Complaint Review: Online Trading Academy TRUSTED Business | Ripoff Report Verified Safe™ …businesses consumers can trust. Online Trading Academy's roots can be traced back to 1997 as one of the largest trading floors in the U.S. with 180 traders averaging half a billion dollars in daily transactions. To improve results managers and the top traders offered daily coaching sessions in how to trade more consistently and profitably.

Now that the kids are away for a bit I will spend some time to tell you about my short experience with the "Academy" so you can have a better idea of what to expect when you go there.

Baiting :

They usually bait most of us by getting our address from our brokerage firm or something like that. In my case, they sent me an offer by mail for a 1/2 day free seminar usually worth X amount of dollars, then they promise you a memory stick full with 4 training videos if you go there, etc.

First warning: You will never see the color of that memory stick. It's just to bait you...

On that flyer, they also give you a very long list of topics they will cover during that half day.

Second warning: none of it will happen. The adivisor there told me right of the bat that this was promo stuff from their head office and that there is no way they could cover 1/10 of that content in half a day, even if they wanted.

Then came the 1/2 day session... which lasted about 1.5 hours... that's a half day at the OTA.

THis was a 100% sales pitch with a bit of room for a few questions. We were a small crowd of about 6 people. The guy is basically probing the crowd to see who can could be a potential candidate.

Then he offered us a subsidized $800 - 3 days workshop. They charged $299 for it... I saved $500...wowwwww!!! That was totally bogus baby...

Since I got nothing in terms of actionable infos during the short sales pitch, I agreed to pay $300 to get the 3 days seminar.

Third warning: they were already starting the sales tactics by telling us we needed to make up your mind fast as there were almost no more seats available.

I asked the guy for my memory sticks at the end. The guy looked at me as if I wanted to borrow his car. "He says, that's just stuff on the flyer, we don't have any of those around"

At least he is direct and does not try to lie by saying: Oh, we are back order, etc. The guys just said flat out: that's just some BS flyer they write at the Head Office.

3 days workshop (or salespitch.)

I will keep this as short as I can. The three days workshop was like 2 days and some. At the end of the second day, they had already signed a few fish and they knew the rest was slipping away from them. Plus the coach came from the States and wanted to go early.

Basically, you will pay $300 for a salespitch... with again no actionable tips or set-ups to bring home at all at the end.

Though I expected some sales pitch, I did also expect some meat around the bones in terms of actual teaching. Well, I was at the wrong place.

The goal of the training is first to destabilize you 100% and to take you from your turf onto theirs of which you know nothing, using their own terminology, etc. so you can feel lost in their world. The only way to make it back to home base is to pay them for their coaching.

Pit Worship:

One of their tactic is to keep talking about the trading pits and how this was a golden era in trading, etc. Many pit traders who were too dumb to cut it with the computers are among their ranks as teachers. Their head is full of anecdotes, etc.

Everything you were told is .... wrong!

The other big part of their tactic is to tell you that fundamental analysis is bogus and that technical analysis is crap as well. Since most of experienced traders are one or the other or a mix of both, then there is nowhere to go other than to start following the OTA teaching, the absolute Holy Grail...

In order to prove their points they have slides with technical charts with a truckload of indicators all at once on the chart so you can't see anything. That makes people laugh at how stupid technical analysis is. However, if someone knows even a bit of TA, they will know that nobody creates charts like that, clogged with way too many lines.

That's their way of doing things: a few jabs at Warren Buffets here, other well-known traders, there. Soon, the rest of the crowed started to realize that only way to trade seemed to be the OTA way.

See, the whole workshop is running on fumes as they keep moving the carrot as the workshop progresses.

The guy that was meeting with me one on one (education advisor)  to see sell me the whole course kept telling me that the instructor would take live trades, etc.

Fifth warning: the teacher did not take a single live trade nor a single simulated trade. Not even close. It was Power Point all along.

He talked about stocks, options and futures, showing you how you can have an incredible lifestyle with little effort.

Trading a bit in the morning and making your dough for the day while enjoying the rest of the day hiking, etc.

Basically, they show you how to set your trades so you can leave home and go to work. Once you reach your target, the stock sells on its own.

They sell (or rather promise) a lifestyle: do little and reap huge benefits. You know better than that guys? The market can deliver HUGE benefits... but it can take its money back in a second if you are clueless. It takes TIME and EFFORTS to be good at anything: be it guitar playing, moose hunting, photography, be good in bed or learning a second lauguage.

This whole idea of making tons of money while paying no attention to the fundamentals and having lots of times to play golf, etc. was like a shot of heroin among the group of naive students that were there.

Having made my share of money with a mix of fundamentals and technicals, I knew the coach was blowing some serious smoke.  During his workshop he said a lot of things that were highly inacurate. The funny thing is that the stock he kept raving about CLF (Cliff Natural Resources) as a stock that would keep going up to the old highs. As of today's date, that sucker is heading by to its low. Things are not looking good with the US dollar going up either.

Wholesale or Retail?

This is a big phrase in  the OTA vocabulary. Do you prefer to pay retail or wholesale?  The OTA guys have a total distrusts in stocks making new highs... as opposed to a guy like Bill O'Neil who can't get enough of those stocks. They like their stocks low... but they are not bottom fishers either.

That phrase came again when they made us an offer on the tuition price.

