All of the charts options can be accessed by right clicking on the Historical Chart. This opens up a menu, from which sub menus and chart settings can be accessed.
Information is divided into these sections
To chart another stock:
A dialog box labeled "New Stock" will appear.
The data for this stock will be downloaded from the Stockwatch database and the chart will redraw.
The five most recently charted stocks are displayed on the Stocks menu. To chart one of these stocks, select it from the Stocks menu.
To compare the relative price change of one stock to another:
A dialog box labeled "Compare Stock" will appear.
This will download the historical price data for the selected stock.
The comparison stock will have its closing prices scaled to begin a the same level as the price of the original stock and all prices will be adjusted by the same price ratio. Only close prices will be shown when comparing stocks.
To change the date at which prices are synchronized position the cursor on your start date and select "Compare on cursor date" from the Stocks menu.
To compare stocks with out scaling prices un-check Scale Prices on the Stocks menu.
To stop comparing stocks select Delete Compare Stock from the Stocks menu and select the stock you wish to remove from your chart.
Any number of stocks can be compared, but for practical reasons more than 4 at a time may be hard to see.
Stock prices are displayed in the top half of the of the Historical Chart applet.
Prices can be displayed in three different ways:
The chart can be zoomed in and out by using the Zoom In and Zoom Out buttons. The keys "i" and "o" are shortcuts that zoom the display as well. The chart zooms in the time axis only. To adjust the vertical axis stretch the window by dragging its border.
The time interval plotted on the chart can be adjusted from 1 day to 1 month. Click on the drop down list marked 1 day to change the interval.
The range of data displayed can be adjusted from 1 Month to 10 years, by selecting a new value from the drop down list at the top of the chart. To chart more than 1 year the Historical chart will request more data from the Stockwatch servers.
Moving the cursor displays summary information for the selected time interval. This information includes the date, open, high, low and close prices, the volume and the value of the indicators being used.
Besides the information cursor, you can choose 2 cursors for drawing lines, and another type of information cursor.
To draw a line segment:
A line will rubber-band from this point to your mouse
pointer as you move the mouse
To draw a horizontal line:
A horizontal line will move with the mouse around the price display area.
To erase a line: Select "Erase last line" from the Prices menu or select "Clear Lines" to remove all of your lines.
Lines are not saved with your charts, if you'd line a record of your chart with lines you can print the chart.
To use the cross hair cursor, select it from the drop down cursor list. As you move your mouse, the chart coordinates ( date and price ) will be displayed in the summary line.
Three moving averages can be added to the price display by checking Moving Average 1, 2 or 3 on the Prices menu. By default these are 12, 24 and 36 period simple moving averages. The setting for these moving averages can be changed by selecting "Moving Average Options" from the Options menu.
Bollinger can be added to price display by selecting Bollinger Bands from the Prices menu. Bollinger Bands are two lines drawn 2 standard deviations on either side of a simple moving average of the stock price. The moving average and standard deviations are calculated over the same period. The default period is 20 which can be changed from the Options menu.
Parabolic Stop and Reverse (SAR) is used to set stops in a trending market, and to indicate when you should be going long or short. Parabolic does not work properly when the market is fairly flat.
Tommorrow's Stop = Today's Stop + AF * ( ExtremePoint - Today's Stop)
AF - is the acceleration factor
ExtremePoint - is the extreme point reached by the
market in the current trade. If long the Extreme Point is the highest
high, if short it is the lowest low.
Acceleration factor increases each time the market reaches a new extreme point up to a maximum. By default the acceleration factor starts at 0.02 and increases by that amount to a maximum of 0.2. The starting acceleration factor and its maximum may be adjusted from the chart menu Options > Parabolic options.
Darvas Boxes were developed by Nicolas Darvas, and described in his book “How I Made $2,000,000 in the Stock Market”.
A five step state machine is used to calculate the values for the boxes. First you set the top of a box to today’s high. Looking at the next day if it is higher you set a new box top. Once you get a value that is lower you can set the bottom of a box. When the top and bottom have been established, you break out of a box if the stock makes a high or low outside of your box.
