Seeking Alpha's Second $1M Marketplace Service

Summary

• Congratulations to Avi Gilburt and The Market Pinball Wizard for becoming our second $1M Marketplace service.
• The service passed the milestone earlier in Q2 and continues to grow as a leading technical analysis and market outlook service.
• Below, we talk to Avi about the Seeking Alpha community, how he helps members understand Elliott Wave Analysis, and how The Market Pinball Wizard has evolved over time.

by Daniel Shvartsman

Amidst a wild market, investors have signed up for Seeking Alpha Marketplace services in growing numbers over the past quarter. Avi Gilburt's service, The Market Pinball Wizard, took that wave to become the second service on the Marketplace to reach $1M in annual recurring revenue, a year after our first.

We launched the Seeking Alpha Investor Marketplace in April 2015 to empower authors to create specialized investing services that could offer guidance, research, and analysis to readers looking for more. The platform hosts over 170 services with over 26,000 subscriptions, covering a range of investing styles and sectors. Our top three services exemplify that, going from dividend investing to technical analysis to shipping. And now the second has crossed the 7-figure revenue mark.

I asked Avi about his experience on Seeking Alpha, how he helps members understand his approach, and how he addresses the questions about Elliott Wave investing to help members succeed. My questions are in headers, with Avi's answers following.

Congratulations on hitting the $1M mark on The Market Pinball Wizard! You've long had your own website and service, what brought you to the Marketplace?

Thank you for the congratulations Daniel, as well as for the opportunity to bring our unique analysis perspective to the Marketplace.

Seeking Alpha's Marketplace was the logical extension of our work for our large following on Seeking Alpha. It allows those that appreciate the Seeking Alpha culture to access our more detailed analysis on a platform in which they are most comfortable.

When did you launch The Market Pinball Wizard?

We launched TMPW in August of 2017. So, we are now approaching our 3rd anniversary.

How would you describe the service to someone newly considering it?

I view it as a market navigational compass. In other words, we provide our members with the most likely paths in the S&P 500 and metals over a range of timeframes. Moreover, our perspective is based upon a proven mathematically-based methodology for tracking patterns in price and sentiment that tunes out all the extraneous noise.

What has most surprised you in running the service on Seeking Alpha?

Since Seeking Alpha is a fundamental-focused site, it has surprised me as to how widely accepted we have become among such an investor group.

As examples, we are the 2nd largest service in the Seeking Alpha Marketplace out of over 170 services, and we are now approaching 1000 members. Also, the fact that I have 50,000 followers just astounds me. And, lastly, we have over 93 followers per article, which is among the highest ratios on the entire site.

So, I view the fact that we have been so widely accepted by the fundamental analysis investor group as a testament to the accuracy of our analysis, as we have proven over the 10 years, we have been publishing on Seeking Alpha.

Who would you say the service is for?

Since we are very careful to assist our members in identifying the time frame which best suits them, we try to provide analysis for different time frames. So, if one is a day trader, we provide 5- and 8-minute charts for those members. And, if one is a swing trader, we provide 60-minute and 144-minute charts for them. And, if one is a long-term investor, then we suggest they focus on the 60-minute, 144-minute, daily and monthly charts we provide.

You focus on Elliott Wave analysis, which is a form of technical analysis, and one that many struggles to understand. How would you explain the approach for someone trying to figure out whether it suits their investing?

Most investors focus on the fundamentals or on news events to drive their investing perspective. Yet, many have learned throughout their career that this does not always provide accurate turning points for major markets. And, that is why we so often hear that "the market is just not trading based upon fundamentals at this time." In fact, we have heard that quite strongly of late.

We provide an analysis methodology that is outside the mainstream and focuses purely on market sentiment, which we believe is the primary driver of the market price. In fact, many social experiments have been conducted over the last 30 years which provide strong support to our perspective.

This perspective has allowed us to identify major market turning points over and over throughout the years we have been providing analysis to our clients, ranging from individuals to professional money managers.

