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VectorVest

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Dave S
Guest
Dave S
July 25, 2009 2:03 pm

I have used VV for over two years and have decided to cancel my subscription. At first, I tried running through their strategies to find the best ones for the market conditions. That became a very time consuming process. I did get some positive results initially, and should have taken my profits and run but didn’t because VV kept me in. I ended my first year with a 30% loss. I started the second year again with some positive results but stayed in too long again because VV kept rating my choices as a “buy” or “neutral” never a “sell”.

I finally went to cash long before the market crashed but did not get any advise to do so from VV. Again, I lost 30% but got out before things got worse. I would have had a 50% loss if I stayed in. I look at VV every night and still missed the March turnaround. I’m tired of spending $59 each month and losing money.

Finally, I don’t like the idea of having to buy add-ons to get the full use of the system. Every time you look they are trying to sell you something and I’m sick of it.

Randy
Member
Randy
September 8, 2009 3:50 am

I have been an active investor for 15 years, and after getting burned with the sell-offs of 2000 and 2008, decided I had to DO SOMETHING to protect from market crashes, so VV got my attention with their market calls of up and down markets. This is a Market Timing system. Their track record is quite good, and I would have a lot more money right now if I had been a subscriber and taken their advice a year ago. The system has a lot of data, a lot of scans for potential stocks to buy. The KEY is to watch all their videos in VectorVest University, listen to Dr. DiLiddo’s training videos, and read their market analysis that is published every night. Since I started in February 2009, my account is up 60%. I could not have done this without VV. I also subscribe to other newsletters, but VV is much more useful for finding stocks that will make money as a swing trader. Note that VV standard is an end-of-day system. They have a new RealTime version which looks slick, but I am not a day-trader, so haven’t subscribed to RealTime. The ProTrader add-on to the standard EOD service to get the better graphs with technical indicators is worth the money.

Tim
Guest
Tim
September 13, 2009 5:23 pm

I think VectorVest’s marketing machine makes them look less credible than they really are. I guess that’s what sells, otherwise they wouldn’t do it, but I think the system is pretty solid. Much like the previous poster, I’m a computer programmer. Unlike that poster, however, I have not had their software crash on me yet, so… Anyway regarding their timing system, put simply, they’ve “never missed a call” because their core timing system tells you the direction the market is already going, not what it’s going to do. Obvously nobody can predict the future with 100% accuracy… except maybe me, given some of my recent stock picks 🙂 All they’re saying is that, given a certain set of proprietary parameters, they believe the market is more likely to continue in it’s current direction that to reverse course. Being a programmer, I’ve done the math, and I found their “confirmed” timing calls to be right more than they’re wrong, but sometimes the market moves against me when I follow them. It’s the magnitude of the moves when they are right that makes it worth it though. When they’re right, they’re really right. When they’re wrong, it hasn’t moved against me by much

Anyway, aside from timing, what makes the system great is that it has most of the important information you want to know about stocks in a spreadsheet format, which allows you to screen for things that you’re interested in. When I’m looking for long positions, for instance, I like to find companies that are growing their earnings and growing their dividends (among other things), and it lets me do that. If my theory is that small caps are going to outperform during a market recovery, while large caps are going to outperform once a bull market has taken hold, I can screen for that. In fact, in the 2 or so years that I’ve used the service, I’ve probably spent like 2 hours a weekend, every weekend, constructing and back testing my theories to see what’s going to work for me. The more I learn, the more my returns improve. I like their recommended searches, by they need to be more actively managed. My searches give me stocks that I can hold for longer periods of time…

So, my answer to those who think the system is a bunch of hype is, don’t believe in the system. Believe in yourself. The system is just a tool. If you’re good at investing, you’re going to do well. If you’ve got a head full of the wrong ideas, unless someone talks you out of them, you’re going to do poorly.

