if you use technical analysis you owe a lot to these individualsTHE HISTORY AND ORIGIN OF TECHNICAL ANALYSIS
I am a firm believer that as investors/traders we need to know the historic and major events that have occurred in this magnificent field of ours that have shaped how it is today.
Today i want to shed light of knowledge on the history/origin of technical analysis as this is a widely used concept that is used by majority of traders/investors to analyse/predict future market moves through the evaluation of historic market data especially price, volume and implied volatility and many have made a living and good returns on the financial markets using the various technical analysis tools and concepts but not knowing where it all started.
many do believe that technical analysis was initiated by Charles Dow in the 1800s but this is not true as evidence of Technical Analysis dates far back as to the 17th century from basic and underdeveloped methods as compared to the more evolved ones used in Morden-day times.
Let's get straight into it:
17th CENTURY
-- 1. the Dutch east India Company traders
The Dutch East India Company which was formed in the Dutch Republic, Amsterdam in 1602 which is known to be the first publicly traded company, trading mainly in spices, Indigo and cotton, which gave way to the first financial market the Amsterdam Stock Exchange. Here is when the earliest forms of technical analysis came to show when the Dutch traders would graph record/keep track of the various price fluctuations of their stock but in a basic form.
2. José or Joseph Penso de la Vega
still in the 17th century a Spanish diamond merchant, philosopher and poet best known also as Joseph de la Vega, born 1650 in Spain also considered one of the earliest financial market expert published a marvellous financial read called "Confusion De Confusiones" which provided detailed awareness of how the Dutch financial market participants operated focusing on their illogical behaviour and price patterns they used further more hinting on technical analysis with his descriptions of technical analysis concepts such as puts, calls and pools which are still relevant in Morden-day technical analysis and how he used these in the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.
18th CENTURY
Homma Munehisa
Homma Munehisa, born 1724 in Sakata, Japan a Japanese rice merchant trading in Dōjima Rice Exchange developed what i consider the most popular form of technical analysis which proved high standards of acceptance as traders/investors world-wide still use it in modern-day times, he initiated the Japanese Candlestick/ K-Line (primarily known as Sakata Charts), which is a price chart that's represents the open, close, high and low prices of a security for a specific time period which was introduced in his book "THE FOUNTAIN OF GOLD- THE THREE MONKEY RECORD OF MONEY" which also shared insights about chart patterns, markets trends and traders human emotions.
LATE 19TH AND EARLY 20TH CENTURY
Charles Henry Dow
considered father of technical analysis born 1851 Charles Dow is the one that first to induct modern-day technical analysis in the United States Of America, he was an American journalist who co-founded Dow Jones and Company which is a publishing firm along ide Edward Davis Jones and Charles Bergstresser. He also co-founded The Wall Street Journal which its first publication was on July 8, 1889 which became the the most reputed financial publication and first of it's kind which was a series of texts that discussed his observations of the U.S stock market especially the industrial and transportation stocks listed in the U.S stock market this gave way to the Dow Jones Industrial Average and Dow Jones Transportation Average, he also held a strong believe that "the stock market as a whole was a reliable measure of overall business conditions within the economy"
he also developed the Dow Jones Theory which states that the market has 3 trend phases which was a significant breakthrough in technical analysis as this theory aids traders/investors in identifying the major, intermediate and minor trends in the market.
after his passing many other technical analysis developers came from studying his work/publications which include the likes of William Hamilton who later become the editor of the wall street journal, others notable followers of his work include Robert Rhea, George Shaefer and Richard Russel.
another prominent figure in the development of modern-day technical analysis is
Ralph Nelson Elliot
born 1871 whose financial career started as an accountant, Mr. Elliot was famously known for studying 75 years of historical stock market data and recording his research and findings manually as computerized systems where limited which i believe is very outstanding.
his work is based on a theory that market movements are not random and that the markets moves in specific trends and patterns (waves) which are influenced by traders/investors psychology.
his wave theory gained traction in March 13, 1935 when he stated that the the market will make a bottom and indeed the following trading day the Dow Jones Industrial Average made it's lowest closing price, which proved his Elliot Wave Theory to be a significant technical anaysis concept.
20th CENTURY
Technical Indicators
with the aid of computerized systems technical analysis evolved into technical indicators which are computer systems backed by mathematical calculations of price data which apply these calculations to analyse large volumes of market data incorporated by algorithms which overlap on charts to forecast future price movements.
hope you have a fun read and learned something new.
“In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.”
Phil Collins
put together by Pako Phutietsile as @currencynerd
