Big Drawdowns Are Part Of The Game

Kim - this is random but this is the best way I could find to quickly let you know that Dan Zanger has another person who has recently been using his twitter account. The evidence is in an early August exchange - think it is August 12 - where he is challenged and he reveals it is not Dan Zanger tweeting but "his protégé." This person's style of bragging and salesmanship is a shame as it reflects poorly on the real Dan Zanger.  I figure if you did not know this you should be made aware as I saw a recent interaction you were having with him a week or so ago.  That said - I would encourage you to challenge him again and more or less force him to say straightforward that he is not the real Dan Zanger.  A lot of people in the trading world are getting pretty peeved at the stuff coming out of Zanger's twitter feed.

That's interesting. But if the real Dan lets "his protégé" to tweet and doesn't stop him, that means he is basically endorsing this style of shameless promotion. 

But my issue with his service was not his tweeting - it's the fact that he does not post a full track record, but only "top picks", and those top picks are based on the high value of the stock, without him giving a specific signal when to exit. Is anyone really able consistently to sell at the top, or even close? And no mentioning of the losers whatsoever.

I  can't disagree with anything you say.  I do not subscribe and would not subscribe to any of Zanger's services but I have followed his tweet feed for years and years because he definitely mentions fast-moving momentum stocks early in their moves and before other people.  Of course - as you said - he picks the winners and those moving well to mention in his twitter feed.  About 2 or 3 months ago I noticed a distinct change in the types of tweets he was sending and the fact there were many more tweets pushing his service and way too many mentions of his winners ad nauseam.  For example - Zanger did in fact mention ACIA in the 30's to buy it as well as REN in the 8's.  Okay - that's great - to his credit he has been picking winners for years - that's why I follow his stream.  The difference now is - whereas months ago Zanger might have mentioned these winners every now and then - the "new Zanger" has mentioned them hundreds of times in the past month to the point of ridiculousness.  I also -as you mentioned - don't understand why Zanger would let this guy - his chat moderator - tweet the way he does if he didn't implicitly approve of his tweeting style.  One explanation might be that Zanger is in bad health with a bad back and so he let this guy have free reign and doesn't have time to check it or care.  It is my understanding that Zanger did not hold a seminar this year because of his health - specifically, a very bad back.

Here is the problem: when you throw dozens of trading ideas, obviously some of them are going to perform well. But when you don't see all picks, you don't really know how good he is overall. IF he is so good as he says, why he publishes only "top picks" and not full track record? To me it's a huge red flag.

Also for someone who claims to make $42M, why he needs to sell a service for $99 per month? Especially considering his health issues that you mentioned?

Of course - he might answer by saying - how come Michael Jordan didn't just play for free after 3 years since he had enough money for the remainder of his life?  Of course - because he wanted to collect money for his abilities and he loved the game. That said - I agree with you that Zanger is among those traders who throws out a bunch of picks and then brags about those that stick. As I don't subsribe - I don't see the ones that don't stick - only those that he mentions on twitter that are doing well.  On another note - when I saw you interact with him I took interest because I respect your workable steady method and I remember years ago when you called out a number of options traders on Seeking Alpha - one in particular - I can't remember his name -  for following and recommending incredible risky options strategies thar more or less could leave someone in the poor house if they followed the strategies.

Yep. The guy you mentioned charges 10k for one week of mentoring, and GUARANTEES that you will make money following his methods. If I followed the marketing tricks of those charlatans who tell people how easy it is to trade options and double your account every month, I would be much richer today. But I cannot break my principles.  

I guess it boils down to the fact I am extremely disappointed with what Zanger's twitter has become and the fact he is coming across more or less as somewhat of a fraud with this new guy tweeting and bragging about his winners again and again and saying odd things. He definitely has instance after instance where he has identified strong movers and played them very well. He rode FB very well - loading big after its summer earnings report in 2013 in the 30's, clearly sold a whole bunch in the 50's a few months later, and then added more later and sold later on in the 70's. He did the same method with BABA during its big run from the 80's to the 120's, SHAK during its run, FIT during its run in the spring and summer of 2015, and many others.  Most recently - ACIA.  When GOOGL IPO'd, he more or less played it to perfection once it started to take off - similar to the FB example.  The guy does have a great method that he uses with momentum stocks and recent IPO's - it is just a shame that the person who is tweeting for him is making him look like a man who is a bragging salesman who is selling a pie in the sky service. 

The question is: does he tell members when to buy and sell in real time? Or it's all hindsight? Again, he might just throw bunch of ideas - and some of them, including those that you mentioned, stick, and become his flagship ideas.

Like this guy Bob Prechter from ElliottWave who made himself a pretty good name by correctly forecasting the 2008 market crash. What most people don't remember is the fact that Prechter's newsletter had been almost uninterruptedly bearish for the nearly two decades prior to 2008 -- and, as a result, according to the Hulbert Financial Digest, was near the bottom of the rankings for market timing performance over those two decades. 

To me, unless a service tells members exactly which stock to buy and sell and when and records those signals, then publishes ALL of them, it's very hard to know the real performance of the service.