Tharp's Thoughts Weekly Newsletter

• Article: My Tesla Road Trip in May 2015 by Van K. Tharp, Ph.D.
• Workshops: Tentative Sneak Peek at 2016 First Quarter Events
• Tip: How Quickly the “Big Thing” Changes — in Three Charts by D.R. Barton, Jr.
• New! Swing Home Study!: Swing Trading Systems at Your Fingertips!

$700 Discount Expires Soon on...

FOREX and FOREX LIVE TRADING workshops
with Gabriel Grammatidis

Join us September 11-13, 2015 in Berlin, Germany for our next Forex Trading Systems Workshop and walk out the door with three individual forex trading systems! We typically hold workshops in Europe just once each year, and Berlin has proven to be a great central location for many of our European clients to attend. Register soon while you still qualify for the $700 early enrollment discount. After you have learned these systems in the first workshop, you may also consider staying for two additional days, September 14-15, to trade the systems LIVE with Gabriel.

Gabriel Grammatidis has been presenting this workshop for several years, and each time we get great feedback from our students about their experience! See what some of your fellow traders have to say about their recent course, and also read on below for Van's observations on Forex and their newfound interest in this market.

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Feature Article

My Tesla Road Trip in May 2015

by Van K. Tharp, Ph.D.

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For the last several years, I had been ready to buy a new car because the two cars that sat in my garage no longer met my needs. One was a 2003 NSX with less than 10,000 miles. It was basically a show car — it had no back seat and it only had luggage space for perhaps one medium sized bag. Furthermore, the total weight for two passengers plus luggage was limited to 400 lbs. Once I drove it for about 300 miles and it was very uncomfortable. So basically, the NSX was not a driving car.

Car number two was a 1999 Jaguar XK8. It had less than 50,000 miles but the last time I took it for a long trip, it broke down when I was crossing the Canadian border. I had to leave it for repairs which were going to take about two weeks so I flew back home and I no longer trusted it for long trips. As a result, I wanted a new car.

My criteria for a new car included: 1) lots of power (400 hp or more); 2) exciting — both of my last two cars were exciting so I wanted that again; 3) capability for long trips — I planned to drive it around the country, so I wanted one that could do that; 4) high tech — all the latest bells and whistles; 5) a reliable dealer that I could trust; and 6) I wanted good gas mileage even though this criterion was incompatible with the first one.

Last summer I heard about the Tesla Model S: 471 hp; infinite gas mileage; everything about it is high tech; it seemed very comfortable; and it had over 60 cubic feet of storage space. Furthermore, Tesla had plans for supercharger stations (where a charge takes 30-60 minutes and is free) all over the country. In addition, a Tesla doesn’t use oil and it has no transmission so maintenance is practically nothing more than changing the water, checking the battery, and making sure the tires are okay.

So I ordered one last July with a delivery date in the fall. About two weeks before delivery, however, Tesla announced the P85D with 691 hp and the ability to eventually become a fully automatic car. I knew I wanted the new model but my car was about to be delivered so I talked to the local dealer. What did Tesla do? They simply accepted my first car into their stock and allowed me to order the P85D at no additional charge other than the price difference for the new model.

My Tesla Driving Experience

Last December I took delivery on my Tesla Model S, P85D. This is the one that goes zero to 60 in 3.1 seconds. I drove it for four months and learned the following:

Click here for larger image.

We had to take the supercharger station route so the distance totaled just over 8,000 miles. We visited 57 different superchargers and the total cost to me for electricity for our trip was zero. My MDX gets about 24 mpg, so that trip would have required 333 gallons of gasoline. At $3.50 per gallon that would have been $1,166 in fuel. Plus there were no exhaust fumes from the Tesla to pollute the environment.

Most of the superchargers are located at very interesting places like shopping malls or outlet malls. Twice we stopped at Tesla locations (Fairmont California — the factory; and Salt Lake City — the Tesla showroom). The best and worst locations are at super nice outlet malls. I say worst because my wife and I probably spent about half of what we saved in gas at those malls.

By the way, the average supercharger starts out at 400 volts and about 400 amps. It takes about 30 minutes to get 170 miles worth of charge. But towards the end of the process, charging stays at about 400 volts but slows down to as little as 70-80 amps.

Checking Out the Country

Part of my motivation in taking the trip was just to see what’s going on in the US. For example, we probably visited about 10 different Barnes & Noble bookstores at various charging stops. Most of them had about one bookcase (five shelves) devoted to investment books and personal finance. Those shelves were dominated by the usual types of books you might suspect from authors like Robert Kiyosaki, Jim Cramer, and Suze Orman. I think my favorite title for the category still has to be Jim Cramer’s How to Get Back to Breakeven (perhaps the subtitle should have been “After following my advice not to sell”). I never saw one of my books. For that matter, however, I don’t think I saw any truly good investment/trading books. We have a record bull market right now in the US but the American public has not been part of that and is still not participating. The bull is being fueled by the Fed funneling money to the banks to prop up the stock market.

We noticed that about 20% of our Interstate Highways are under construction. Perhaps this is Obama trying to put people back to work, however, in many construction zones; we didn’t actually see anyone working.

