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<br>With over [1800](https://www.investing.com/crypto/currencies) [currencies](https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/03/11/what-is-cryptocurrency.aspx) already listed, the crypto Industry is such a virgin financial opportunity, and a fast growing industry, you can pirouette from being a financial minnow to a financial mogul in the blink of an eye.
<br>But it is also, as recent trends have demonstrated from since Bitcoin’s - its flag bearers- all-time value high of near 20$ last year, an extremely unpredictable market, a snap of the finger is all it takes to lose every investment.    
<br>The question that many a novice trader asks, and rightly so, is: how do you select the right opportunity/choice from such a vast array of currencies? Are there any tools to support proper risk taking in crypto trading? How reliable are they?
<br>For your information, there are basically three classic approaches for analyzing any market or investment vehicle, namely, fundamental analysis, Technical analysis and sentiment analysis. The focus of this article is Technical analysis.
<br>But before we continue this discussion, the ultimate of which shall lead us to the question of Technical Analysis and whether or not it works with crypto currency markets, let me say something about Africa, and the block chain.
<br>On May 23/24th., an [Africa Block chain Conference](https://africanblockchain.org/) to discuss the role of Block Chain Technology in Africa’s transformation, is to be held in Uganda, East Africa.
<center>http://digestafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/African-Blockchain-Conference.jpg</center>
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Undertaken under the auspices of the Government of Uganda, the conference in which H.E President Y. K Museveni is the invited Chief Guest, will also be graced by [Changpen Zhao](https://www.linkedin.com/in/cpzhao), the CEO of [Binance](https://www.binance.com/?ref=11890575&gclid=CjwKCAjw8_nXBRAiEiwAXWe2ycY4W_y_PXqSjg8EyKbg4FtavqOzFwZk6JxUDcAk8jbauCRc-Rf2TxoCMyAQAvD_BwE) among other distinguished guests across Policy, Business, political and academic fraternities.
<br>It is, one can say, yet another victory for block chain technology as it makes inroads into Africa and gains [mainstream acceptance](https://www.globalpolicywatch.com/2018/01/blockchain-and-virtual-currency-regulation-in-the-eu/?_ga=2.175997419.832157805.1526700073-1735489677.1526700073). It is, without doubt, the clearest evidence of the steady growth of the crypto industry. 
<br>I am personally excited. The opportunity, for Africa, in regard to block chain Technology, is for me, the greatest our continent has ever been presented with, for tackling its vast social, economic and political problems. 
<br>This is in large part because the critical factors for the success of block chain technology are all present, the cardinal reasons for its necessity are all obvious, and the timing of for its advent is on the hour. 
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
You only have to think, for instance, of the millions of tech savvy youth graduates and entrepreneurs and your mind leads you to the vast investment portfolios they would exploit in Block chain technology. 
<br>Not only that, you only have to travel Africa and seeing the pitiable financial/banking and physical infrastructure, and you remain with no doubt in your mind, that the overriding cryptography secured exchanges of the block chain are the classic solution to leap frogging these limitations.
<br>You think of the multi-ethnic fueled mistrust, the competing political interests that typify African communities, and your mind takes you to the vast potential of the block chain to increase transparency, to automate accounting and to improve processing times.
<br>You think of the land wrangles and fraud, for which people daily die in Africa, and there you can’t help, but wonder at how easily block chain-based land registries could come handy.
<br>And not only that. You think of the thousands of Africans living overseas and who are burdened in extending financial assistance to their needy kinsmen back home, and you find in crypto currency the most time and cost viable option for cross-border remittance payment transactions.
<br>You think of the massacre causing electoral disputes rampant in Africa due to electoral mistrust and fraud, and what comes to your mind is a block chain based voting system with its guaranteed transparency.
<br>How about the Savings and Credit Cooperatives, the crude traditional mechanism that most Africa communities use for short and medium term gathering, keeping, growing and distribution of finances? Would not these find their most effective expression and application in block Chain technology?
<br>On and on, we can go, but the bottom line is that Block chain Technology holds the greatest opportunity for Africa’s transformation, both urban and rural. 
<br>I believe with the whole of my heart, that if Africa does not radically transform its economic and social outlooks using Block chain Technology, then maybe it never will with anything else.
<br>And we shall just about be right to conclude that maybe Africa really is the poster child of the biblical [Cain](https://carm.org/what-is-the-curse-of-cain) tragedy, cursed to economic abjection and marked out of the globe as such to simply survive rather than thrive.
<br>At any rate, the future of crypto currency is certainly rich, and its potential to radically revolutionize Africa and the rest of the world, is vast. 
<br>It is a good thing that the African [Millennials](http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-42582343) have taken passionate interest in Block chain and Crypto currencies. It is likely, this opportunity will be exploited.
<br>But of course not all is rosy. There is also a lot of suspicion at crypto currencies, and it is in part contributing to whatever reservations large companies and some African governments still harbor, and even worse, the larger local communities.
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That said, of block chain’s vast portfolio of investment options, is crypto currency trading. It is the one area that many in Africa will look to invest in as this technology gains mainstream acceptance. 

