraged Plan, gained 20,553% over that time period. The Retirement Savings Plan does not just generate returns above the market but also preserves wealth that is decimated with a Buy and Hold strategy. Our system has beaten the market over any 5 year time period since 1996.
Is your performance verified by an independent third party?
We launched our website in January 2008 and since then have been tracked by an independent third party website called TimerTrac. If you are a TimerTrac subscriber, then you know that we rank among the top trend timers that they follow.
What differentiates you from other Trend Timers?
Many market timing systems create a model using technical indicators such volatility, relative strength and moving averages, then modify the parameters of their model until it is optimized with respect to historical data. The trend timer can then look at his past performance and say that his results are great, even though his model was optimized for that data. The model may then even work for several months or years and then lose its efficacy, leaving the model's subscribers no better off than if they had just bought and held an index. The cycle repeats itself, as the trend timer may then fit his system to the new data and declare that his model now "works". Of course, the model may still fail, as the timer hasn't actually gained any insight into the market, but has just fitted his parameters to the old data. Our model is different in that we designed our own technical indicators and have not overfitted our model to old data. We started with a theory of how markets work, translated that theory into a mathematical model, made some minor changes, and left it alone. Our system has not changed since 1996 and works in all market conditions. Our model does not generate a plethora of signals and will not cause you to lose money chasing trends in the noise.
How long have you been in business?
We launched our website in January 2008. The design of our system began in 1976 and use of the system with our accounts began in 1996.
What is your background?
Strategic Trend Timing is the creation of two individuals, Fred Isabelle and Eric Verner. Fred is the Chief Analyst, the designer of our Trend Timing system, and the creator of most of the studies you will see on the website. He has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University and has done extensive coursework in Economics at the University of New Mexico. He was in the Navy from 1952 to 1960 and worked for IBM from 1959 to 1971. He has been working on technical analysis of the stock market since 1976. Eric is the Webmaster, responsible for the design, maintenance and some content of the website. He has a B.S. in Engineering from Harvey Mudd College and a M.S. in Electrical Engineering from USC. He worked for Raytheon Co. for 6 years as an electrical engineer, specializing in Analysis and Algorithm Development.
How do I get started?
Our How to Use page has an explanation of how to get started using our system.
I am a broker or institutional investor. Can I use your service for my clients?
Rates for professional investors are negotiable.
How are your signals generated?
Every day after the close of the market, prices from the NASDAQ-100 are entered into our system, which determines whether we should Buy, Sell or go to cash. Our system is proprietary, and we do not divulge any details as to how our model generates signals from market data.
Do your signals work on any other indices or mutual funds other than the NASDAQ-100?
The NASDAQ-100 is an index of one hundred of the largest non-financial companies in the NASDAQ. This index contains stocks from the Technology, Industrial, Transportation, Health Care and Service sectors. Because the NASDAQ-100 consists of so many technology companies, this index is a bellwether of the overall economy. Consequently, the signals we derive from the NASDAQ-100 can be used to time any market index or mutual fund. If you have questions on any specific fund in which you are invested, please contact us, and we will provide back-tested data which shows the performance of our system with the fund.
How do you notify your customers about new signals?
We notify our customers of new signals the day they are generated by email and on our Registered Subscribers' page. Our subscribers can also opt to receive a phone call each time a new signal is generated for a small fee.
Is your system complicated to use?
No, our system is not complicated to use. We provide comprehensive data on many indices that experienced investors can use. However, to use our system, one must simply follow the signals.
What is Diverse Strategies, Inc.?
Diverse Strategies is the parent company of Strategic Trend Timing.