My, my, my, how word gets around. I just cancelled my premium room subscription so I am out of the closet. Happy DA? Here’s the story.
My first couple of weeks with Oscar were pretty good. I was totally thrilled to find somebody to do the heavy lifting for awhile. I didn’t have a futures trading account and much of my trading capital was custodied in such a manner that it could not be moved, nor could I use it for futures trading. I followed along with Oscar’s recommendations using ETFs tied to the S&P 500. I began the process of opening a small account just to trade one lot and see how I felt about it. I went thru all the paperwork, asked everybody in the room how much the trade commissions were -’ ask Oscar’ was the reply. Talked to the staff — ‘ask Oscar’. When Oscar finally showed up in the trading room, I private-messaged him several times and asked — what’s the cost. He never answered me. So I’m a schmuck. Figuring it would ten bucks or so at most, I placed my first trade. The trade confirmation arrived and I nearly fell off my chair. The charge for 1 lot round-trip was $50. When Oscar showed up again in the room (mind you, you could wait around all day before the great man made an appearance), I sent him a private message saying that $50 wasn’t going to fly. He replied ‘k’ and closed the chat window. I kept opening the window back up, telling him we needed to have a conversation before I placed any more trades. He kept giving noncommittal answers and closing the chat window. I wrote that I was willing to pay $10 each leg. He wrote no prob. It’s all good. But you can’t discuss it with other room members. Don’t want a mutiny here. Most of the others pay $50. I didn’t put that in quotes, but it’s pretty close to word for word. I said I wanted an agreement it in writing. He said he had ‘guests in town’. I wrote that I wanted it by the end of the day. It took a boycott on my part of one week (not participating in the trading room) before Oscar contacted me. He was full of excuses as to why it had taken so long to reply. Friends in town, birthday party, etc., etc. He wanted me to let him know when I was ready to ‘rock and roll’. The thing that was missing was a written disclosure of trading charges but – I ‘had his word’ on it.
The mechanic who takes care of my car gives me a written estimate before any work is done. The company that takes care of my lawn sends me a written contract. Would you not think that a broker, someone who can charge your trading account on a whim, should provide you with a written agreement disclosing costs associated with trading?
Here’s another matter of ethics that I find disturbing. Why should Oscar give me a better deal than someone who has been there longer?
Why did so many of the other members pay more only because I was willing to make an issue out of it. Is that fair to his other subscribers? Granted, $50 per trade is robbery plain and simple, but the charge should be the same for everyone especially for 1-lot traders. Perhaps a little higher for multiple lots, but a standard fee schedule, nonetheless, should apply.
As I was in the process of opening my account (which now sits dormant at Dorman) my bullshit detector started screaming at me. It doesn’t work quite right, doesn’t always go off when it should, but when it
does, I know I am in an area of highly concentrated bullshit. I
really did have a few excellent first couple of weeks and was cheer leading just like the rest of the drones. I thought Oscar was the genuine article, but then it seemed like everything abruptly started to run off the rails. When he had ‘friends’ in town, he neglected the trading rooms altogether. I was concerned about placing a trade with a huge stop on it and then going to bed and hope for the best. What is that? I was concerned about people being chastised for making small talk — what are you supposed to do when there is no trade, no Oscar, and no making trades on your own, no talking about your own trades — trust in the ‘Omni’. When the ‘Omni’ was wrong or the trade was bad, it was always someone’s fault, like the dollar didn’t do what it was supposed to or you were stupid and didn’t follow directions. Manage
your own trade!!!!! How do you manage a dumb-ass trade? As for
making your own decisions regarding the trade, you are only encouraged to do that when a trade has gone wrong. Otherwise the message is ‘do what I say and do not question me.’ As for the spreadsheet on the net, I would say that’s a pretty accurate record of following directions to the letter. The quality of that record keeping also indicates that it was prepared by an intelligent person capable of following directions.
I was tired of hearing how stupid the open room people were. One day when the ‘Omni’ was green Oscar was laughing because the ‘morons’ in the open room were short. Those ‘morons’ made about 20+ points that day while we in the superspecialVIPpremium room sat on our hands.
People being banned from the room really threw up red flags for me too. No dissenting opinions were allowed. You could not talk about trading ETFs, most likely because then Oscar couldn’t dip his fingers into your till. I was personally called out on the carpet for trading ETFs instead of futures. Frankly, my business is none of his business. I was his boss, not the other way around.
Oscar seemed to undergo a change in behavior over a small period of time. At first he was positive, I thought he was so cool — but things changed in a hurry. He would be absent from the rooms most of the day, then showing up late in the afternoon looking like he was ill (or had a hangover). One day he didn’t come in at all, had slept all day.
Claimed to work all hours of the night analyzing the markets for us but didn’t often come up with a trade, and when he did, it usually did not go well. I must say, though, the premium room people were absolutely the best, nicest ever. I will miss them all. In a nutshell, I can echo all the negative remarks that everyone else has made. Chris is just a good guy, loyal to a fault. I hope he eventually joins us here.
