Frequently Asked Questions

What is CSWTRADER.COM?
What CSWTRADER.COM is NOT
How do I begin?
How do I get a username and password?
How do I renew my membership?
How do I cancel my membership?
How do you pick your trades?
Will there be a model portfolio to track performance?
When are the Alerts and weekly review sent?
How do I get a refund?
How do I change my e-mail address?
When do I know how to buy or sell?
How do I view past newsletters?
I signed up for the newsletter but I haven’t received anything for over 24 hours. Why?
Can I pay by check or Money order?
How many trades will you suggest each month?
How does CSWTRADER.COM calculate their monthly portfolio results?
My username and password are not working, what's wrong?
Where do I email my questions?
What is the CSWTRADER RATING?
How do i follow CSWTRADER.COM recommendations?

What is CSWTRADER.COM?
CSWTRADER.COM is a non-biased, technical trading grain advisory service focusing on the global corn, soybeans and wheat markets.

A subscription to CSWTRADER.COM includes:

a) Intraday Trading Alerts (sample) - Detailed trade recommendations using futures, futures options and futures spreads will be given out to subscribers on an as it happens basis. Trade ideas will be sent via email in real time, and will be posted in the Members Area section of the website. Pre-open, you will receive a small blurb about overnight developments, some critical levels to watch for in the markets, as well as perhaps a trade idea.
Intraday you might receive a trade idea. Trade ideas can come 24 hours a day, and with the markets open about 17 hours daily (Sunday-Friday), it’s up to you to execute the trades at any time

b) A Comprehensive Weekly Report (sample) - Once a week, over the weekend, you will receive full technical and fundamental analysis of the entire grain market, detailed price targets and trade ideas.

With the advent of cheap commissions and electronic trading, many traders feel they can wade through the markets on their own with limited broker involvement. CSWTRADER.COM embraces that idea and wants to help all grain traders, whether you are a 1 lot spec trader looking for wealth accumulation, a 5,000 acre soybean farmer looking to properly market his crop, or a 200 lot hedger looking to protect your company’s profits. We believe that CSWTRADER.COM is the simplest and most cost effective way for you to try and outperform the global grain markets.

What CSWTRADER.COM is NOT
CSWTRADER.COM is not a fundamental news organization, a weather organization, or a government data analyzer. We are technical traders. We follow the charts, period. While important data, weather changes, and USDA reports are always considered, we generally don’t base our trading decisions on them. We focus on the charts so as to remove any bias and emotion from the markets that might hinder your performance.

How do I begin?
Well, once you've signed up, you can login with your username and password and view the current portfolio in the newsletter.
Look over our current open positions and trade ideas that are still in play.
If your assessment concurs with ours, feel free to trade and follow along.
NEVER make a trade just because it is recommended in our portfolio. You should always do your own due diligence trade what you are familiar with. CSWTRADER is not a licensed investment advisor. This is an educational resource only.

How do I get a username and password?
At the time you join CSWTRADER, you will choose a password. Your username will be your full email address. (e.g.bobsaccamano@yahoo.com) If you change your e-mail at any time during your membership, then your username changes along with it to the new address. If you lost your password, you can recover it here.

How do I renew my membership?
Your membership is automatically renewed every month. Following the $29 / month introductory offer, your card will be charged $99.00 / month until you cancel your membership.

How do I cancel my membership?
To cancel your membership, go to the Member's Area and click on "Cancel Account" After canceling, you will be notified of when your membership terminates. All cancellations must be done two business days or more before the end of the paid term to avoid rebilling. E-mailing us that you desire to cancel IS NOT proper procedure and will not take effect

How do you pick your trades?
No one method is used every time and we use a variety of technical indicators to select our trades. We explain each pick before we make it, and that is the extent of the explanation we can and will give.

Will there be a model portfolio to track performance?
Yes, a simple track record will be posted along with a W/L record and a trading statement balance (including the commodity and the date entered and the P/L in dollars after $25/rt all in commission)
We will trade a sample portfolio using 1-lots with a $10,000 account along side our recommendations.

When are the Alerts and weekly review sent?
Trading alerts can be sent at anytime 24/7, but they are generally sent prior to the market open and during or after the session. Weekly reviews are sent anytime after Friday Settlement to before the Monday open. Precall market letters are sent before the daily CBOT open.

How do I get a refund?
As outlined on the site, CSWTRADER does not give refunds. If you are unhappy with the service, you may cancel immediately and your membership will terminate at the end of the term for which you applied. However, your credit card or check will be charged as of the first day of your membership and no refund will be given. The credit card companies have a copy of our customer agreement on file to prevent chargebacks.

