| All the column headers in our Track Record reports
are explained below. The explanations are split into two categories:
Detail Data Table Columns and Summary
Table Columns. This information applies to the Track Record
summary table as well as the supporting
detail files available to our subscribers.
Detail Data Table Columns
pd_date
Positive Development Date – Positive Territory
works after the market closes and computes for action the next trading
day. pd_date is the date Positive Territory identified an issue
as a potential purchase.
Issues and suffixes
The issue (also known as a symbol) is the string of
characters assigned to differentiate one issue from another. We
don’t append dot-something to a symbol to show its exchange
(NYSE, NASDAQ, OTC, etc). We do append some other characters as
described below.
| -d |
Indicates that a dividend occurred for this
issue at some point while it was being held. The basis is
adjusted so the reported gain includes the dividend.
For example: DIA-dd
The 1999 Q2 Track Record includes this on pd_date 4/22/99.
The purchase date was 4/23/99 and the sale date was 7/6/99.
Between these two dates the Diamonds Trust (Series 1) issued
two dividends, $0.229 on 5/21/1999 and $0.117 on 6/18/1999.
The previous dividend of $0.15 was on 4/16/1999, before
we bought. The next dividend of $0.033 was on 7/16/1999,
after we sold.
|
-OLD |
Indicates an issue that traded under that symbol during
the time covered (ex: 1999 Q2) by the Track Record program,
but no longer trades under that symbol as of the time the
Track Record program was run (ex: January 2006). A different
issue may trade under the that symbol without the –OLD
suffix.
For example: AMSF-OLD
Aames Financial Corporation traded publicly under
the symbol AMSF. In November 2004 it became a non-publicly
traded company. A year later Amerisafe, Inc. traded
under the same symbol (AMSF). We can't show two companies
with the same symbol so Positive Territory uses AMSF-OLD
to refer to the Aames Financial Corporation, a company
that used to trade under the symbol AMSF which now
refers to another company.
|
-s |
Indicates that a split occurred for this issue at some
point while it was being held. The basis is adjusted so the
gain includes the effect of the split.
|
-X |
To improve our operating efficiency we separate issues
into active and inactive groups. An issue may be marked inactive
because
The 40-day simple moving average of its closing
price is $2.00 or less.
SMA(40)(Closing
Price) >= 2.00
or
the 20-day simple moving average of its volume
is 40,000 shares or less
SMA(20)(Volume)
<= 40,000
or
The issue has less than 31 trading days of
history
or
There were zero trades in the preceding week
All of these conditions are conducive to a risk
higher than we want.
Inactive issues are re-evaluated weekly and may
be reactivated. The –X suffix indicates an issue that
is inactive when the Track Record program was run (ex: January
2006) but may have been active during the time covered by
that program (ex: 1999 Q2).
For example: INTD-OLD-X
In January 2006 we ran Track Record for the
period 4/1/1999 through 6/30/1999. The 1999 Q2 Track Record
includes INTD-OLD-X on 4/28/99. Intelidata Technologies
Corporation was traded under the symbol INTD. The –X
is because it was deactivated (made inactive) 3/23/2005
because its SMA(40)(Closing Price) <= 2.00. The –OLD
is because on 8/19/2005 INTD was no longer traded.
|
purch_tcpd
At the time of purchase there were this many total
cumulative positive developments (TCPD).
purch_tnpd
At the time of purchase there were this many total
new positive developments (TNPD).
purch_date
The date the issue would have been purchased. Is always
the day after pd_date, but the next day may be after an intervening
trading holiday, a weekend, a holiday weekend, or some other event
that closes the market.
purch_price
The opening price on purch_date.
sale_date
Our risk tolerance is reflected as a 5% stop
loss
For Track Record we determine a sale
at the high point during the 50-day look ahead period
(the price
went up and down but never as low as our stop loss)
or
at the high point before a triggered stop loss
(the price
went up and down and triggered our stop loss)
or
at the stop loss
(the price
went down, never higher than purchase,
and triggered
our stop loss)
or
at the closing price on day 50
(the price
never went up, but never went down low enough
to trigger
our stop loss)
Remember, the purpose of Track Record is to see how successful
we are in predicting short
term price rises.
sale_price
The price at one of the four reasons we sell. See
sale_date above.