I waited to reveal my identity because I was waiting to see how things would play out. After submitting my first trade, I emailed Oscar’s office a couple of times to make sure the recurring charge was removed from my account. No action of was taken, of course, so I just sent a message to cancel my subscription. A few days later a charge for
$395 appeared on my Paypal account for another months’ service. I disputed the charge and Paypal issued a refund.
Now, here is what i said about the infamous and supersecret ‘Omni’ — i think it is a Twister spinner. Remember the old game of Twister? Red and Green are obvious, Yellow means maintain ‘neutral stance’ and Blue means up all night doing homework.
Now translation — ‘neutral’ and ’stalking’ means ‘I slept all day’ or ‘didn’t feel like bothering with you morons today’, blue means no signal at all ‘wtf, I was up with my buddies all night’ drinking or gambling or whatever it is he does that makes him look like warmed-over death.
Anyway, best of luck to all of you. I have never met a single one of you, yet I feel I have made many good friends and I hope we will stay in touch. I have also learned yet once again that nice guys (and
girls) are pretty good at getting their pockets picked. Be careful and be skeptical.
- Linda Sue
Good story linda
Hi,
Super post, Need to mark it on Digg
Jinny
Nice detail post, thanks Linda
Linda, i like your translation of the color code. LMAO. Its exactly whats going on. With Oscar one gets in to a unique position where one pays to loose money. LOL. He claims he wants a war with us? He will have it. He forgot what a good ass kicking feels like.
thanks for writing this.. i was really hoping this was a chance to make some money.. but it kept seeming like this guy was a huge scam artist.. and this post seems to verify exactly all my suspicions.. all he’s doing is conning people really. i will not be signing up after all, and now I need to think of another way to make money..
Hi, nice post. I have been wondering about this topic,so thanks for sharing. I will certainly be coming back to your blog.
Hi! I have been following Oscar over a year as a copper member. I’m not a daytrader, but I think he has been more right than wrong about the markets overall - which is very good performance. I take what is free and it makes me a very happy “customer”. You can always go back and check how good he did and even he himself brags about that. You may not like that kind of alpha male attitude, but the truth is that they are not trading with buttons there. Your puny $50 critique is just ridiculous - Oscar is expensive (period). You’ll be fine without the intraday recommendations.
The OMNI is something I just don’t understand, but as a black box - how could I? The old saying about the market gurus is still valid: follow them when it works, but dump them if it starts to suck. But since I believe in technical analysis myself I find it very hard to disbelieve his analysis which he does much more diligently than I do. He squeezes the whole into so small packet that it’s enviable.
Here’s how LiveWithOscar.com works: They sell advice for the customer. The customer takes the advice and puts his money on the trade. If you happen to fail trading -> you’ll be dissatisfied about the advice, while it still is you who takes the action. If you happen to succeed in trading -> you’ll get the monthly fee easily and continue to the next month. The main idea: risk transfer. LWO.com transfers the market risk to the members. The biggest loss to Oscar is a lost customer. But! The maximum gain is limited to the membership fee. If they lose all the members it’s not going to profit. And that can happen very fast these days if there really exists a scam possibility.
About trading… You didn’t even find out the real price before placing a trade. Who are you blaming for your own bad trades? Yourself of course. Obviously Oscar sucked because you sucked first. I suggest you follow his free stuff in addition to other analysts who are plenty.
I would also advice you to stay away from daytrading. It’s simply too hard and prone to human errors which cannot be factored out by wishfull thinking that you all here are practicing. Oscar’s analysis worked well during the biggest dip of trading history.
You are in the minority here. We will see if it stays so. It’s good to have critical opinions, too.
Linda, Thanks for the post. I was wondering what happened to you.
BB, you make some interesting points; some of which I agree. After reading the various posts, I do not think Linda is in the minority. There are an ever increasing group of dissatisfied ex-Premium and VIP members, who all echo the same grievances.
I have no problem with losing money on a trade. Anyone who does is in the wrong game. What I do object to is being offered one type of service, and not getting what was proffered. I also object to the unprofessional way that the back office / VIP accounts / commission structure is handled.
Hi again! One other interesting point is that peope tend to interpret Oscar’s background differently. Some see the drop from the silver trading seat as a bad thing. According to the New York post article he was victim of the advancing technology if not also losing money.
Anyways Oscar is appearing in the money show of las vegas. I don’t know how popular event that is, but he is some sort of celebrity.
The trading recommendations or “Flash updates” are pretty clear. The exact entry is not given for free, but the people in the open chat room tend to start react to the movement of the current recommendation.
I wonder, exactly how many dissatisfied customers do you know?
Banador, just read here http://www.fadethetrade.com/?p=5#comments, 654 responses. You havent been in the premium room, neither have i, but that is where the real scam happens. Everyone tells that the turnover rate in every room is almost is very very high. I think there should be twice as disgruntled as satisfied customers.
As a copper you will never hear about losing probes. You will only get the good trades in the ever so convenient “Look how much money we made in premium room” flash.