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<br>Personally, crypto trading is the one area in which I have recently taken keen interest. 
<br>It is the one area which, looking to understand and exploit, I have since researched about, so to arrive at the thoughts on the subject of their technical analysis, that I here share.

><H5>How it begun</H5>

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When I just joined steemit, over a month ago, I was, by true definition a crypto novice. I didn’t even know what Steem/SBD meant. The closest I would in time come to think of SBD/Steem, was that it served ‘symbolic value’. 
<br>Of course I had no problem, so long as I could whenever I so wished, transform this ‘symbol’ into value shillings for feeding myself, affording internet, meeting my basic necessities and as well sorting some of my academic bills. I was satisfied. 
<br>That however was only for a while. More reading and engagement led me to posts and articles both on steemit and off steemit that introduced me to the wider cache of crypto trading. 
<br>I have to say, they peaked my interest. Crypto trading, and all the potential it held to catapult me from rags to riches overnight, as drummed from those posts, hooked me up pronto. 
<br>What’s more, apparently whatever work there was to be dispensed to earn, 75% was already done by Technical analysts, and all i would have to do, if I was too occupied with other commitments to become a technical analysts myself, is follow their ‘signals’ to know when to opt in and buy, and/or to opt out and sell.
<br>I rued my ignorance. This was a get rich quick opportunity I had all along just beneath my nose, and yet not smelt! I was going to start trading.
<br>So I read about everything to do with Technical analysis, I rummaged posts of some leading members here who do that ‘Technical analyses’, readying myself with boundless enthusiasm and expectation to start trading. 
<br>I read so much, I could narrate how it all went, the 4.5+ star books I looked up at Amazon, and blah blah blah, until the point when upon reading some article on steemit, a twist came and I finally, and luckily before I had made the mistake of applying those principles, to real trading, found enlightenment. 
<br>That enlightenment led me to reverse research on the fallacy and folly of Technical analysis, bringing me to the final conclusion, that technical analysis is 101% bullshit, and the majority of so called technical analysts are quacks.
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
From here forward, I am going to examine what technical analysis is and will end with some advice. If you are a so-called Technical analyst, I recommend you stop right here. I am afraid from here forward, I am going gung-ho and off the cuff, you will find nothing to your credit, and reading will only serve to create bad blood, the least of my interests.
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<br>**What is Technical Analysis?** The truth is there is in my opinion no solid definition of technical analysis. Its believers suggest that it is a way of forecasting future price movements of assets by ‘analyzing’ past prices of stocks and volume data.
<br>But then this is where the first problem and flaw starts from. It starts from terminology. Under no reasonable circumstances should the word ‘analysis’ have been used, as there is frankly nothing to analyze. But of course you have to give it up to its practitioners for this daring move as adding the word ‘analysis’ makes people who basically draw charts and lines, look like serious people. 
<br>But of course they are not. And Technical Analysis is a mockery of science.  
<br>First, it is founded on the wrong thinking that market price movements are not random but follow a predictive pattern and trend that repeats over time. 
<br>Following from this wrong reasoning, the first goal of Technical analysis is to tell you the price and/or the volume of Bitcoin tomorrow using the price and /or volume of Bitcoin yesterday.
<br>But of course that is nonsense as there is not the smallest of scientific evidence of genuinely predictive patterns in stock price charts. On the contrary, there is a load of scientific [evidence](https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjwrb6z0arLAhVKMZoKHTejDbgQFgg1MAM&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsite.iugaza.edu.ps%2Fwdaya%2Ffiles%2F2013%2F03%2FA-Random-Walk-Down-Wall-Street.pdf&usg=AFQjCNHLTyBGrBDIsfnmRr_vXaia0cBctw&sig2=O7F076ttwfe0KVUfy0emZA) that chartists see patterns in random process. You here that? Patterns in random processes. Is that not absurd enough?
<br>How hard is that? How difficult is it to see in your chart, price going up, or coming down, and then drawing a trend line to confirm that? I did that time and again in my ordinary level math class.
<br>But of course those posturing to practice it, will tell you it is more complicated than that! Apparently, you must be able to see cups and handles and heads, and shoulders, neckline and legs and maybe even toes, all those funny terminologies to describe the shape that tea leaves take upon settling at the bottom of the cup.

