James Altucher claims that his “Alpha Brain” algorithm identifies “glitches” that can make you $4,946 on average in about 7 days or less. But, is this really true? Can you trust him… is this a legit investment opportunity?
When things sound too good to be true, they usually lead to disappointment, and we all know that you can't trust all of the investment teasers that are floating around the internet.
In this review I'll be going over what we are told, who James Altucher is, what this “Alpha Brain” thing is and more.
The Teaser:
I found two variations of this teaser going around, and there might be more…
We are told that machines do 90% of the trading and have taken over Wall Street. And, according to Altucher, “these machines glitch out and wildly overreact in choppy markets”.
In an attempt to figure out why the markets were swinging all over, in what appeared to be random movements, Altucher claims to have coded some software that led to the finding of a “huge glitch” – a “huge glitch” that tends to self-correct in seven days or less.
And he claims that getting into trades when these glitches happen can be extremely profitable, bringing in $4,946 on average in 7 days or less…
In the presentation he goes for what seems like all of eternity, and shows a bunch of charts where these glitches were supposedly detected and then stock prices rose, such as Mattel and Netflix…
The software he created to identify these glitches is what he calls AlphaBrain, which uses a number of algorithms the he has coded.
This algorithm, as we are told, has an amazing track record…
And he claims that his system has just identified another, adding a sense of urgency to the pitch – like we have to get in on this right now.
Altucher tells us that getting in on these glitch trades “couldn't be simpler”… all you have to do is…
- Let AlphaBrain Scan the Markets
- Get in When It Spots the Seven-day Glitch
- Walk Away a Few Days Later With a FAT Payout
Sounds easy enough… but it also sounds fake and too good to be true.
I mean, really?… “glitches” that you can make $4,946 from on average?
Not only does it sound a bit fishy, but there are some other red flags I noticed.
Red-Flags:
First off, he doesn't even mention anything about what kind of starting investment you'd need to make an average of $4,946 on these trades – so these numbers mean nothing.
Second, I noticed that above the presentation that was playing it was telling me that “this message will be pulled offline” at a certain time. I decided to test this statement and got off the computer and waited until later. Sure enough, I got back on later (after the deadline) and it was still up… just a trickly little marketing tactic, that's all…
And third, he tells us “please do not share this with anyone”, as if the presentation is some confidential thing that no one can know about.
Well Mr. Altucher… don't you think it might be a good idea to stop promoting the heck out of it if you don't want anyone to know about it? After all, this is being blasted out via email to thousands of people across the country.
It's a Sales Pitch
In order to get your hands on James' “Glitch Detected! How To Make $4,946 From Your First AlphaBrain Trade” report, which let me remind you he has referred to as “free”… you first have to buy into his paid advisory service.
This is pretty much the marketing blueprint for service like this nowadays – just like how it went with Yastine's “The $5 Biotech Stock Revolutionizing Health Care” report, which was said to be free.
What you have to subscribe to is called Altucher’s Weekly AlphaBrain Alert. This is basically a follow-along investment advisory service that provides regular trade recommendations.
What subscribers get at its core includes:
- A new trade recommendation weekly – each week James will send out the strongest recommendation that the AlphaBrain has found, and which has been vetted by him
- Alerts when it's time to buy or sell
- Access to the AlphaBrain App
- The AlphaBrain Quickstart Manual – goes over things such as how to profit no matter what the market is doing, how to magnify trades, how to make these trades in any sort of brokerage account, etc.
- AlphaBrain Confidential, which is a 5-part video series that goes over exactly how to execute these trades
- Model portfolio updates when something important happens that could affect one of the recommendations
The cost of this service is $4,000/yr… certainly not cheap. And you should be aware that there are no refunds. The best you can do if this service's recommendations don't perform well is to get a second year of it for free… but there is no way to get your money back after you buy in.
It's also worth mentioning that this service provides stock and options recommendations. Much of the profits shown in the promotional material come from trading options.
Who Is James Altucher?
James Altucher is an entrepreneur and angel investor – a bit of an eccentric one.
His background is pretty interesting. He's made it to the rank of “chess master”; he has wrote best selling books; he has founded or co-founded over 20 companies; he has a background in computer science (graduated from Cornell University with a bachelor's degree in computer science); he traded for several hedge funds and much more.
He's an interesting guy, and certainly knows a lot about a lot, which has led to him being featured on media outlets like CNBC and Fox Business News for his expertise.
What's relevant to this article, and to this “Alpha Brain” system, is that he has coded algorithms for trading in the past, and even claims that in 2003 he wrote algorithms to trade futures for the famous hedge fund manager Victor Niederhoffer.
*Note: He also says a lot of crazy things, is known to contradict things he's said in the past, and throws one heck of a sales pitch.
What Is AlphaBrain?
AlphaBrain is the name of the algorithm James has developed to identify these “glitches”, as he calls them, in the stock market.
It is an AI system that uses signal processing algorithms, as he states.
In the presentation we are shown a snippet of this algorithm in action, but if I'm honest, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference if this was completely fake. He could have shown an algorithm that counts the number cat videos posted daily on Facebook and I wouldn't have known the difference…
Anyways, this algorithm supposedly uses “hidden Markov models and Monte Carlo simulations to process stock market data through dynamic transition matrixes and Viterbi filters” – tracking billions of data points.
He tells us that these are the same types of signal algorithms that help run deep-space satellites.
Is Alpha Brain Legit?
There is no reason for me to call this a scam. However, it would be nice for a programmer to look into it more, such as look into the algorithm snippet he shows us, and see if he's just showing us a bunch of BS or not.
That said, the core of what you are getting here is legit. Altucher, although eccentric and although you sometimes have to take what he says with a grain of salt, is a genius and highly successful in the trading world.
Conclusion
Quick Recap:
- AlphaBrain is a trading algorithm that identifies, what Altucher calls, “7-day stock market glitches”
- These “glitches” occur in Wall Street's trading algorithms that tend to self-correct within 7 days
- AlphaBrain supposedly just detected another “glitch” and anyone can get Altucher's “free” report “Glitch Detected! How To Make $4,946 From Your First AlphaBrain Trade” – to get the information needed to trade this glitch
- In order to get his “free” report, you first have to pay $4,000 for his Weekly AlphaBrain Alert advisory service
And there you have it. Hopefully this quick review has helped clear things up for you.
There's no reason to call this a scam, but if you do decide to buy into it I'd recommend not expecting the hyped-up results like those shown in the promo material.
If you have any comments or questions be sure to leave them down below.