And the moneyshow, Oscar isnt such a celebrity as he makes you want to believe. Just look at the frontpage of the website. http://www.moneyshow.com/LVMS/ . Do you see Carboni? I don’t. He doesnt even get mentioned at the Commodities page, http://www.moneyshow.com/LVMS/commodities.asp.
The only place where you find him is in a big list of speakers, he is giving a stage presentation on Monday 14th May in the morning. http://www.moneyshow.com/LVMS/wBios.asp?id=4777OTE .
In fact i have now multiple stories from people in the industry that laugh at him, please dont start to believe the crazy stories how he can sell OMNI for millions to a big retail bank.
And LMAO about his whining how needs security on the moneyshow. Oh please like someone is prepared to give a whole day + flighttickets to him. Though people who lost a shitload of money can be very dangerous, i would report to the police if i had heared of someone.
And for matter in fact, both Linda and I are more successful after Oscar than during.
His 50 bucks is really really expensive, just do some calculation how fast you are cheaper off with discount + premium monthly instead of VIP. I say that after 8 trades premium is cheaper.
I was a prem-room member dont join, Oscar sucks ass. After a coulpe of days you will see he sucks. The trade rec’s are skewed, he can have we are short up to 902, but the room is really short 895 898 and he has the balls to say they are short upto 902.
Yes, Omni Joke is correct……I have seen many, many instances of flashes giving false impressions of trades being more profitable than they really are. Whilst the flash entry and exists are correct, most traders did not get all those points.
Yes, most traders get in way after omni, yesterday was an exmaple.
Here’s my take. Check out an 89 period moving average on a 15 min chart, use 24 hour data. This is basically the omni for intra day execution and analysis. check it out anyway its very close. Prob uses standard deviation bands as well. Nothing special here should not be to hard to firue out given a little more work. 50 a turn is highway robbery, never think differently. Also remember Oscar is a New York broker. I repeat he’s a broker (a New York one at that), he takes no risk. If you like his analysis fine…take it for free and trade it on your own. I think his AD trade or whatever it is at the end of the day is based on closing imbalances. Again nothing special you can’t do yourself. Some of his fills on the update are just not going to happen and are suspect…they are also optimized so be careful. Overall just remember what he is and what his game is……He’s a broker, not a trader. Use his analysis if you like it….it no worse (prob a little better) then any other clown out there trying to make money off of traders but thats all it is. Good Tradin’
should prob clarify how I think he plans his execution. Does his analysis to go long short…then uses an 89 period MA with bands around (not sure if 1 std or 1.5, thats the Omni ) on 15 min 24hr data chart to execute. so will go short in the area at the top of the bands kind of thing if his analysis is to go short, but all revolves around that average. check it out…comes pretty close to his entry areas. cheers.
i also was a prem member and i dont think oscar is smart enough to trade that way. the omni is a coin flip. He has the worst turn over rate i have ever seen. u will be up one do lose it all the next. once and awhile you will one 2 in a row. AD sucks ass by the way. He doesnt even follow his rules. think about it, 15 point stop. u will never win in the long run. if he was that good why do so many people leave. from when i was there i saw people drop like flys.
Hi all!
The money show is over and the videos are in. Looking at those omniacs in the youtube video it makes me ask once more… are those people there just to fool around… or are they really greeting their master.
Today there was a bullish flag in the euro/usd. Oscar’s video showed that also. Technical analysis worked, but my intraday trading strategy blowed. In the end I was -10$. I overtraded a lot. The problem was probably that I traded alone.
Oscar’s five flash updates on Euro catched 190pip movement. He gave orders to move stop losses and finally to exit the market. Does anybody find a problem there in his guidance? I wasn’t reading those during the day.
I also did a quick analysis of the complaints in the first review. 86% of the people were complaining. That’s 25 of the 29 names I counted. That’s not much in a thread that is about complaining. Here is the list (the ‘+’ signs no complain):
+Chris999 , +Omni User, +OmniFan, +Quin, A few last words, A.N.otherPremiumRoomMember, anotherpremiumroommember, billy, CamillaChow, cj, col, Confused Omniacs, DA, Danny, Darren Winters, difdiffer, FelixRohatyn, happyhappy, hp1975, iamcerious, lindasue, Mist, no-newbie, oscarnotrades, Scott, SIAD, uptick57, wherchat, X91
Now look at the posting time of this message. There are 48 logged in the Premium trading room. 63 in the copper room and 14 in the Gold room.
I also read the blog of Adam Hewison (occasional CNBC technical analysis commentator). His advice is to not listen to brokers. This has bothered me a lot, because Oscar is also a broker and he clearly has an interest in putting you to trade. Then again Adam sells his own market scanning product which is the Trade Triangles.
U guys want to see flashes with wrong impressions? Compare the flashes that are sent out to premium vs copper. U’ll be shocked.
I was a member of the copperroom for half a year. For the last 5 years I have been trading on my own for a living and I can say this, I never once took a trade in the same direction as Oscar.
And I never will!