<br>Take the example of this graph sourced from investopedia. 
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>

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<br>Cup and Handle (Investopia.com): <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/"></a></sub> </center> 
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<br>Do you know what the chartist will tell you, when this happens,
<br>“Hei, the stock just formed a cup and handle! The price is shooting up!!!!” But seriously, what is was difficult with seeing that ‘cup’ and ‘handle’? What has been analyzed?
<br>The truth is that charting is useless, and there is a lot of evidence from science research going back nearly half a century proving so. In summary, price is mostly random, and it is misguided reasoning to think that you can tell future prices using past prices of stock.
<br>At any rate, Scientific evidence has proved that technical analysis is an equivalent of chance events when it comes to predicting the future price of stocks. That much is a given. But am I suggesting that nobody ever makes money buying and selling as advised by a technical analyst? 
<br> “But I made money last week following so and so’s “Cup; and “handle” prediction!” That is okay, the chartist got it right! 
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
<br>**But how about this?**
<br>https://steemitimages.com/DQmNwPvSYhKQCqyRkNE1iVQK1ykXnpkW3Cdybzy6ScDarhb/image.png
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<br>Now do you see what I mean? It is all about ‘chance’ not ‘analysis’; by chance alone, that technical analyst guessed a recommendation that made you money. 
<br>That is okay, so long as you appreciate that a man who closes his eyes and throws a stone up on the mango tree, can occasionally happen to hit on target and yank down a mango to eat!
<br>The danger, is in getting convinced that each time he throws the stone up, he will bring down a mango; you know, that your technical analyst has some coded formula that will bring you success always. By the time you are done throwing your 10 valuable stones up, the return of two successful hits is all you get!
<br>The thing is, Chartists have some set of chart rules. When these are met, the conclusion is simple: the result is what was expected. It is a license to circle jerk and blow the trump on social media. But when an unexpected result happens, despite the chart showing otherwise, some news about the ban in Japan is to blame!
<br>It is always a confirmation bias: if the pattern is confirmed, then the stocks will fall, but if the pattern fails, then the stocks will rise! 
<br>Seriously, are you kidding me? Who doesn’t understand that stocks rise or fall?
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
<br>Conclusions
1.	Most technical analysis charting is founded on confirmation bias. You simply look for patterns that confirm expectations that are tied to future economic conditions. When they put a caveat and say, for instance, “This could happen and the price falls’, they are only behaving like a quack doctor who tells you that your patient will not recover from illness. If the patient dies, he was right! If the patient survives, will you blame him? No, you will be too overjoyed, even perplexed at the miracle that has disapproved even the doctor!
2.	Charting Technical analysis is bullshit. Waiting for patterns to form under the guise that they are not random but carry some useful predictable information, is acting like an astrologer….
<br><center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
<br>Speaking of astrologers, some many decades ago, some great men looked up at the midnight sky. Those who did so on a January exclaimed to themselves, ‘Wow! That is Capricorn! the ones who did so in February thought they saw a Pisces, a Taurus, a Sagittarius, and so forth…… 

