I have a different take.
Quant strategies (Momemtum/TA) have some issues:
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Poor quality : The strongest trends are seen in low quality stocks. This gets worse as a bull market progresses. When a momentum strategy works for long periods of time you end up allocating more of your capital to duds, and when the party ends you are unable to exit.
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Operators are smarter : Operators also know about TA. I have seen a pattern in a few stocks when the stock price gets pushed down without any news just before a big upmove. Probably stop-loss and margins calls get triggered and then the stock makes a big upmove. So purely rule-based systems cant participate in such price movements.
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Perpetual arms race : If all traders use the same methods, then no one makes any money. So you need an edge. The larger/smarter traders use far more sophisticated methods than discussed here.
Having said that quant methods are quicker at identifying trends than waiting for a quarterly financial result. I see it as a way of fishing out insider activity. If well informed investors are accumulating some stocks – it may show up as TA patterns like breakouts, crossovers or whatever.
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