How do I change my e-mail address?
If you wish to change your e-mail address, or any other customer info, you may do so in the Member's Area

When do I know how to buy or sell?
When we recommend a trade, you will see "Buy/Sell at $X."
When we have physically entered the trade, it will read, "Bought/Sold at $X."
If we do not reach entry over a certain period, we will remove the trade from our watchlist.

How do I view past newsletters?
Only the current and the previous day's newsletter are available on the web site. Archived newsletters are inaccessible.

I signed up for the newsletter but I haven’t received anything for over 24 hours. Why?
The most common reason for this is that you entered an incorrect e-mail address or your ISP has blocked your account from receiving mail from us. You must e-mail us at info@cswtrader.com with a correct e-mail address or a temporary one (using Yahoo, hotmail, etc.). Please realize that we will not be able to contact you without the correct e-mail address. Situations might occur where you may be able to send us mail, but we can not reply to it. DO NOT write to us about not receiving newsletters from the address that is not working.... we will not be able to respond to your message.

Can I pay by check or Money order?
We only accept credit cards. We no longer accept checks or money orders due to a high level of fraud in the past.

How many trades will you suggest each month?
We are continuously tracking all grain markets, all months, all futures spreads, and all options contracts for the Corn, Soybean, and Chicago Wheat markets. To a lesser extent, we will offer ideas of our lesser traded markets (soymeal, beanoil, oats, rice, cotton).
Each month, subscribers will receive anywhere from 3-10 trade ideas. Volatile months usually result in more holdings. Slow summer trading may see less on occasion. We likely won’t hold more than 5 positions at any one time.

How does CSWTRADER.COM calculate their monthly portfolio results?
Limited access to statements detailing P/L will be made available but open/closed positions will be made available to all subscribers.

My username and password are not working, what's wrong?
Please email us at info@cswtrader.com and we will try to resolve the issue.

Where do I email my questions?
info@cswtrader.com

What is the CSWTRADER RATING?
CSWTRADER Rating is a proprietary trading indicator that tracks the level of bullishness, bearishness or neutrality of a continuous corn, soybean and chart.
+8 = Maximum Technical Bullishness
0 = Neutral
-8 = Maximum Technical Bearishness
Subscribers are urged to keep a close eye on this number, their weekly delta, and more importantly, the relative strength of each market’s rating.
CSWTRADER.COM will help you to use the ratings to establish spread positions and to help determine trend changes.
Be aware that a market at either Maximum level is also at great risk for a technical correction.

For example:
Current CSWTRADER Ratings (as of 6/12/2009)
Soybeans = +6 (6/5/2009 Rating = +6, unch)
Corn = -2 (6/5/2009 Rating = +2, -4)
Wheat = -2 (6/5/2009 Rating = 0, -2)

Notes:
Corn has overtaken the wheat as the technically weakest grain for the moment. Both markets have a CSWTRADER Rating of -2, corn fell almost twice as hard last week, losing 4 points, and crossed from positive to negative territory. Recommend looking to establish long wheat/short corn positions basis December.

How do i follow CSWTRADER.COM recommendations?
The orders will be written simple enough to the point where you can just call your desk and read the order verbatim to them:
(option trade) – Call your broker and tell him to buy a call spread. “Buy 1 November Soybean $12.00 call, sell 1 November Soybean $13.00 call, opening a position, for 22 ticks premium to the buy side, GTC”. On a separate ticket, tell your broker to sell a put. “Sell 1 August Soybean 9.60 put for 18 ticks or better, GTC.”

Pre-open, you will receive a small blurb about overnight developments, some critical levels to watch for in the markets, report information, pivot points, opening calls, as well as perhaps a trade idea. Trade ideas can come 24 hours a day, and with the markets open about 17 hours daily, it’s up to you to execute the trades at your discretion.

Most trades will have 3 targets (T1, T2, T3) and one stop (STOP).
For futures positions, stops should be physically placed in the market.
For futures spreads and options trades, stops will be on a CLOSING BASIS ONLY, unless otherwise specified.

One-lot traders are encouraged to sell at T1, and then reenter on a Stop (or closing stop for Futures & Options spreads) above T2 with a stop below T1. Multiple lot traders are encouraged to sell at all targets given but never to let a trade that reaches T1 to turn into a loser.

For CSWTRADER.COM’s portfolio, specifically in short term trades, we view T3 as the optimal position to take money off the table. T1 and T2 are generally used for stop movement.

A move to T1, and we recommend moving stops to breakeven.
A move to T2, and we will move stops a few ticks below T1.
A move to T3, and we will look to lighten positions by at least 50%.

It’s important to understand the distinction between Buy and Bought when you monitor our portfolio.
Buy is the recommendation, and Bought is the result.
Sell is the recommendation, and Sold is the result.