It's also a style that draws criticism for being vague. How do you explain Elliott Wave Analysis to someone concerned about that?

We get that comment at times from those who are unfamiliar with our analysis methodology. For those that are not used to a non-linear approach to markets, a superficial perspective of our analysis would elicit such a conclusion at times.

However, when one recognizes that the market is a non-linear environment, and then learns how to apply our non-linear methodology to such an environment, they wind up changing their entire investment outlook. We've heard from professionals with decades of experience say that we've "totally changed the way I look at investing."

To this end, we outline the parameters for our primary outlook on a chart, and if the market moves in a manner inconsistent with that primary outlook, we have an alternative outlined along with the primary perspective which we immediately adopt so that we maintain on the correct side of the market the great majority of the time. So, while many may view this as being "vague," it is no different than when a general goes to battle with his main battle plan, yet, he also has a contingency battle plan ready to go if the main battle plan fails to work out as planned.

How do you translate the analysis into actionable takeaways for subscribers?

We strongly encourage and support our members to learn our methodology, since we feel it is important to teach people how to fish. Therefore, we provide a significant amount of information and support for them to learn our methodology. The main reason we do this is because people have varying time frames for which they invest or trade. So, if they can understand how the methodology applies to their own timeframes, they can make better decisions regarding their personal holdings.

Moreover, for each time frame chart we provide to our members, we attempt to outline target boxes where we have identified higher probability turning points and targets. As an example, in March of 2020, we provided our members with a target box highlighting our expectations for a bottoming region for the SPX.

There are people who have signed up for your service who haven't found it helpful, and there are people who have and who love it. What do you think differentiates the two groups; in other words, what do you think the second group figures out that doesn't connect for the first group?

I caution those coming through our doors that we will not be for everyone. Elliott Wave analysis is not an easy methodology to learn. If one is doing it correctly, it is a very intricate and detailed analysis methodology, wherein many factors have to mathematically align in order to obtain a high probability analysis and expectation.

So, what I tell everyone that comes through our door is that if you maintain an open mind and take the time to learn the basics of Elliott Wave analysis that we provide, coupled with our Fibonacci Pinball methodology, you will begin to see the financial markets in an entirely new light which will change the way you invest forever. In fact, I can no longer count how many members have told us that we have changed the way they view markets forever.

But, those that do not want to put in the time to learn the methodology will not likely gain much from our service. While I do understand that not everyone wants to put in the time to learn a new methodology, I can promise those interested that, if they do, they will gain an insight into the market that will open an entirely new world to them.

I am not sure how to really explain what differentiates those who get it from those who don't, it's like just the light bulb goes off when you begin to see the waves before you take shape.

As Paul Tudor Jones of Tudor Investment Corporation was quoted in Market Wizards as saying, "I attribute a lot of my success to Elliot Wave Theory. It allows one to create incredibly favorable risk-reward opportunities."

What stocks or markets do you focus on in the Market Pinball Wizard?

We have become known for our metals (and mining stocks) and S&P500 analysis throughout the years. But, we also provide analysis on USO and the US Dollar as well.

What led you to this approach to market analysis instead of fundamental analysis or other technical analysis approaches?

When I began my investing career, like many of those reading this interview, I devoured everything I could possibly read and get my hands on. I figured that if I was able to develop an "expert" level of knowledge on a particular market or sector, then I would be able to outperform the rest of the market. So, being a lawyer and an accountant by training, as well as a voracious reader, I set about my task with great fervor and zeal.

Sadly, the more I read and learned, the less I was able to outperform the market. It often left me scratching my head when a stock or market moved in the exact opposite direction dictated by the fundamentals I was reading.

And, for some reason, I was comforted when I heard an analyst on television state that "the market is just not trading based upon fundamentals at this time." While the "red" was clearly evident in my trading account, at least I was not stupid or wrong. Or, so I thought. For some reason, hearing those words made me feel better even though the losses were still mounting. It was somehow acceptable to have losses in my account since I "knew" the market was wrong, rather than my analysis.

