Ian Crawford, Dip.F.S. & Shirley Bates, Dip.F.S., the directors of Universal Shares, created their company for private investors who not only require research material and/or education, but need a proven and defined strategy to build the confidence, to successfully take control of their finances and make better financial decisions.
Ian and Shirley had been trading for quite some time when they met, and both were experiencing 'hit and miss' results with their trading systems.
Ian was mainly focused on fundamental analysis and long term growth, while Shirley concentrated on technical analysis. After discussing who was right or wrong, they came to the conclusion that both were right if the respective information was correlated in the correct order.
Through working as a team and developing a proven strategy for success, they have now created the perfect investment vehicle for their book Creating Wealth Through Trading.
Ian Crawford & Shirley Bates can be contacted through their publisher Joshua Books
Ian Crawford (DIP.FS)
Like most people, I had a strong desire to take control of my financial situation and create wealth long into the future. I had already been studying several forms of investing while I was struggling to pay off a mortgage. I came to realise that I was trapped in the mortgage cycle, and even when I finally owned my own home outright, I understood that unless I created wealth outside of my job, I was still going to have to work full-time well on into the future. It became apparent quite early on that to create growth and income it was necessary to find an alternative vehicle.
I looked at many aspects of investing and came to the conclusion that I was best suited to the share market. You are not only able to invest any quantity of money at any time, you can also access the funds at any time – at a moments notice, should the need arise.
When I first started out, the only courses readily available were focused on technical analysis. I read every publication printed by well known successful traders. I could see potential in their formats, so I spent thousands of hours researching the various methods. I soon came to realise that nobody seemed to have a simplified approach as to when to buy and sell. I found them all to be overly complex and very time consuming.
It was not until I made the decision that I had to actually develop my own system that suited my circumstances and trading style that I really started to make money. In the past, I had tried to explain my system and methodology to others, but without a reference book and the demonstration of my own portfolio, it was proving to be difficult.
It soon became apparent that without the actual demonstration of a working portfolio, most people could not overcome the very real fear that what they were doing may not work and they would lose money in the long term. Even I had to overcome many psychological factors myself to be successful in this area.
By this stage I was mainly focused on fundamental analysis and long term growth. It was not until I met Shirley that I actually started to use a simplified method of technical analysis for entry and exit points that really improved the overall performance of my style of trading.
Shirley Bates (DIP.FS)
I entered the work force at the age of 17 and very quickly came up with what I thought at the time to be a sound financial plan. If I was to work to excess, I would be able to make enough money to retire at the age of 40. And so began a life of compromise. For 23 years, I worked 80 hour weeks, quite often not taking a day off for 10 years at a time.
When I reached my milestone of 40, I felt like I had hit a brick wall running. I had accumulated a reasonable amount of savings, but unfortunately at that stage I was far too exhausted to appreciate what I had accomplished. I retired at 40 – just as I had promised myself I would – and went in search for the lifestyle I had always dreamed of.
Unfortunately, after two years I came to the stark realisation that my savings would not see me through to 50. Something drastic had to change, and working for a living was no longer on my agenda. I had already completed more working hours than most people by the time they reach 65 years of age.
Since I now had more time to spare than I had ever thought possible, I decided to enroll in as many different investing courses as possible. With all the various methods of investing, share trading took my fancy. There were no tenants to be concerned about, no repairs and maintenance costs, no trying to decipher truth from fiction with salespeople. There was just me – in total charge of my hard-earned dollars.
The courses I completed with share trading all centred on technical analysis. This approach seemed excessively simple, which appealed to me greatly. So I put all my new-found knowledge into practice and found the results to be a bit of a hit and miss scenario. But, I still hoped that my hits would be bigger than my misses.
Then – as fate would have it – I met Ian, who also was a keen share trader.
However, I soon found that although we were speaking the same language about the same subject, I barely understood what he was talking about. He was totally focused on fundamental analysis and was proving to be considerably more successful with his trading than myself. After many months of discussing who was right and who was wrong, we came to the conclusion that we were both right – if the respective information was correlated in the correct order.
We have now successfully created the perfect investment vehicle that allows us to live the life of our dreams.
Through working as a team and simplifying both fundamental and technical analysis, we are now successfully creating wealth through trading. It has now become our dream to educate others on the simplicity of the process, and to remove the fear of losing money. We have found out through friends and relatives that the only way to convey this successful trading strategy is to demonstrate it with a live portfolio.