Buy signals are generated when the price goes above the top of the box. Sell signals are generated when the closing price goes below the bottom of a box.
Keltner channels are calculated using moving average and price ranges. The middle line is an exponential moving average, default period is 20. The true range for each point is the maximum of: high – low, yesterday’s close – low, or high – yesterday’s close. The true ranges are also averaged and then the upper band is draw at 2 times true range above the center and the lower band is 2 times true range below the center.
The period of the center line moving average, and the true range moving average can be set from the Prices menu “Kelter Channel Options”.
Volume is grouped into 12 price ranges and horizontal bars are drawn to represent the relative volume at each price level. The bars are drawn at the left edge of the chart.
Indicators are plotted beneath the price display. Indicators are calculated from the price and volume of a stock. You can view one or more indicators at a time. To view more than one indicator check Multiple Indicators on the Indicator menu. To view only one indicator un-check Multiple Indicators.
Selecting an indicator puts a check mark beside it on the Indicator menu. In Multiple Indicator mode, clicking on an indicator again will remove it from the chart. You display a chart with no indicators by un-checking each one.
Most indicators have default starting parameters. To change these parameters select Indicator Options under the Options menu and select the Indicator whose parameters you would like to change.
Indicator values for a specific time interval are displayed on the summary line when the cursor is moved. If several indicators have been selected, some of the values may not fit on this line.
Simply the volume of shares traded in a period. Shown as a vertical bar. If share prices are in thousands the scale abbreviation is "m", if prices are in millions the abbreviation is "M".
On Balance Volume is a running total of volume where the positive interval's volume is added and the negative interval's volume is subtracted. It was developed by Joseph Granville. If a intervals close is higher than the previous interval, the volume is added to the total, if it is less it is subtracted.
Moving Averages Convergence Divergence was originally developed by Gerald Appel. Two curves are generated. The primary series is the difference between two exponential moving averages of different periods. This difference oscillates around the zero line.
The secondary series is an exponential moving average of the primary series. This curve trails the first one. Trades are signaled when the two series cross each other.
The MACD Histogram is formed by subtracting the secondary or trigger line from the primary MACD line. The difference is plotted as a histogram. The default moving average periods are 12 and 25.
Two curves are plotted for stochastics. The %K, or raw stochastic is the position of a day's close as a % of the range established by the high and low of the time period we are using. This curve is then exponentially smoothed to give the %D curve.
The formula is %K = 100 ( ( Close - Low of period ) / ( High of period - Low of period ) )
Then %D = 100 x ( Sum of n( Close - Low of period ) ) / ( Sum of n( High of period - Low of period ) )
The default starting parameters are 5 for the %K period and 7 for the %D period.
Simular to Stochastics but with smoothing.
Ctod - today's close
Ln - lowest point for n days
Hn - highest point for n days
n - selected by trader ( default n is 5 )
Ctod - Ln * 100
%K= ----------
Hn - Ln
%D = %K smoothed usually over 3 days
The default starting parameters are for Slow Stochastic are 5 and 3.
The Relative Strength Indicator measures the strength of a stock against itself. It is a type of momentum indicator. RSI is not the same as Relative Strength which measures a stock against some market index.
RSI was developed by J. Welles Wilder.
The formula is: RSI = 100 - 100/(1 + RS)
Where RS is the ratio of the exponential moving averages of Gains over Loses. Gains and Loses are measured from one day's close to the previous day's close.
Momentum is the difference between two prices subtracting the second price from the first. The prices are a constant number of intervals apart. This interval can be changed, the default is 7 intervals.
Rate of Change is related to momentum. Rate of Change is the close price of the first interval divided by the price of a second interval. The prices are a constant number of intervals apart. This interval can be changed, the default is 13 intervals.
Directional Movement indicator is based on formulas given in "Trading for a Living" by Alexander Elder. Calculating Directional Movement is a multi-step process.
1) DM is the largest part of today's range outside of yesterday's range. DM can be positive or negative. Make both +DM and -DM positive.
