Just in case anyone hasn't noticed, I think when it comes to the stock market, "chartists" are living in a world of phony baloney. All of these supposed patterns -- "value dip," "pivot point," "triple peak" -- are supposed to predict, in and of themselves, future stock prices. It's nonsense. The way these people attempt to prove themselves is by citing one or two stocks that fit the pattern. The truth is that you can always find a stock to fit any pattern, including a correlation relating to World Series winners or the weather. The more important truth is that past performance does not predict future performance.

With this in mind, I was intrigued by the latest dispatch of mythology from Investors Business Daily. It's the publication's umpteenth roundup of various chart patterns and their supposed predictive value. But the best sentence is this one:

Studies by IBD of the market's biggest winners over the past 50 years show that the pivot represents the best time to attain superior gains with less risk.

The pivot, of course, is the point in time when a stock starts rallying. So in other words, "studies" of stocks that have risen the most show that the best time to buy stock is at the beginning of a long rally.

What insight. My own study shows that the best approach to the market is avoiding chartist fiction and circular logic.