I lived in California from 1975 through about 1990 and I moved away for two reasons. First, California was not a friendly state in which to do business (the state income tax forms were as complex as the Federal government). The second reason was the traffic. Driving on a Sunday morning for 10-15 miles on the LA Freeways took about 40 minutes. I can’t imagine trying to do that every day in rush hour traffic. On this trip, we left Marin County (above San Francisco) on the Friday of the Memorial Day weekend at about noon. Driving out from that area reminded me of LA traffic - our average speed on the freeways was probably 30 mph. The only other area with traffic resembling that was the metropolitan Washington DC area during rush hour (and that goes on for 50 plus miles).

I did get to tour the Tesla factory in Freemont California which was quite amazing. We saw all sorts of robots in action building the car. They told us we couldn’t take any pictures (and I didn’t) but the Internet is full of them. The tour guide said that Tesla’s goal wasn’t to build the best electric car ever (which they do) but to build the best car ever. I’m totally convinced that they have done that also.

Courtesy of Tesla Motors

My understanding is that the state of North Carolina has the second highest number of Teslas after California. I’m not sure why, but I quite often hear from people, “I’m thinking of getting one of those, how do you like it?” My response is that I think it’s the best car ever made.

I subscribe to articles on Tesla stock from the website Seeking Alpha. It’s interesting to read that half the authors are short Tesla and talk about its eventual demise. The other half love the company and talk about how great it is. I don’t own the stock, but I would if it dropped below $200 and started to go up again.

Driving on the Trip

We drove through two passes in the Rockies when it was snowing. They hadn’t shut down the roads yet but cars and trucks were starting to skid. My wife was terrified. I wasn’t worried about the Tesla though because I’d seen a picture of the amazing traction it had on the ice beds in Finland. And that test used only a two wheel drive model — I have the four wheel drive model. We experienced no skidding on the snow/ice nor any hydroplaning when we drove in rain that was coming down so hard that you couldn’t see.

We drove through a lot of farm country and plains. I used to think that type of totally flat landscape was absolutely boring. But my wife is an artist and she always looks for barns to paint and wanted me to stop a lot to take pictures. So I grew to appreciate those parts of the country that used to bore me. Overall, most of the trip was full of breath taking scenery.

I never used cruise control in a normal car because I had to adjust the speed for slower cars. On this trip, it took me about 6,000 miles before I discovered the adaptive cruise control on the Tesla. You set the speed you’d like to drive and you also set the number of car lengths you want to maintain between you and the car ahead. When a car ahead of you is going slower than the cruise speed you have set, the Tesla slows down and maintains the set number of car lengths you want. Move into another lane and almost instantly, the Tesla starts going the speed that you set. When I was within 10 miles of our home at the end of the trip, a car was actually stopped in my lane while we had the adaptive cruise control on. The Tesla came to a stop behind that car without me doing anything. So now I can see why a fully automatic car is not that far away.

My wife drove about 20% of the trip and after we got back she said, “I want a Tesla too.” Driving my MDX now with 300 hp seems like it has hardly any power and it feels weird — I feel like “What’s wrong with this car?” It also seems strange that you have to put your foot on the brake so often to stop with any internal combustion engine car. When you take your foot off the gas on a normal car, it just seems to keep going and that seems strange now.

Next Trip

To me, one of the really brilliant things about Tesla is the supercharger network that they are building. I’m planning to take another trip later next year — this time around the periphery of the US and perhaps into the Canadian Rockies. The figure below shows the projected network for the end of 2016. (If you live in Europe, you can see the supercharger network there at www.Teslamotors.com/supercharger.)

Click here for larger image.

Tesla Referral Discount

Tesla now has an owner referral program and the nice thing is that anyone that references me gets $1,000 off the list price — and this is the only Tesla discount I have ever seen. You certainly cannot get that by going to a Tesla showroom or ordering off the Internet. For any sale by referral, I also get $1,000. I don’t really care about that, although I suppose I can use the credit for service should I want something that’s not covered by the warranty. Anyway, if you are interested in a Tesla (and you should be able to order the Model X SUV and get it pretty quickly), then use this link http://ts.la/van8593 and save yourself $1,000. The program goes until the end of October.

About the Author: Trading coach and author Van K. Tharp, Ph.D. is widely recognized for his best-selling books and outstanding Peak Performance Home Study Program—a highly regarded classic that is suitable for all levels of traders and investors. You can learn more about Van Tharp at www.vantharp.com. His new book, Trading Beyond The Matrix, is available now at matrix.vantharp.com.

Workshops

A Trend Toward Forex

Over time, Van has seen that the majority of traders taking his courses tend to focus primarily on one market. In the 1980s, most of Van’s clients were commodity traders. Then there was a shift to equities—where most traders have focused for a long time.

Van has seen another shift underway for the last few years and this time traders are moving to currencies. In fact, most of the attendees at several recent workshops have been Forex traders – something Van has never seen before this year.

