Each morning I check foreign markets and DOW futures and ...

>And try to predict the opening machinations of your favourtie stocks, right?
Yes, something like that.

I figure if my stock opens UP by, say 1%, then it's on a roll and might go even higher. I check to see how often this happened in the past and whether I might expect another 1% rise.     For example, take a look at Figure 1. It's the stock price over the past 2 years. >I wouldn't touch that stock with a ten foot pole! Yes, but check this out: GCE.TO opened UP by (at least) 1%, 37% of the time. That's quite often, eh? In 83% of those cases, it continued to increase (to the daily High) by another 1% (at least). In fact, the average increase (to the High) was 4.7%.

Figure 1

Okay, suppose we had bought the stock every time it opened UP by at least 1%. In fact, we bought at the Opening price. Then we sold it later in the day ... praying it would increase by at least another 1%, from the Open. If it didn't rise to the occasion, we'd sell it at 1% below the Open. Then ... >Then you'd have lost your shirt! Check out Figure 2. Though the stock prices dropped 13.5%, our strategy would have made us 198%. >But 185 trades? What about trading fees? We've assumed a fee of $10 every time we bought or sold.

Figure 2

>So, it's guaranteed?
Hardly. We'd want a stock where opening UP by 1% happens frequently and, in a large percentage of those times, it continues to go UP.
Here are some not-so-happy examples of this ritual:
 

Here's the spreadsheet:

>So, a couple of examples is some kind of proof of efficacy? Here's what would have happened had we applied the ritual to the DOW stocks: >I assume you've made a bundle using this ritual, right? Of course! I always make a bundle when I trade retroactively ... using historical data. For real trades, I use this: