Many years ago, I was at an event in New York City when a colleague told me that while he respected the research that earned me the 2015 Charles H. Dow Award, he believed options were simply a playground for traders chasing quick, risky profits. I did not respond at the time, but I also […]
Author: Amber Hestla
A Smarter Way to Find Stock Market Opportunities
If you have followed my work for a while, you might have already heard the story I am about to share. I revisit it from time to time because history matters, especially when it comes to the markets in which old lessons have a way of resurfacing when conditions change. There is a […]
She Actually Beat Wall Street By Ignoring Earnings Entirely
March is Women’s History Month, a time set aside to reflect on the women who pushed boundaries long before many of the opportunities we have today existed. In finance, those stories are not ancient history. Many of the women who opened the doors to this profession were working only a generation ago. In 2015, I […]
Focus on Profits From Rotation Without Predicting Market Winners
Paradigms shape how we interpret markets. Traders and long-term investors operate under very different ones, and I find trading paradigms are easier for me to understand. Long-term investors believe they can identify future leaders. In the 1980s, they bet on Commodore as personal computers reshaped the world. In the 1990s, they backed Motorola. Later, many […]
How People Turn Cognitive Discipline Into Trading Edge
Long before I managed trades each week, I managed uncertainty for a living. As an intelligence analyst, my job was not to predict the future. It was to make careful, structured decisions when the information in front of me was partial, unclear, and at times intentionally misleading. That difference matters. Trying to predict feels powerful […]
Here’s A Better Volatility Indicator Than VIX
This week, I found myself thinking about how I actually discovered my edge in trading. It was not luck. It was not a hot tip. It was a process. There were three clear steps. First, I noticed something in the market that aligned with how I naturally think and trade. I was not trying to […]
In a Market Without Trends, Probability Becomes the Edge
Markets are adjusting to competing signals rather than moving in a single, clear direction. Interest rate expectations remain divided. Financial markets have reacted to the possibility that the Federal Reserve’s policy will remain restrictive for longer, which has supported a stronger dollar and pressured assets that benefited from easier conditions. At the same time, futures […]
A Smarter Way To Manage Risk Right Now
Recently, a piece of global debt data stood out to me. Not because it signals an immediate market event, but because it helps explain the kind of market environment investors are navigating. According to the International Monetary Fund, six of the seven largest developed economies now carry government debt equal to or greater than their […]
The Simple Market Behavior Most Investors Miss During Volatile Periods
Markets have been processing a wide range of policy and international developments at the same time. Bond yields have adjusted, commodities have been active, and risk has been repriced unevenly across asset classes. These conditions often feel difficult to interpret because signals are mixed and narratives shift quickly. But they do not prevent opportunity from […]
Why Headlines Mislead And Markets Recalibrate Quickly
The current financial news cycle is dense, with a range of policy and international developments unfolding simultaneously. These moments naturally attract attention. Even for those trained to analyze information rather than react to it, the volume of competing narratives can be difficult to ignore. That tendency is not a flaw. It reflects how humans process […]