These people probably perceive the benefits from trading Forex caused in part by countries around the world trying to use their currencies to gain economic and strategic advantages; China’s central bank move last week to devalue the Yuan is a perfect example. Actions like that promote trending prices which follow through for the longer term in currencies. The liquidity and 24 hour market make price gaps largely unheard of in Forex trading.

To help traders transition to Forex, we have developed an outstanding workshop in Forex trading. The trend oriented systems you will learn in this workshop are applicable on multiple timeframes from intraday to moves that evolve over several months. You pick which timeframe works best for you.

Combo Discounts available for all back-to-back workshops!

See our workshop page for details.

Trading Tip

How Quickly the “Big Thing” Changes — in Three Charts

by D. R. Barton, Jr.

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Tail risk is something that most retail traders and investors think about rarely — if ever. This kind of risk relates to instruments or even an entire asset class experiencing a very large and relatively quick move away from current prices. Large here is generally defined as three standard deviations. Technically, the move can be positive or negative but money managers almost always talk about the downside when they mention tail risk.

This concept is on asset managers’ minds enough that Bank of America (BoA) includes tail risk questions in their monthly global fund manager survey. BoA just released their latest results which have been generating some buzz. The folks over at Zero Hedge have gone back and put together the last three monthly survey results that reveal an interesting development.

What Fund Managers Worry About

Over the last few months, several “combustion points” have been concerning for asset managers. What’s really striking to see from the following three charts, however, is how fast the specific concerns changed this summer and how concerned managers are over the current one.

Let’s start with the June data compared to May:

Back in the May-June time frame, fund managers were most concerned about “geopolitical crisis”. At that time, the biggest concerns were about the Middle East, ISIS in particular and about the Ukraine where Putin seemed unable to “play nice”. The second and third place worries were that the U.S. economy would overheat (!) leaving the Fed behind the curve and a “Grexit”.

The June/July picture changed drastically:

By July, German power brokers had made it known that they would entertain a Grexit (which may have been just a negotiating strategy) and every deep breadth taken in Athens or taken by the EU overlords sent the markets alternatively tumbling or springing to new life over and over again.

The August survey that came out this week shows yet another turnover in fund managers’ psyches:

Now we have a new number one tail risk which has been aided and abetted by the collapsing Chinese stock market and Yuan devaluations — a China recession. Notice that almost twice the number of managers put this issue as number one vs. the highest ranked issues in the previous two months. Also note that the Eurozone breakdown has now moved almost off the chart as that can has again been kicked down the road one more time…

So many different tail risk issues competing to be “top-of-mind” for money managers in just a three month period raises a yellow flag. Could there be one more straw that breaks the proverbial camel’s back and could that be very far away?

Counterbalancing the concern those questions address is the resiliency of the U.S. equity markets through each worrisome news churn. The S&P 500 set its all-time intraday high in late May and since then has never strayed more than 4.2% from that top.

My best prescription for long-term holdings here? Stay the course but keep both eyes on “get to the sidelines” index prices. The indexes will tell us that trouble is brewing — not the news flow. A couple of closes below the S&P 500 price level 2,040 should be an alarm for your long-term money as that could lead to a test of the 1,972 price that was hit in February.

Please let me know your thoughts and opinions on the article. Send your comments to drbarton “at” vantharp.com — I always enjoy hearing from you!

Great Trading,
D. R.

About the Author: A passion for the systematic approach to the markets and lifelong love of teaching and learning have propelled D.R. Barton, Jr. to the top of the investment and trading arena. He is a regularly featured analyst on Fox Business’ Varney & Co. TV show (catch him most Thursdays between 12:30 and 12:45), on Bloomberg Radio Taking Stock and MarketWatch’s Money Life Show. He is also a frequent guest analyst on CNBC’s Closing Bell, WTOP News Radio in Washington, D.C., and has been a guest on China Central Television — America and Canada’s Business News Network. His articles have appeared on SmartMoney.com MarketWatch.com and Financial Advisor magazine. You may contact D.R. at "drbarton" at "vantharp.com".

NEW! Swing Trading Systems E-Learning Course

We are excited to announce that our new Swing Trading Systems home study course is now available! Learn with Dr. Ken Long as he teaches his Swing Trading Systems Workshop via streaming video!

This new e-learning course includes Ken Long's Swing Trading Workshop, 5 swing trading systems and a bonus workshop featuring Van Tharp on Tharp Think principles. The course also includes extensive downloadable files to support your learning.

You can complete this course at your own pace, from the comfort of your own home or office, and access the materials as many times as you wish during your 1 year subscription period.


Take a look at this video from Ken to learn more about this course.

We have extensive information about the Swing Trading System e-learning course, including how to purchase...click the link below!

Learn More....

Also check out last week's video highlighting fun moments from the Day Trading Workshop.

Matrix Contest

Enter the Matrix Contest 
for a chance to win a free workshop!

We want to hear about the one most profound insight that you got from reading Van's new book, Trading Beyond the Matrix, and how it has impacted your life. If you would like to enter, send an email to [email protected].

If you haven't purchased Trading Beyond the Matrix yet, click here.

For more information about the contest, click here.

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