In 2008, I started writing every day just to keep my family and friends in the loop about what I was seeing at work.
At that point, I had already earned my CMT designation and had a few years of real market experience under my belt. Enough to know I didn’t know everything. But also enough to know I had something worth saying.
So I wrote it down, every day. I sent it out to a small group. There was no strategy, no grand plan. Just trying to make sense of a market that was completely falling apart in real time.
I was 26 years old with a front-row seat to the Great Financial Crisis. You don’t forget something like that.
Fast forward to today, I’m 44 and still doing the same thing. Still writing every day. Still trying to make sense of the market. Still sharing what I’m seeing.
And I can’t imagine living any other way.
What started as a simple habit turned into everything. A blog. A business. A network. A career. A life I’m proud of.
More importantly, it made me better. A better trader. A better investor. A better thinker.
Because when you write it down, you’re forced to think it through.
That’s what this post is about.
The Habit That Changed Everything
If my third-grade teacher, Mrs. Pedrazza, could see this, she probably wouldn’t believe it.
She gave me a C in English. That knocked me off the honor roll. At the time, it felt like a big deal. Now it’s just funny.
Because today, one of the things people compliment me on the most is my writing. Not just the quality, but the consistency. Every day. No excuses.
What started as a simple email to a small group turned into a blog in 2010. That blog turned into a hedge fund.
That evolved into a technical analysis research business that eventually got acquired by a billion dollar fintech company backed by JPMorgan (JPM) and Morningstar (MORN).
All from writing things down.
The market always gives you something to think about. That part was never the problem. The habit of putting those thoughts on paper is what changed everything.
And the payoff hasn’t just been incremental.
It’s been exponential.
Sharpening the Edge
The biggest benefit of writing every day is also the most selfish one.
It forces you to organize your thoughts.
If you’re going to sit down and write pages of ideas, you actually have to think them through.
You can’t hide behind lazy opinions or half baked takes. Writing exposes that immediately. And in this business, clarity of thought is everything.
That alone makes you a better trader and investor.
The idea of writing things down isn’t new. Kings and philosophers have been journaling for centuries. Most of them kept it private. But the act itself has always had value.
Getting your thoughts out of your head and onto paper does something to you. It sharpens you.
What’s newer is the sharing part.
When I was coming up in the 2000s and early 2010s, the blogosphere was all about community. People were genuinely excited to share ideas and highlight others doing great work.
If you wrote something good, people linked to it. They passed it around. That was the culture.
It was a different environment than most of what you see online today.
Because of that, my work started to spread early on. That led to invitations to go on live TV across all the major business networks. Not just in the U.S., but internationally as well.
Living in New York, everyone eventually came through town. Because I was out there every day, sharing my thoughts, those online relationships turned into real ones.
Dinners. Drinks. Conversations with some of the smartest people in the business. That’s how the network was built.
And that network made me better.
When you can pick up the phone or send a text to brilliant investors all over the world, you’re operating with an advantage.
You’re seeing more. You’re thinking better. You’re making informed decisions.
And it all started with writing things down and being willing to share it.
Which brings me to the part most people struggle with.
I Was Never Scared
Most people don’t last.
They make a big announcement about their new blog, write a few posts, and disappear. Maybe they try again a few years later. Same result.
That’s the norm.
What’s not normal is showing up every day for almost 20 years without even thinking about it.
I was never scared to put myself out there.
In 2008, I was just trying to keep people informed. By 2010, I had my CMT and had already lived through one of the most chaotic markets in history.
I came at it with humility. I knew I didn’t know everything. But I was confident in the process.
Then something changed.
By my mid 30s, it became obvious that nobody really knows anything. The ones pretending they do are usually the most dangerous.
That’s where understanding behavior, supply and demand, and market structure becomes the edge.
So I kept sharing.
It never bothered me to be wrong. It still doesn’t.
I’ve sat across the table from some of the greatest investors in the world. They’re wrong all the time too. That’s part of the game.
Fast forward to today. I’m 44 years old and still excited to wake up and write.
Sure, I could walk away, ride off into the sunset.
But I wouldn’t.
Even if I had nothing to do all day, I’d still sit down in the morning and write about the market. That’s how much I love the process.
The upside has been incredible.
The downside is basically nonexistent.
Why I Share Everything
People ask me this all the time.
“JC, if you’re so good, why do you share everything?”
Because why wouldn’t I?
It started small. Just writing because my friends were writing. Sharing charts because that’s what we were all doing. No strategy. No big plan.
Then it compounded.
That small snowball turned into something much bigger. It built friendships all over the world. It opened doors to every major city.
It helped me raise money, start a hedge fund, and build businesses with people who trusted me because they had been reading my work for years.
That doesn’t happen if you keep everything to yourself.
And here’s the truth most people don’t want to hear: Good investing is boring.
If you need excitement, go find it somewhere else. The market is not the place for it.
What I do now is simple. I study the market. I run my strategies. And I share what I’m seeing with the world.
At TrendLabs, we’ve built a community of traders and investors from all over. We get together multiple times a week, talk through ideas, and even put trades on together in real time.
That’s the trading floor now.
Because the reality is, I sit in an office by myself. I don’t have the daily energy of a floor full of traders like I did throughout my 20s.
But we’re not meant to do this alone. We’re social beings, after all.
That connection, those conversations, that exchange of ideas, it makes all of us better.
This week I’ll be in Las Vegas for the The Oxford Club’s Investing U Conference, and I’ve already heard from people who want to meet up. People I would have never met if I didn’t just write things down and put them out there.
That’s the point. This is what I do.
I study markets. I execute my process. And I share it.
Why would I ever stop?
If there’s one piece of advice I can give you, it’s this: Write it down.
I don’t care if you share it publicly or keep it to yourself. Just write.
It will force you to think better. It will make you sharper. More disciplined. More honest.
Not just as a trader or investor.
As a person.
It will humble you. It will test you. People will judge you. Most of them won’t understand.
Good.
Do it anyway.
Because on the other side of that is clarity, confidence, and a real advantage.
Write it down.
Every day.
This Week in Everybody’s Wrong
On Monday, we debunked conspiracy theories about the U.S. dollar.
When someone says the dollar is losing value, the first question should be, “Losing value against what?”
People, the denominator matters.
On Tuesday, we recognized once more that the game is about positioning, not fundamentals.
Sometimes extremes get stretched, and unwinds get violent.
And we’re starting to see a recipe coming together.
It’s important to recognize where we are and what matters at any moment in time.
We took some time to do that on Wednesday.
And these levels will separate the winners from the victims.
On Thursday, we remembered the tech trade everybody forgot about.
Software doesn’t run in the air, and chips don’t just float around on their own.
On Friday, we looked beyond the headlines and the magazine covers.
There’s a big rotation happening, and participation is still expanding.
Leaders and laggards aren’t lining up with the narrative, and that’s good for us.
On Saturday, Jason Perz returned to open our eyes to one idea.
If this market’s gonna bottom, it’s gonna to do it now.
Here’s how Jason sees the state of play.
Have a great Sunday.
We’ll see you Monday morning…
Stay sharp,
JC Parets, CMT
Founder, TrendLabs