The basic course with one year of XLT training was close to $20,000.00 retail. The guy then asked, do you want to pay wholesale or retail... such a dumb question.

XLT online was $11,500 + the Pro Trader in Class was $7000 - all plus taxes.

If we signed up right then and there that day, we could have the whole thing for about $14,000 a "wholesale" bargain.

I knew my spouse would start to laugh when she would see those prices. She did.

If you take the total package called Total Solution Education Track... that's only $95,045.00... the price of a few good cars... That's the retail price. If I remember they can cut you a deal for $65K if you sign right away.

Before the class, I was asking myself, if these guys are so smart, what are they doing here? I also told myself: how can they make any money with about 15 students at $300 a pop... When I saw the price of their actual course... it took like a quarter of a second to get ALL my answers. They are making a KILLING with those tuition fees. No real need to trade  ;-)

Let me tell you that you can lear to trade well for a fraction of that... a very small fraction.

The few folks that signed were the most naive: several Asians got sucked right in and a few retired guys. They sure got about 6-7 suckers signed up. I was about to make a few recommendations to some of them in terms of learning to trade for peanuts as I knew through conversations during the breaks and lunch time that they were clueless but then I saw them come in the class with their OTA software box and their kits Sunday morning, I knew they are swallode the bait, the fish rod and the boat. I was within their school afte all so it was a bit tricky to give them some advice on how to learn to trade for a fraction of that... there were always a few OTA guys buzzing around.

My conclusions:

OTA- stop sending that fraudulent flyer. Tell people upfront that the free 1/2 day meeting is a salespitch and that the $300 seminar is a salespitch on steroid... again, with no actionable set ups. Plus that they will NEVER get that stupid memory stick loaded with video courses.

Would I recommend the $300 seminar for anyone at all? I would recommend it to someone who knows nothing or close to noting about the markets and that wants a decent overview of options, stocks and futures within about 2 days. This could save you a LOT of reading. For someone of average intelligence and very eager to learn, that could save you some time.

Caveat: keep your credit card in the freezer at home and don't sign nothing as if you are green, tender and naive, you could easily be blown away by those pompous claims you will hear all week-end. Yes, their hot tuition deal is only good for a few days... but for your finance's sake, cool down and talk to some friends about it, especially if they are good traders.

Second caveat: Play the game with them. Tell them you have a LOT of dough burning a hole in your pockets like $200K if you are a grown up or 50K if you are just out of school. Telll them that it is sitting in a GIC doing nothing. The reason I am saying that is that if you tell them you are broke or that you have little money... they will more than likely dump you right there and block you from attending. They know they have no chance to upsell their pricey tuition. You need at least $7k for the course... but if that's all you have you have that bogus 7 days course but not money to trade after. A stupid move in case you did not figure it out.

The role of the "education advisor" they put you in touch with is actually to probe the depth of your purse... and your wife's or husband. As a result, get ready to fill out a form asking how much cash you have in the bank, in options, in stocks, etc. If you don't tell them. Bye-bye baby. Just put some BS numbers in there otherwise they won't let you in.

Why put some fake numbers?  First, these are salespeople on steroid, they are not Mother Teresa. It's none of their business. Also, at the back of the form it is written in small characters that by registering to the course you agree with them selling or exchanging your information with some third parties. So get ready to get a few calls here and there at night. That's a possibility.

How to learn trading on the cheap:

Many will disagree with me but it will take you years to become a good trader that does not screw up too much with a good defence (learn your defence ASAP.) A muiti-millionnaire guy I know that made his millions trading told me that it took him about 10 years to become a high level trader.

For me that's about that as well... though I am far from having the same money that he has. He went full time early. I took it as a hobby for far too long but not anymore. I am dead serious about it these days... That's why I tested the waters with OTA.

Recently my 19 years old nephew told me that he was very eager to learn about stocks, etc. Pretty bright kid who is starting his first year in Engineering which will already demand a lot of him for the next few years.

My suggestions to him were a few books, then I told him to get some really good but inexpensive stock newsletters so he could read back issues and see where the newsletter guys are coming with their trades, then he can see how their old trade panned out.

I also gave him a couple of books to read though I don't want him to read too much either so he can keep his focus on this studies.

One is the classic from Sam Weinstein "How to Make money in up and down market", the other one is by Jesse Stine: Superstocks and the last one is by Bill O'Neill. His classic "How to make money in stocks" O'Neil is full of himselft at times and he keeps refering to his website every 5 pages... but there is some good stuff in there.

Getting on the stockcharts.com site with a low fee subscription to get some great daily analysis and comments from some pros and great chartist is excellent as well.

Would I ever go to a Big Money course from OTA.

Strangely, the answer is "Yes." If I were millionnaire and living at home with not job, I would take a trip to one of their schools but I would be VERY picky as to who the teacher is though. You don't want to pay $8000 for a week only to find out the teacher is the worst lemon on the roster.

During the 3 days sales pitch I did spot some good kernels of information and they do have some perspective that actually match some successful trades I witnesses myself. It's not all bad. The problem is that until you pay the big bucks, they won't give you the whole recipe.

Podcast:

I am also a listener of their Power Trading Radio podcast where they review the markets almost every day. Their host (Merlin Rothfeld) is actually fairly lively, well informed and he has some nice guests. Not a bad podcast at all. Light hearted and informative.

That's basiclcally it guys. Learn and trade well. I just wanted to give you a "head's up" so you know what you are signing for.