Kermit
Prather – JUNE 2007
Kermit
Prather - The Trader
Kermit
has been involved
in investing since the 1970’s and has been a full-time trader since
2001.
Kermit
has been tutoring investors and traders for several years in small
groups and
in a one-on-one mentoring mode. Kermit has spent numerous hours and
thousands
of dollars learning from some of the best in the business. He has not
only
attended seminars by Stephen Bigalow of www.candlestickforum.com
, but has
provided advice and counseling to him on several occasions. Kermit was one of the primary
reviewers of Steve’s latest book, “High Profit Candlestick Patterns”
prior to
it being published. Kermit
has
written several papers on trading plans, trading techniques, Money
Management, basics
of backtesting, and the design and
development trading strategies.
Kermit
continues his learning process by attending
as many seminars and trade shows as he can. He has attended seminars
given by
many of the trading gurus such as; Linda Raschke, Carolyn
Boroden, Mark Braun, John Bollinger, Steve Nison, Steve Bigalow, David
Elliott, plus many others. He has learned from each one. What
Kermit
learned the most was that one must create their own style of trading by
combining what is learned from others.
Kermit
has tried
virtually every piece of charting software on the
market. But always returns to Worden Brothers’ Telechart where he has
been a
user since mid-90's and is now a reseller of Worden Brothers products.
Kermit
uses
several Telechart add-on products such as: TC-Companion to test and
develop trading
strategies, RAMP, TCScanPlus, and Correlscan. Kermit also uses other
programs, like
Tom Bulkowski’s Free Patternz or the free Quotetracker program.
Kermit’s
trading style is primarily short-term, but he believes
in holding a position as long as it is still increasing in value. He
advocates
exiting a position once it starts to stall and lose momentum. Kermit
believes
that no trade should be entered until you have researched it,
identified the
entry, exit (stop-loss), and profit targets. He believes that one must
be
careful not to over trade and that one should know how to trade
equities and
options.
Kermit
has been teaching and trading
full-time for the last 5 years using candlestick signals based off
major moving
averages as well as breakouts and breakdowns. He believes it is
important to
know how to play both sides of the market and how to use the vehicles
available
to allow you to do it. Kermit
provided a stock picking
service for a well known website for several months. Kermit
has been very
active in group discussions and is always willing to assist and give
advice to
others.
Kermit’s
personal, professional, and
financial experiences have taught him many things over the years, which
is why he
has put together "The
Complete Trading Process" seminar.
The seminar takes you from , building your Plan,
Executing the
plan, Analyzing
your performance, and Repeating the
process. Kermit’s main goal is to help others learn effective and
successful ways
to trade.
Kermit
currently resides
in the beautiful Tampa Bay area of Florida. He can be reached
at Kermitp@tradingourway.com
Kermit
Prather - The Person
I
thought it would be good to say a few words
about Kermit, the person. Although I have received mixed opinions on
telling
people so much about me personally, my opinion is that If you are going
to
spend your money on my seminar then you should know the real person,
not just
Kermit, the trader.
I
am married to an unbelievable lady who
never has a bad thought about anyone, except maybe me. She still
believes that
people will always do the right thing. We have 7 children, all have
moved away
from home. Somehow, they all managed to get at least one college degree
and
most have multiple degrees. Thus far they have produced 8
grandkids.
I
began my working life as a “Rocket
Scientist” designing missile guidance systems, helping design the first
non-heat seeking tracking system using a new form of radar. Following
that, I assisted
in the development of the first imaging radar system in the early
1960’s, which
is where I was first introduced to computer programming. After service
in the
Vietnam War, I spent 28 years with IBM designing computers and
software. Upon
retiring from IBM, I bought a small consulting firm specializing in
Business-To-Business real-time data interchange. I ran this firm over
the next
couple years, consulting for companies across various types of
industries, both
domestically and internationally. Later, I was asked to become
the Electronic Commerce Manager at GE Aircraft
Engines and so I
retired from consulting.
A
few years later, I retired from GE.
After my third and final retirement party, my wife and I bought
a 36 ft RV and spent the next several months touring around the
country. My wife
decided that family and grandkids came before the RV, so I put the RV
up for
sale. Since I couldn’t drive around the country anymore, I had to find
something to do with my time.
That
brings me to my trading life. I started out early in IBM buying IBM
stock.
Eventually, I got around to selling it and buying other stocks through a full-service
broker. I kept the account for years buying and holding and losing. So
in 1994
while I was consulting in Miami and my wife was in Tampa, I had to have
something to keep me busy. I decided to try the stock market. After
all, I
listened to Wade Cook while driving back and forth between Miami
and Tampa.
He
was very convincing, so I paid Wade a lot of money to learn his 11
strategies. Over the next few
years of not
applying myself, I lost more money and put it down to part of the
learning
experience. In the late 1990’s, I finally started making money and
thought I
was a genius. Little did I know everybody was making money?
Remember
that RV I bought? Well, I could not travel and play the market at the
same time
and still enjoy myself, so to prepare for my final retirement and my
travels I made
probably the smartest move I will ever make in the market. In February
2000, I converted
all my assets to cash in preparation for turning it over to a “Money
Manager”.
In July 2000, I gave my money to the "best" Money Manager there ever
was (at least he said he was). After several months of traveling around
the
country enjoying ourselves, I finally checked to see how much money my
wonderful Money Manager had made for me. I
was devastated to discover they had lost 40% of it.
That’s
when I made the second best decision of my life (#1 was when I married
my wife).
Once I got my money back or at least what was left of it, I placed it
in money
market and started to really learn how to invest. When I wasn’t
traveling I was
investing and when I traveled I transferred it to money market.
That
brings me back to where I am today, a full-time trader.
Want to see what
others think about Kermit
