Later in life, Gann becomes a bit frustrated that his students were straining to learn the more intricate astro-based techniques in 'The Truth of The Stock Tape,' and 'The Tunnel Thru The Air.' The older he grew, the more he would emphasize this simpler but still ingenious 'Mechanical' system.

Originally designed for the US Indexes, the Mechanical Method identifies a 2 to 4-day trend for its entries and exits. The real beauty of the Gann's Mechanical Method is that it is a self-contained trading framework. It works independently of astro and numerology, because it captures a repeating short-term pattern inherent to equity markets. This ancient market pattern determines the trader's risk, reward, and money management.

Mechanical Method has taken us nearly 10 years to decode. Though Gann's descriptions of this system seem fairly simple and straightforward, his basics for decoding are found in other places in his written works. There are a couple tricks to this, and Gann's actual methods differ significantly from what he seems to say in his public books.

The Mechanical Method wows you once it is unlocked. Inside of Gann’s wonderful discovery is found timeless principles measuring supply, demand, and near-term market direction over a couple days. To see a picture of it, it simply looks like a bunch of random entries and exits on a chart. But the back-testing tells another story. We had to repeat it over and over by hand, because it looks too good to be true.

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Because W. D. Gann taught to both professional traders who had access to the floor data in additional to retail investors, Gann organized the Mechanical Method in a way where traders had options. Gann first outlines the basic "Mechanical Method," and then he delineates another variant which he earmarked the "Safest" method. Pictured is the entire 2020 and 2021 (so far this year) back-testing of Mechanical Method of the ES with just 1 contract per single and 1 contract for runner trades. Many of the positions exit before EOD. The numbers represent points. We usually shave 10% off the profitability for slippage.

The method labelled 'Basic' in these panels is the basic method Gann first describes and gives example trades of. The 'Safest' method labelled in these panes in the method whereby Gann added pullback buying, multiple signal entry, and further safeguards which qualified entries.

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The 'Basic' method was given to traders who has less access to market data and wanted fewer trades. It also includes more double-reverse stops which could be handled by brokers in the 1940's and 50's. While the 'Basic' method waits until previous trades play out before entering anew, the 'Safest' method enters more lots on each new signal of the same direction. The 'Safest' method also results in fewer double reversals.

Trades on both methods usually result in durations of a few hours to a couple weeks. Ideally there is a trade working at most times which is considered a 'runner,' or longer running trade than the first lot.

Though many traders and investors reel at the market volatility of 2020, W. D. Gann's Mechanical Method seems to work better. See the table to the right for 2020 through July All this through the most volatile market in American history.

See the graph below for the same comparison of the 2 Mechanical Method variants for the first 3 months of 2021. You may have noticed that none of the months in the previous data showed a monthly drawdown. There were none in our 2019 results as well. But March 2021 showed the first drawdown in the 'Basic' method going back 3 years. But the "Safest" method still plugs away with a profit.

These Mechanical methods are taught in their entirety in our "W. D. GANN: MAGIC IN THE MARKETS" Training.

W. D. GANN SOYBEAN MECHANICAL

Click to expand this graph of results for Gann's Soybean Mechanical System for the last 3 and a half years. The Soybean Mechanical method works on a similar principle as the basic Mechanical Method does on US Indexes, but the details are substantially different. The timeframe and cycle are a bit longer. Like the previous Mechanical Method.

Like the Mechanical Method above, Most of Gann's method on Soybeans works without astro. The one exception is the technique for pinpointing pullback prices. This test uses 1 leading contract per type of trade.