The stock market is playing your song.

Are you listening to the market music? Until you can hear it you will not be in sync with the price action. If you are out of step you will lose money. Few investors ever learn the words much less the music.

About 99% of fund managers continue to play one song, “Buy And Hold” Part of the time they are dancing smoothly. Investors and their money partners do well for long periods of time. The music plays their tune for about 16 years. Every dancer thinks he is dancing with the stars.

Suddenly the beat changes from a Foxtrot to a Tango and the investor and his partner fall. They can’t hear the beat. Each time they try to get up they fall again.

They know the beat has changed, but continue to do the BuyNHold step – and continue to fall. Their dance instructor can’t seem to get it right either. He allows his students to fall.

The stock market does have a beat. You have watched conductors wave their batons – up and down, up and down. And music follows those up and down waves of notes. Investors don’t want to be out of sync with the market music.

All successful market technicians learn music of both the up and down beats. The title of the song is “Technical Analysis”. The beat is very different from “BuyNHold”.

The dancer-investor can learn the up beats and down beats. He can be long with the market when it is going up and out when it is going down. That is dancing with the stars. That is first prize.

How and where does an investor learn the music? Not at his brokerage company or from his mutual fund manager. Few of them have mastered the tune as is easily seen from their performance during bear markets.

It is your money. If you wish to keep it and see it grow you must become more adept at managing your funds than mutual fund managers. When you look at their record that will not be too difficult.

Go to the Internet. Draw charts of the equities you own. Using a free service such as www.bigcharts.com you can put in a simple 200-day Moving Average. Plot it against your mutual funds and ETFs. When the line is going up hold on to your equities. When it starts down, sell. Pretty simple.

Whatever you do, do something that you can check on as fund managers never sell. Learn the beat of the market’s music. Learn the dance steps that make money.

When you have learned the dance steps you will hear the music.

Let the band play on.

Al Thomas' book, "If It Doesn't Go Up, Don't Buy It!" has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. Read the first chapter at http://www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he's the man that Wall Street does not want you to know. Copyright 2010 Williamsburg Investment Co. All rights reserved.