W. D. Gann the legendary Financial Prophet in the Early Twenties To most of the technical analysts and financial traders, the name, William Delbert Gann, is well-known. Gann was the greatest trader in the early twentieth century. He had extremely arcane trading analysis techniques and methods based on ancient mathematics, geometry and astrology. The theory of Gann is admired by most, but grasped by few. To understand Gann's theories, it is essential to know his life and living. W. D. Gann was born in an Irish family in Lufkin, Texas in the United States on 6 June 1878. His parents were devoted Christians with a strong Methodist background. W. D. Gann was himself a devoted Christian. He claimed that his market cycle theories were discovered from the Holy Bible. The home country of Gann was a cotton land. The influence on him was understandable. When Gann was 24 in 1902, he made his first trade in cotton futures, and enjoyed the instant profit. The 53 years of trading thereafter, it was said that he had gained US$50 million from the markets. The wealth of that scale compared with the purchasing power at his time was, indeed, very substantial. In 1906, Gann moved to Ohakama with ambition to start up his career as a broker and trader. His life and trading were both, up and down. His advice after decades of trading were that, if an investor enters the investment market without a grasp of knowledge, his chance of failure would be 90%. The reason behind these failures are, human emotions, hope, greed and fear. Knowledge is the way to win in the market. Starting from his early age, Gann already realized that natural law is the underlying driving force that moves the market. He claimed he had spent 10 years in studying the relationship between natural law and the market. During these 10 years, he traveled to England, Egypt and India for knowledge. When he was in England, he spent days and nights in the British Museum studying the financial markets of the past hundred years. During that time, he focused himself on ancient mathematics, geometry and astrology for inspiration and revealed their relationships with the financial markets. One of his most important techniques, the Gann Cardinal Square, was said to be inspired from the structure of Egyptian and Indian temples. After the long journey for knowledge, he concluded in his findings that, the financial markets are driven by the "Law of Vibration". The law once grasped, will accurately forecast market time and price with high accuracy. Gann also claimed that the "Rate of Vibration" of individual stocks and futures contracts determine the up and down of their prices. Unfortunately, the details of his theory were often kept in veil. Latecomers are very difficult to grasp the essence of his techniques. In general, his theories are based on the following: ancient mathematics, geometry, numerology and astrology. In 1908, Gann moved to New York at the age of 30, where he started his brokerage and research business and seriously tested his theories and trading techniques. In the same year, he developed his major technique "Master Time Factor" with success that made him famous on the Wall Street. In October 1909, he was interviewed by Richard D. Wyckoff of the Ticker and Investment Digest, a then popular financial magazine in the early twenties. The interview extended for an unusual period of one month in order for the reporter to monitor his trading activities. To the surprise of the reporter, Gann stroked a return of 1000% on his trading capital. He had made a total of 286 trades in 25 market days, 264 times won and 22 times lost. The profit rate was 92.3%. During that month, the average interval between trades was only 20 minutes. On one trading day, he made 16 trades, 8 out of them were the exact reversal points of the intra-day market fluctuations. According to Gann's friend William Gilley, "One of the most astonishing calculations made by Mr. Gann was during last summer [1909] when he predicted that September Wheat would sell at $1.20. This meant that it must touch that figure before the end of the month of September. At twelve o'clock, Chicago time, on September 30th (the last day) the option was selling below $1.08, and it looked as though his prediction would not be fulfilled. Mr. Gann said, 'If it does not touch $1.20 by the close of the market it will prove that there is something wrong with my whole method of calculation. I do not care what the price is now, it must go there.' It is common history that September Wheat surprised the whole country by selling at $1.20 and no higher in the very last hour of trading, closing at that figure." At the peak of his career, Gann founded two
market research companies, W. D. Gann Scientific
Service, Inc. and W. D. Gann Research Inc., and
employed 35 people to produce technical charts
and conduct market research. He published
investment newsletters and made annual stock and
commodity forecasts that attracted much attention
from the investment community. Gann also hosted
several investment and trading seminars. Gann
tried to keep his teachings secret and confined to very
few people, no student was allowed to give
the materials out to others. The fees for these
seminars were US$2500 and sometimes US$5000,
which were enormous in his time. It may be equivalent
to US$25,000 to US$50,000 nowadays! His Methods According to his followers, the accuracy of W. D. Gann's prediction was up to 85%. His predictions actually were not restricted to financial markets, Gann also gave predictions on the election of US Presidents and the beginning and ending of World Wars. Gann claimed that every forecast was solely based on mathematical principles. With sufficient information, he could forecast the forthcoming events with his "cycle theory" based on ancient mathematics and geometry. In his mind, the nature of things had not changed, all of the events were based on mathematical principles. What are the mathematical principles? W. D. Gann said that, the 360 degrees of a circle and the numbers from 1 to 9 were the origin of mathematics. In a circle, we may place a square and a triangle. Outside the circle, we may also construct a square and a triangle. These constructions are in fact the dimensions of the market. Strange enough? In fact, W. D. Gann believed
that the market's reversal points (tops and
bottoms) were related by the mathematical
principles. There is no single market top or
bottom that cannot be explained by angles and support
/ resistance levels. In other words, if he was
given the times and prices of historical tops
and bottoms of any market, he could utilize the
mathematical and geometrical principles to
predict future market turning points. Why were
these principles able to be applied to market
trends? W. D. Gann said, he had all the
proof from astrology and mathematics!
His Market Predictions Interesting enough, W. D. Gann lived in the early twentieth Century while the economic life of the world was in total chaos. Gann experienced the first World War, the historic stock market crash in 1929, the great depression in the thirties and the out-break of World War II. In these years of frustration, conducting investment business was risky, not to mention market predictions. Since the Twenties, W. D. Gann began to publish annual market forecast reports. These reports provided market forecasts for the whole year to come. It was nothing new providing these types of services. The new things were that, W. D. Gann actually depicted the market movement for the whole year by providing detailed time and prices of the markets reversal points! His annual forecasts were in fact the road maps to wealth. He did not only forecast the market, he also provided forecasts of major social events. Surprisingly, he accurately predicted the
stock market crash of the century in 1929 to the
date. In his annual forecast published on
November 3, 1928, he explicitly predicted that
September of 1929 would be the dangerous month.
Stock prices would slump on "Black
Friday". In fact, the Dow Jones Industrial
Average topped out on September 3, 1929 at 386.10.
Two months later, the Dow fell to below 200! The
bear market brought to the western world the
great depression. The Dow eventually bottomed
out at 40.56 in July 1932. W. D. Gann's Master Trading Courses W. D. Gann's most famous work was later summed up in two master courses he made available to the public. With the knowledge applied in these courses, one may accurately preditct exact turning points in any market. All of the master traders techniques are discovered here. The regular price for these two courses is $500 each. As an introductory offer we are only charging $99 per course; This is a limited time offer for the first 10 people only. When 5 of each, or 10 combined courses are sold we are once again, charging the full regular price. Purchases can be made with PayPal. The courses are in pdf. format and can be downloaded immediately after payment. "W. D. Gann Stock Market Course" "W. D. Gann Commodity Market Course" (Copyright Reserved Discount Distributing 1997) |