Format Change

I have been holding off on bringing this dreaded topic up for several months now. However as it’s now almost mid January I am seeing a distinct trend that cannot be ignored and it’s one I am now forced to address openly.

If you take a look across the financial blogosphere you’ll quickly realize that retail traders are abandoning equity markets en masse. The reasons for this phenomenon have been discussed here in length and I don’t want to go over the various factors that have forced retail traders to abandon the Wall Street casino for Vegas where the odds may be distinctly better.

Thus, despite having made quite some prescient calls in the past six months I had to watch the number of our subscribers drop steadily. Of course the usual critics and hate mongers will most likely point the finger at me but the truth of the matter is that I have continued to post high quality content throughout 2010 and have kept subscribers (and leeches) from falling for many Fed sponsored bear traps on many occasions. If you have any doubts about that then feel free to peruse my prior postings and correlate them with market events – the truth after all is in the pudding. I may also point out that I repeatedly queried ex-subscribers and was given a whole host of reasons for leaving – and not one single time was it the quality or format of my work. In some ways that was very encouraging but also a bit discouraging at the same time.

Early last year I introduced a format change on this blog, which was a hybrid model which allowed non-subscribers to see my posts for free a day or two later. My thinking was that this would lead non-subscribers to recognize the quality of my work and eventually decide to support it. However, judging by the numbers it seems that this model does not seem to be very successful and thus I have decided to abandon it. Quite frankly, I cannot afford to give it away anymore.

Some of you may not be aware of this but outside of trading I also happen to be an entrepreneur. A few years ago I founded a technology start-up which is now progressing nicely and demands more and more of my time and attention (hence my frequent trips to Asia). My time spent on Evil Speculator was always more of a labor of love than an income racket but most recently it has become a very expensive hobby. As you can imagine it’s very hard to justify spending half my Sunday on a post if I see only a handful of comments (and few subscriptions) the next morning. Especially if the other half is spent working on my other venture, which does not leave much time for leisure or relaxation.

So, effective today subscriber only posts will remain as such and will not become free after the fact. I am sorry that I have to disappoint my beloved leeches (yes, despite my abrasive online persona I do care for all of you guys) but my hosting and data feed cost are now higher than what I make in subscriptions. I hope some of you will decide to start supporting Evil Speculator, if you do care about this blog then you got to ask yourself if it’s worth a measly 29 bucks a month.

Let me also thank all of you stainless steel rats who have continued to support my work throughout what I deem to be some of the worst tape of the last few decades. I have never taken you guys for granted and have often forced myself to jump beyond my own personal frustrations and setbacks to deliver the objective and cutting edge analysis you expect from me. As you may imagine it’s not easy to sit down every single day and produce something of value (and sometimes funny) – especially if you feel like just taking a few weeks off. I would very much like to continue with Evil Speculator as I believe that it’s one of the best financial blogs out there. But maybe financial blogging has seen it’s day and it’s time to focus on other endeavors.

I will give this another sixty days after which I will make a final decision. Thus far I have decided to continue but on a subscriber only basis. That does not mean every single post will be exclusive to subscribers but the ones featuring important long term charts most definitely will be. I hope you all can appreciate this format change and will continue to support Evil Speculator.

Cheers,

Mole