One final note. Though the interface to the system is very easy, the depth of it really sucks you in. If you sign up, and you have an open mind, basically, digging in is going to become your new hobby, so you better make sure you have the time!

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rgsanfran
rgsanfran
September 19, 2009 1:08 pm

I have an MBA from Wharton and am a retired mutual fund
manager.

This site is so bad the SEC should look at it.

He makes his record on buying 25 cent stocks that go to 35 cents. You can not buy them as they hardly trade.

His intellectual problem is that he covers 8300+ stocks. In the real world there are 3000 that are of size and really traded. Think of the Russell 1000 and Russell 2000 = 3000.
Or the S&P 500,400,600 = 1500. Lots of stocks in the bottom
of the Russell 2000 have very thin trading.

Then he has these 49 strategies with weird names. Which to use
next.

He is a nice old man with a PhD in Chemistry, not Finance or
Economics.

Save your money. Do not sign up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Billy Jack
Guest
Billy Jack
September 27, 2009 4:27 pm

I have been using VectorVest for about eighteen months and am very satisfied. I was a “virgin” when it came to investing although I gained a good feel for finance based on my professional career prior to retiring.

VectorVest is not for the person who expects that making money in the stock market using VectorVest is a given. It requires an education process and gaining trust in the VectorVest system to be successful. There is a host of educational tools available that I read religiously and go back to occasionally for review. The identified strategies are of value to select stocks; long or short but one needs to watch the market to invest for gains or limit ones losses is a changing market.

I have taken advantage of their training; including the one-on-one consulting. For example, I am using RealTime and after purchasing ProTrader and gaining experience, I took one hour of their individual training. Ninety-five dollars may seem expensive at first blush but it has become one of my key evaluation tools and was well worth the time and money.

I trade quite often at times; multi-trades per day but then may let my portfolio ride for a time in certain markets. I am currently “getting educated” in the options market and expect to start option trading to protect my portolio in addition to option trading.

There may be better systems out there but I am totally satisfied with VectorVest with a portfolio that the IRS is going to be happy with come year end. But one needs to “pay the piper”.

Unless one is dedicated to investing, I suggest that one put your money in other investments. Success with VectorVest is similar to a career; you get out of it what you put in. Don’t get involved unless you expect to use the tools; it would be a waste of time.

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JoeInvestorly
Guest
JoeInvestorly
October 11, 2009 1:28 pm

There seems to be quite a bit of confusion about what VectorVest is. I see people posting that they don’t like the VectorVest “recommendations” for various reasons like that they’re sometimes Micro Caps or too volatile. Fine. You have your investment strategy. Other people have theirs. But don’t discount the entire system based on the fact that you don’t like some of the stocks found by some of the strategies. There are hundreds of strategies, each different. The system is designed to construct strategies or algorithms that make use of the financial data that’s available. That’s what it does. The recommended “strategies” are nothing more than an analysis of what’s currently yielding the highest returns in the short term. If you’re a short term investor, that’s great. But what if you’re a long term investor? Well, we all know that you’re not expecting huge pops in your investments in the short term, because you’re picking stocks that are less volatile and that have consistent earnings. There are VectorVest strategies for the long term investor as well…very good ones, in fact. But they’re not going to come to the top of the “recommended” list, because at any given time, they’re not going to be yielding the biggest short-term gains. There is, however, nothing in the VectorVest system that will keep you, as the user, from back testing the long term strategies over whatever your investment timeframe is, or from constructing your own strategies, and back testing those. That’s what I do, and it’s worked great. I’m a value investor, and when I search for companies that are undervalued, growing their earnings, increasing their dividends, etc, I find exactly what I’m looking for. After that, it’s up to me to pick what I think will work. So, to discount the entire system based on the fact that you don’t like some of the strategies that are working for the short term, is basically to discount your ability to construct or use strategies that will provide consistent, market beating returns over the long term. If you have no faith in your own abilities, then don’t subscribe. Just buy index funds and be done with it. If you have ideas that you think are going to work, then sign up for the semi-free trial they offer, and start back testing those ideas. If they work for you, use them.