Well, it did not take much more in the way of mounting losses to eventually come to the realization that I was simply part of the herd, and the herd will never recognize a trend change before it happens. Rather, they are simply "herded" to the slaughter. As an average, everyday "Joe," I had to come to the realization that fundamental analysis was not going to give me an edge over the rest of the market.

So, I recognized that not only was the market not trading based upon fundamentals at a particular time but that fundamentals are also really not what drive markets at all, rather, they lag the market. Ultimately, my search led me down a path of understanding market sentiment, which made a lot more sense as a driver of markets as compared to the lagging fundamentals I had been studying.

How do you help members understand Elliott Wave analysis on The Market Pinball Wizard?

We encourage and support our members learning of Elliott Wave analysis as much as possible.

We provide articles and recorded webinar tutorials in our Getting Started section. We also provide Beginners Webinars every Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings, which are recorded and can be accessed by our members at their convenience if they cannot attend the live webinar.

I also spend a half-hour before the open on Wednesday mornings in a webinar going through the charts I analyze and provide insight into how I view these charts from short term to long term perspectives.

What do you think has driven the success of the service over the past nearly 3 years?

Most services present their "reasoning" as to why a stock or market will move in a specific direction. But, we do not view the market as a "reasonable" environment. Rather, we view the market as an emotional environment and analyze it as such.

So, at the end of the day, we are simply selling the accuracy in our analysis more so than anything else. And, since people have come to recognize the high level of accuracy presented in our analysis during the almost 9 years we have been in business, it is the simple reason that we have grown to over 6000 total subscribers, over 500 money manager clients, and over 50,000 followers on Seeking Alpha.

What advice would you give to a new author starting out on the Marketplace or considering launching a Marketplace service, or just writing on Seeking Alpha?

In my opinion, there are several keys to success on Seeking Alpha.

First, you should have something that sets you apart from everyone else. While there are many authors on Seeking Alpha, how many of them are really presenting a unique perspective about the market?

Second, you must be accurate in this unique perspective on a consistent basis over the long term.

Third, if you are accurate in your unique perspective on a consistent basis over the long term, you will see your ratio of followers per article grow. I see this as the strongest gauge for success on Seeking Alpha. This provides a clear statement that readers consider what you have to say as being important. The higher the ratio, the more likely the contributor will achieve success on Seeking Alpha.

Lastly, I would strongly encourage you to engage with your readership in the comments section. While this is not the easiest endeavor, as there can be considerable pushback in the comments section, it provides you a wonderful platform to exhibit your knowledge of the subject matter beyond that presented in the article. In fact, many of my members throughout my career have explained that one of the reasons they chose to subscribe to my service was because of how confident I was in my opinion and I was able to support it through the arguments I presented to commenters in my articles.

What are you looking forward to for the rest of 2020 and beyond?

I am looking forward to going out to dinner and traveling with my family again! (smile)

I'm an investor. Why should I consider joining The Market Pinball Wizard rather than going it alone?

If you are an investor who is satisfied with your returns and think you are maximizing your abilities, then there is no reason to fix anything that is not broken. But, if you have not been satisfied with your returns, or have been caught by surprise by many market moves, and are willing to learn a new methodology that can change your entire perspective on the market for the better, then we are absolutely a service that can change your life. In fact, over the years, I have received thousands of notes from members telling us how we have changed their lives, and it makes all of this truly worthwhile.

***

It's exciting to see the success Avi and his team have had, and we congratulate him. We know that 2020 has been a scary year for many and that the markets have indeed felt 'unreasonable', and we believe the Market Pinball Wizard and the Marketplace as a whole can really help investors navigate the ups and downs.

I expect us to see other services hit the $1M annual recurring revenue mark this year. Marketplace authors work tirelessly to provide guidance, research, and ideas to their members, and the amount of positive reviews and demand for those services continues to grow.

If you're interested in checking out one of our services to see how it might help you, you can go here. And if you have a pitch for our next $1M service, email us at [e-mail], we'd love to hear it and see if we can get you on your way to the same end.

Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours.