Technical Analysis is one of those topics that divides a lot of people in the #trading community--some people love it, and some people hate it. In this article, we show why #TechnicalAnalysis is so controversial, and what is the most productive way to understand technical analysis, and how to use it properly. **This article is adapted from a series of lectures from my Coffee Trader's Course.** Why Its Controversial One of the biggest complaints against technical analysis is t

Candlesticks charts have become the gold standard across the trading world: from #coffeefutures to #bitcoin, these funky little charts are used to display the day’s price action in easy-to-read visual fashion. Since these charts display so much information on price action, they are prized by technical analysts who specialize in predicting future prices based on reading of past prices. In this article we cover 10 of the most commonly used #candlestick patterns and what they me

One of the most popular, important and “easy to use” #technical indicators is the Simple Moving Average (SMA). This simple indicator can be used to tell you several things about the #coffeemarket, however, it has one very important and primary purpose: a simple moving average allows traders to define and identify the trend. In this article, we will first cover why it is so popular, then we will define what the moving average is, what the logic is and how one can use it when

As part 2 of our series on #TechnicalAnalysis, today we discuss one of the most useful and popular technical indicators for #commodity and coffee trading: the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD). In this article, we will discuss how this indicator is constructed, how we can trade with it and what the limitations are, all while using examples from our favorite coffee futures "C" market (KC). If you are interested in learning more about technical analysis, this indicat

One of the most useful #TechnicalAnalysis indicators for #commodities in general, and the #coffeemarket in particular, is the Relative Strength Index (RSI). In this article, we will discuss what this indicator is, how it is constructed, and how it is interpreted when reviewing the #market. If you are interested in learning more about technical analysis, this indicator (along with many others) are taught in detail as part Day 3 of the Coffee Trader's Course. Why should you ca

You can't be half-pregnant, but that is exactly how the #coffeemarket looks right now. The technicals are equal parts #bullish and #bearish. There is a strong uptrend but declining momentum. We have Bullish #triangle continuation and Bearish #doubletop forming. As is so often (frustratingly) the case in #TechnicalAnalysis, we need a #breakout confirmation to confirm the direction. This ambiguity confirms with the #Fundamentals at this point. There is a #bullish deficit th

With #technicalanalysis for #commoditymarkets, the key is to ask yourself is there a logical, #psychological phenomenon ? With #coffee this week we are seeing two classic examples of "continuation patterns". #Continuationpatterns are typically a consolidation before the #trend continues in the same direction. The logic and psychology behind #consolidation is pretty straightforward. Whenever there is a big move in one direction (the #trend), the appetite for buying or sellin

On 5 Year chart, we have resistance in #KC around the 135-140 level (Jul 2017, Sep 2017, Dec 2019, Aug 2020 and Feb 2021). This psychological barrier is tough to surmount. When there is no crisis, 140 is considered expensive in our collective psyche. Yet since at least May of 2020 we have been recording higher lows. This means that for those #trading #coffee we are consolidating on agreement for the fair price of coffee at consistently higher levels but still below the expens