gain_loss_dollars
Are the sale_price less the purch_price.
gain_loss_percent
Is the gain_loss_dollars divided by purch_price expressed
as a percent. In the spreadsheet version this should be formatted
as 5.00%. In the CSV version of the Track Record this will be expressed
as a decimal value (ex: .05 being 5.00%).
eDays
These are the Elapsed
Trading Days
ratr
This is the Relative
Average True Range for this issue on pd_date. In the spreadsheet
version this should be formatted as n.nn%. If you are looking at
the CSV version of the Track Record this will be expressed as a
decimal value (ex: .nnn being n.nn%).
winners & losers
If the sale_price is greater than the purch_price
then a number 1 is placed in the winners column. If the sale_price
is less than or equal to the purch_price then a number 1 is placed
in the losers column. This makes it easier to count the winners
and losers.
Summary Table Columns
Select
We summarized the results of the Track Record two
ways. ALL is the summary of all selections made during the period
covered. RATR
>=6% is the summary of a sub set of ALL and includes only those
selections whose RATR on pd_date was greater than or equal to 6.00%.
Gain%
This is the average of gain_loss_percent (described
in the Data Columns above) for each issue in
the selection. By averaging the percentages instead of the dollars
we are removing any capital weighting bias in the results. This
is the gain percent for the period between purchase and sale. It
is not an annualized percentage.
eDays
These are the Elapsed
Trading Days
Ext
This is short for extension. Read this
explanation with care. One Gain% and eDay pair cannot
be directly compared to another pair of Gain% and eDay. Again, no
comparison can be made between
| |
Gain%=10.75% |
eDays=9.08 |
|
and |
Gain%=9.17% |
eDays=5.51 |
|
Yes, the second has a lower gain%. Yes, it was “faster”
(fewer elapsed trading days). Which is better? You cannot directly
compare them.
To allow for a comparison we create a standardized combination.
Ext = ( Gain% / eDays ) * 260
Why 260? Gain% / eDays is a very small decimal number so we
wanted to scale it up for easier comparison. Early tests were
scaled up by 1000 but those numbers proved to be unwieldy as
our results improved through selection changes. Eventually we
standardized on 260 which also happened to be about the number
of trading days in a year.
So for
| |
Gain%=10.75% |
eDays=9.08 |
ext=296% |
and |
Gain%=9.17% |
eDays=5.51 |
ext=416% |
What does this mean? It does not NOT NOT mean
that the results of the second set would earn you over 400% per
year. This would only be true if every 5.51 trading days you could
invest the same amount each time to make a purchase that would gain
9.17% at sale. That is very, very, very unlikely.
This does mean that the second set is, on average, better than
the first set.
%Winners
This is the sum of the winners (see "winners
& losers" above in Data Column descriptions)
divided by the number of issues in the selection. If there were
200 issues in the selection and 180 were winners then %Winners would
be 90%. %Winners plus %Losers should be 100%.
%Losers
This is the sum of the losers (see "winners
& losers" above in Data Column descriptions)
divided by the number of issues in the selection. If there
were 200 issues in the selection and 20 were losers then %Losers
would be 10%. %Losers plus %Winners should be 100%.
Duplicate Selections Inhibited
(Allow_Duplicate_In_Portfolio=No)
During 2005 Q2 CA (known then as Computer Associates, now
just CA, Inc.) appeared on five Daily Abbreviated Reports
(DAR) (4/5/2005, 4/12/2005, 5/4/2005,
5/16/2005 and 6/17/2005) but appeared only twice on the track
record (purchase dates 4/6/2005 and 6/20/2005). Why? There
is a single reason why an issue shown on a DAR might not appear
in the Track Record. That is because that issue is already
being held.
The track record held CA from the first purchase date 4/6/2005
to 5/23/2005. So on 4/12/2005, 5/12/2005 and 5/16/2005 CA
was already held in the track portfolio and would not be
duplicated. CA appears on the track record again (purchase
date 6/20/2005) because the previous CA holding (the one
purchased 4/6/2005) was held to 5/23/2005. So on 6/20/2005
CA wasn't in the portfolio and could be held again.
Portfolio holdings are only restrictive within the same calendar
quarter, not between calendar quarters.
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