2)
3) Calculate +DI = DI/TR or -DI = DI/TR.
4) Smooth +DI and -DI with a moving average, using a default 13 day period.
5) Calculate DX using this formula.
+DI - (-DI)
DX = -------------- * 100
+DI + (-DI)
6) Smooth DX to get ADX with a 13 day moving average.
Money Flow Index gives an indication of whether or not money is moving into or out of a stock.
First calculate the day, or period's Money Flow.
Typical Price = (hi + lo + close)
Money Flow = (hi + lo + close) * volume / 3
If the current Typical Price is greater than the previous Typical Price then Money Flow is positive, otherwise it is negative.
We create the positive Money Flow by summing daily positive values over a period. We sum the negative values to get the negative Money Flow.
The Money Ratio is Positive Money Flow divided by Negative Money Flow.
Money Flow Index = 100 - (100/(1 + Money Ratio)
Money Flow Index varies from 0 to 100. The period used when summing up positive and negative money flow values can be set from the menu by choosing: Indicator > Options > Money Flow.
Larry Williams developed Williams %R to measure the capacity of bulls and bears to close a stock near the edge of recent range.
Williams measures the location of each closing price in the recent high-low trading range.
Expressed as a precentage: Williams = 100 * ( RangeHi - Close )/(RangeHi - RangeLo)
The indicator defaults to a 7 period range. This can be set from the menu by choosing Indicator > Options > Williams %R.
Accumulation/Distribution is a measure of how close a stock closes to its high or low. To calculate subtract a portion of the day's volume from a running total of volume.
A/D = sum of [ (close - low) - (high - close) / (high - low) * volume ]
If the stock closes close to its high A/D increases, if the close is closer to the low it decreases.
Chaikin Money Flow is closely related to Accumulation/Distribution. It is calculated by summing the Accumulation/Distribution values over a period and dividing the sum by the sum of trading volume over the same period.
sum of [ (close - low) - (high - close) / (high -
low) * volume ]
------------------------------------------------------
sum of [
volume ]
The default period is five.
CCI measures the variation of a stock's price from its average price. A high CCI means that the stock is priced high compared to the average, low values indicate unusually low prices.
CCI = ( (Typical Price) - (SMATP) ) / ( (0.015) * (Mean Deviation) )
Calculated by:
Typical Price = ( H + L + C ) /
3 , H = high, L = low, and C = close
SMATP -- Simple Moving Average of the Typical Price during
period m_iPeriod
Mean Deviation -- Mean Deviation in period m_iPeriod
Percentage Price Oscillator is based on the difference between 2 moving averages of different periods. The result is divided by the faster moving average to normalize the values.
PPO = (Fast_EMA - Slow_EMA) /
Fast_EMA
To turn on the scale grid check Show Grid on the Options menu. To turn it off un-check Show Grid.
News Indicators are vertical orange or yellow lines. Each day that has at least one News Headline will have a News Indicator. News headlines can be scanned by moving the cursor to a day with a News Indicator and reading the list of headlines displayed at the bottom of the chart. You can turn of the News Indicators and hide the list of headlines.
To turn on News Indicators and display the headlines, check Show News Indicators on the Options menu. To hide news Indicators un-check Show News Indicators
Sometimes it is useful to use a logarithmic scale for stocks that have an order of magnitude or more price fluctuation. To turn on log scale check Log Scale on the Options menu. To turn if off un-check it.
American stocks usually trade in fractional increments such as 1/8s or 1/16s. By default NASDAQ and NYSE stock prices will be printed using these fractions. To display decimal prices un-check Fractions. To switch back check Fractions.
Stock splits and adjustments are automatically included when displaying a chart. To view the price history without the effect of these adjustments un-check Adjust for Splits. To include them again check Adjust for Splits.
The Historical Chart displays a headline for each news item that comes in for a stock. This information may be news headlines, press releases, trading suspensions or other types of press releases. This information is derived from Stockwatch's news database of publicly traded companies.
To read a news article:
A window will open up with the last 2 weeks of news headlines from that date.
Last modified: July 13, 2001