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JoeInvestorly
Member
JoeInvestorly
October 11, 2009 1:30 pm


There seems to be quite a bit of confusion about what VectorVest is. I see people posting that they don’t like the VectorVest “recommendations” for various reasons like that they’re sometimes Micro Caps or too volatile. Fine. You have your investment strategy. Other people have theirs. But don’t discount the entire system based on the fact that you don’t like some of the stocks found by some of the strategies. There are hundreds of strategies, each different. The system is designed to construct strategies or algorithms that make use of the financial data that’s available. That’s what it does. The recommended “strategies” are nothing more than an analysis of what’s currently yielding the highest returns in the short term. If you’re a short term investor, that’s great. But what if you’re a long term investor? Well, we all know that you’re not expecting huge pops in your investments in the short term, because you’re picking stocks that are less volatile and that have consistent earnings. There are VectorVest strategies for the long term investor as well…very good ones, in fact. But they’re not going to come to the top of the “recommended” list, because at any given time, they’re not going to be yielding the biggest short-term gains. There is, however, nothing in the VectorVest system that will keep you, as the user, from back testing the long term strategies over whatever your investment timeframe is, or from constructing your own strategies, and back testing those. That’s what I do, and it’s worked great. I’m a value investor, and when I search for companies that are undervalued, growing their earnings, increasing their dividends, etc, I find exactly what I’m looking for. After that, it’s up to me to pick what I think will work. So, to discount the entire system based on the fact that you don’t like some of the strategies that are working for the short term, is basically to discount your ability to construct or use strategies that will provide consistent, market beating returns over the long term. If you have no faith in your own abilities, then don’t subscribe. Just buy index funds and be done with it. If you have ideas that you think are going to work, then sign up for the semi-free trial they offer, and start back testing those ideas. If they work for you, use them.

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Al
Guest
Al
October 18, 2009 1:52 am

I first used VVest years ago in early 2006, and by mid 2006, the market had performed -0.6%, year to date, in other words, massive sideways movement for 6 months. Quite the opposite of the current 7 month rally which has only gone in 1 direction, up, and which is the best rally the market has had since, you guessed it, the 1930’s Great Depression.

Needless to say, I started using VVEst at the “wrong time” and lost plenty of money, percent wise, altough in absolute terms not much since I was still testing it. Ended up using it for a few months but never went back to it. All during that time, the VVest massive marketing machine will try to entice you back so I was kept abreast of their latest performance and have confirmed it with their published market calls. But, we’re talking about a rally the likes of which was last seen by people who are now mostly dead…

Keep in mind the above, and I recemmend instead Elliotwave.com b/c only their approach will warn you of upcoming trend “personalities” where you have the odds favoring the “let the winners run” concept.

The market only trends about 30% of the time, and it only trends as powerfully as it has since the March 2009 lows every 70-80 years so… Expect VVest to only dissappoint you in future. If however, you are still determined to make the best of it, from my experience the best long term approach is to forget about stocks and any of their strategies but instead focus on using market index ETF’s with their market up calls. Use inverse ETF’s with their market down calls. Unless this once in 80 years March 2009 rally keeps going, you will not have the results to give you the fortitude to stick with VVest b/c the drawdowns, using stocks, will be HUGE, as is normally the case under most market conditions.

But, if you are willing to stick with market index ETF’s, and experience greater percent accuracy as a result, you will gain the confidence to likely stick with VVest long enough for it to prove of benefit.

I also recommend Elliotwave.com as a good substitute to VVest market calls. EW gives you the context of the whole market for the last 5 to 10 to 300 years of capitalism, if you are inclined to review it that far; it also provides a context of market trend “personlities” which proved invaluable in characterizing the March 2009 rally as the type to “let the winners run for the roses” type of rally.

However, to be fair to readers, EW is by their own admission, not a trading system, so don’t expect specific entry or exit calls unless you also subscrbe to the FF Short Term Update which is updated 3 times a week. Even here though, you get a market call infrequently for some of the minor market trends.

In summary, EW will try to identify the upcoming, yes forecast, major market trend, which can last from months to a few years, and as time passes their monthly publications will update the major trend while FF STU will do as well plus provide opportunities to trade the minor trends within the major trend.

I repeat though, don’t use stocks, stick with market index ETFs and if you are more experienced you can use leveraged ETF’s like QLD for QQQQ or inverse QID for shorting the QQQQ’s.

Personally, I use short term options and longer term options strategies like directional Butterflies and directional Timespreads along with simple spreads like Bull Call Spreads etc. Using options alongside EW and a trading system will yield the greatest results in the shortest time. To be honest, it has taken me 9 years to get to this point but I didn’t have someone lay it out to me the way I am doing now so recognize that my advice is uncommon and to start, stick with market index ETF’s. Good luck to all.

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HoustonJack
HoustonJack
November 14, 2009 11:13 am

I have been trying to make money with Vectorvest since May, 2009. They typically report annual gains of 40-60%. Their portfolio is up about 88% on the year, but nearly all of that came in the big move up in March/April. They have gone from being up about 140%(?) to a current 88%. Since I started following their recommendations they are down substantially.

I believe that prior to May, they were in fact, moving the market with their legion of subscribers. They tended to pick relatively small cap stocks with low volume. With so many subscribers, the recommended stocks took off like rockets, so the game was to be sure to get in minutes to hours earlier than the majority of the followers.

Since I started following their recommendations, they have been much less specific about which actual stocks to purchase. They will offer 5 strategies with a total of 50 stocks, and only after they invest will they reveal which of the strategies they used. They have also increased the volume requirement on the stocks they select. Since they have lost about 40% of the portfolio’s value since I started following them, I have a very strong suspicion that all of their great gains in the past have been through making their own market.

Currently, I am getting whipsawed on almost every trade I make following their recommendations. They typically won’t enter the market until it has made a strong upward move, so they get in at the top of a short-term high, then get whipsawed by a 10% stop-loss. Generally as soon as they get stopped out, the market moves back to their original entry point and then proceeds to move even higher, which means that I totally miss out on the move. They do this on both long and short strategies, so you usually end up getting double-whipsawed. Very frustrating!!

I don’t know what else to say at this point. I look at their historical returns, which motivates me to keep trying to make money with them. I keep hoping to stay in the game long enough to catch a major move which will make up for all of my losses. In the meantime, the market keeps going up and my portfolio keeps going down. Definition of insanity: to keep doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results.

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GKN08215
Member
GKN08215
November 14, 2009 11:33 am

I’ve owned VV for a couple of years now and in the last few months I have been thinking of cancelling since I been burnt a couple of times. I follow their suggestions twice and lost money both times. I think their overall educational value and market interpretation is good but in the end I was looking for good stocks to buy and I just dont think I’m getting that here. This is a pretty expensive service to not be totally happy with so I will cancel Monday.

Tim
Guest
Tim
January 10, 2010 7:50 am

I invested in this service about a year ago, looking for something cheaper than a 100k a year subscription to Compustat or a 15k a year subscription to ValueLine’s historical database. As a retail investor, I have no justification to spend that amount of money on research.

What I wanted was reliable data, and even though the data was incomplete (seriously, guys, no ebit, no book value, be serious), I at least depended on the service to provide reliable data.

It doesn’t — for a simple reason: when a company goes bankrupt it is deleted from the historical data. FAILURES NEVER EXISTED.

You could build almost any strategy that “works” in backtesting if the failures are eliminated.

After discussing this with customer support, I got nowhere. All I asked for was a toggle for serious backtesters to include 100% loss companies. After building a system on this service that garners exceptional returns in backtesting, I ran a live test in real time since the March lows in parallel to my own moneyed portfolio.

The VectorVest backtest designed system lost money since the March lows. It LOST money. I didn’t lose money, because I didn’t use it.

But I would have used it had I not suspected survivor bias.

Imagine a gambling “system” — you always bet pass on craps and double your bet when you lose. If I eliminate all the gamblers to when bankrupt with this system, I’ll “show” you a winning system.

But don’t dare use it.

To be fair, VectorVest is a total concept series of systems based on relatively sound marketing ideas. An investor SHOULD track fundamental data as well as technical data, and should exercise reasonable stops. All of this is sound, and I would recommend this site will 5 stars all the way across if they used real data.

But eliminating bankrupt companies is not merely faulty data, it is FALSIFIED data. Backtest systems will skew toward success because of survivorship bias. Users will be lulled into thinking they can make money with their ideas, when they will lose — or gain far less than they expect.

VectorVest needs a warning for existing data, and needs to add a toggle that includes non-falsified historical data for serious retail investors who want to experiment.

This is an easy fix. The only reason not to fix it would be to keep current subscribers who want a false sense of security.

That, my friends, is malpractice.

If you want historical information on existing companies, this site is very useful. If you want a graphical representation of some simple fundamental relationships to technical movements, this site is very useful. Because of this, I am continuing to use this service and will recommend it to someone who is NOT interested in backtesting.

But we retail investors still have no useful tool for designing systems meant for real world investing. Sorry.

Tim

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Martin
Guest
Martin
February 17, 2010 9:45 pm

I have been a subscriber to VectorVest for several years.

Here is how I would summarize it.

-Fairly easy to use – tried 3 other packages and decided VectorVest was the easiest and I only wanted to learn 1 system.

-Very educational and excellent customer service — if you have questions on the software or a strategy they have very good people to help answer your questions. They also put on very good seminars for a reasonable price, all around the country. And every week have a strategy that is online as well as many educational / how-to lessons, all online.

-The ability to backtest strategies is a big plus but no experienced user ever believes the results will be the same in the future as they were in the past — I use the backtests to compare strategies and whichever one gets the best results then that is the one I use — I don’t expect to get the same results going forward because the market is never the same — but I know I am using a good strategy (compared to the others I was testing or considering).

-Their Yahoo user group is excellent — lots of good investors post ideas and strategies they use.

-Their local user groups are also good, but vary by location and the amount of effort the members want to put into the meetings.

If anyone thinks there is an easy system that will make money with little or no effort, good luck in finding it — just read all the reviews on this site — lots of scams, misrepresentations and outright lies — IF you put in the effort you can make money with VectorVest, I do and I know several people that do — and I also know far more that didn’t want to commit the time or effort to it and have given it up and either moved to something else or just quit trading.

willy
willy
May 28, 2010 8:53 pm

I use Vector Vest. They don’t tell you what to pick. The mix the technicals and calculate value along with trend confirmations (Bear or Bullish). If you trade with the trend and use your stop losses you will make money. I have but not 300% per year. Try is out. 5 weeks free trial is a good deal.

blackjack
blackjack
August 10, 2010 10:16 pm

So far I like it
however i deal on the Australian AX and it annoys me that I get Fridays info and its Monday in Australia. So theres no update across the weekend and OZ markets open for 12 hours before i ge data and so I need to cross check with the ASX to see prices.
This simple to fix problem may prove costly one day.

Fix it Vector Vest please

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blackjack
blackjack
August 22, 2010 12:56 am

update on VECTORVEST
regarding the 12 plus hours lag time in AUstralia

well it happened when CDU a mining co made its stock exchange announcement that plunged its share price 55% in a few hours

Vector vest had it still rated as a buy and when the databased refreshed itself 12 plus hours later it was listed as a sell

NOT GOOD enough me thinks

come on VV if your selling a product with a flaw like this fix it

yesterday

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Lloyd
Guest
Lloyd
August 23, 2010 8:01 am

I have been a subscriber to VectorVest for about 5 years. Since I live in Canada, my subscription includes both the Canadian and US markets, on linked sites.

I found that there was a fairly steep learning curve to learn how to make best use of the product, but there is basic training available on the “University” link. One needs to learn the definition of the propriety indicators that VectorVest uses. Back testing can be done by sorting stocks by any indicator over a number of periods to check for consistency of the results. In constructing searches, what you are really doing is eliminating stocks that do not meet your specific investment criteria, such as stocks trading less than $1.00, or average volume less than 50,000 shares, or whatever. What’s really important is the criteria that is used to sort the basket of stocks that are found using the search. Particular attention needs to be made to the definition of their “BUY”, “SELL” & “HOLD” recommendations, as their system does not mean the same thing as a buy recommendation from any other source. Since there are so many searches available in the product, it is so overwhelming, that I usually construct my own searches.

Quite often, the stocks selected by a VectorVest search will contradict with recommendations made in newsletters issued by my broker.

VectorVest seems to be slow in updating cuts to dividends, so it is always best to check a second source to verify the dividends being paid by any company. In Canada, the company is also not great at assigning stocks to the correct industry or sector.

I find that a good way to test your own impression of the indicators is to find a stock that you would like to have purchased at some specific time in the past. Call up a graph of it and click on that date and observe the propriety indicators. This may help you determine how you could have used VectorVest to have found that stock on that specific date. You can use this method to construct your own searches.

The basic version of VectorVest is now version 7, which is available with a 15-minute delayed data system, or for a higher subscription price, it is available in a real-time version, but for the US only. For Canada, and likely other countries, it is still an end-of-day system.

My conclusion is that VectorVest can be used as one tool in your war chest, but scan results need to be back tested and/or confirmed by other sources. Their market timing indicators have some merit.

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Fred D
Guest
Fred D
August 25, 2010 3:34 pm

VV is a huge ripoff. It creates a false sense of security. Its a joke and its way over priced. Avoid them like the plague or you will be sorry.

S.R.H.
Guest
S.R.H.
September 14, 2010 10:24 pm

I have had much more success by simply using moving average crossovers than VV’s recommendations. I agree with other reviewers that the back testing success they claim are hand picked. They never show failed back tests. I used their service for over two years and found it to be rather inferior. I cannot recommend them.

john white
Guest
December 10, 2010 8:12 pm

I tried the 5 week trial, and now began a subscription. My stocks, 2, have returned about 20% in less than a month, but this happened in an unusual way, which I gather from reading the above critiques, will be par. I chose stocks VV were hyping in their ads (ads are free). I watched the stocks in realtime watchlists for a few days. Good move. One of the winners (high VST) crashed about 2.50 in 2 days. I bawt. I’m now up nicely. But I did my usual thing, watched, waited, jumped. I jumped too soon, and bawt more going down I knew the overall trend of the market was up–and a winner is a winner sooner than later. I didn’t really need VV to tell me that. In fact VV had a yellow alert in the “color guard”, and advised “prudent investors against buying stocks. Next day the market rose about 250 points … So, summing, I think VV is a class act, with excellent intentions, but you have to use this tool along with other tools and your own skills to benefit.

ed m
Member
ed m
December 18, 2010 7:29 pm

I gave this method a fair trial. There are so many different systems you will never know which if any works at any moment in time.

Their ads are very misleading. They claim they never missed a major market turn. I don’t believe it and the bullish or bearish sentiment can change on a daily basis so how do you know if it is a major turn.

I gave it a thorough test and could not make any money and lost money. The price used to be reasonable now they got greedy and the price is outrageous.
I could not make money with this.

I would advise that no one even sign up for a free trial as thell will rope you in so you won’t get any refund even if you hate the system.

End of story

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