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<br>Some great men looked at the midnight sky and saw a Pisces and the rest!: <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Night_Sky_-_Saint-Paul_Asylum,_Saint-R%C3%A9my_-_0400_on_18_June_1889.png"> 
Creative Commons </a></sub> </center> 
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<br>Technical analysis is its equivalent. It is a pseudoscience. These are fields whose practitioners approach as if it were some science. 
<br>They christen every phenomena in such a manner as to make it appear unique and serious. Then they hypothesize that this particular image should it form in the chart, determines this or that result or means such and such. 
<br>Next, they consult the historical/past data hope it has happened before. The assumption, wrong of course, is that markets are not adaptive.

><H5>Now what?<H5>

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My own opinion, is that Technical analysis is bullshit! What is yours? 
<br>Well, if you believe that chanting clairvoyant can predict your future fortunes by 'analyzing' your birthday; 

<br>If you believe the advice given to you by a prophet using comets; 

<br>If you think you are going to live for the next 50 years because the sage declared so after reading the crisscross lines on your palms, 

<br>If you believe the witch doctor who says that you are poor because your great grandfather long buried a decade ago, was also poor, then, well

>*You may just as well believe the men who spend 24 hours to daily draw color trend lines on a chart and tell you the price of Bitcoin will be 10$ tomorrow simply because the scenario is similar to yesterday*
  
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
<br>Okay, enough of rambling. Take it or leave it, Technical analysis is bullshit.

>Here is my advice

<br>Have read this article this far? Whom do you know is posturing as a crypto analysts? Whatever! If you must remember one thing about this whole rambling, it is this: whatever advice you read/receive on crypto trading, and that is based on Technical analysis, is 101% bullshit. It is not even good for entertainment purposes.
<br>I don't see how somebody who has had discovered a magic formula,  system or secret for making free millions of dollars trading stocks, is so quick to share it on social media?
<br>Any analyst who promotes Technical analysis and uses it to advise people how to earn investment returns higher than the market on a risk adjusted basis is a quack.
<br>If telling the direction a product is moving with any degree of certainty higher than the average, by simply staring at charts and drawing lines was that simple, then everyone, including me would be doing it.
<center>https://steemitimages.com/DQmfL7e2eZVRPBGodWKpCw8EcpV7zmnX5vdzLUdDjjN2ADo/image.png</center>
<br>**References**

1. Chartists see patterns in randomness [Malkiel, 2007](https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjwrb6z0arLAhVKMZoKHTejDbgQFgg1MAM&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsite.iugaza.edu.ps%2Fwdaya%2Ffiles%2F2013%2F03%2FA-Random-Walk-Down-Wall-Street.pdf&usg=AFQjCNHLTyBGrBDIsfnmRr_vXaia0cBctw&sig2=O7F076ttwfe0KVUfy0emZA)
2. Past prices are extremely poor indicators of future prices (Kida 2003: p. 122)
3. Turning points cannot be predicted (Sherdan, 1997)
4. Increased sophistication does not improve accuracy (Sherdan, 1997)
5. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/technicalanalysis.asp
6. https://carm.org/what-is-the-curse-of-cain 
7. https://www.investing.com/crypto/currencies
8. https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/03/11/what-is-cryptocurrency.aspx
9. https://africanblockchain.org/
10. https://www.linkedin.com/in/cpzhao
11. https://www.binance.com/?ref=11890575&gclid=CjwKCAjw8_nXBRAiEiwAXWe2ycY4W_y_PXqSjg8EyKbg4FtavqOzFwZk6JxUDcAk8jbauCRc-Rf2TxoCMyAQAvD_BwE
12. https://carm.org/what-is-the-curse-of-cain
13. https://www.thenational.ae/business/how-blockchain-technology-could-help-africa-solve-its-problems-1.707723
14. https://www.globalpolicywatch.com/2018/01/blockchain-and-virtual-currency-regulation-in-the-eu/?_ga=2.175997419.832157805.1526700073-1735489677.1526700073

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