Steven Hicks

Markets rarely move on price alone. One of the most overlooked pieces of market information is trading volume—the number of contracts or shares changing hands during a given period. While price tells you what is happening, volume often provides clues about how much conviction is behind the move. Imagine

Successful investing is often portrayed as a search for the perfect strategy or the perfect prediction. In reality, long-term success usually comes from something much simpler: a commitment to continuous learning. Markets change. Economies change. Weather patterns shift. Supply chains evolve. New technologies emerge. Investors who stop learning eventually

No factor moves commodity markets faster or less predictably than geopolitics. A missile strike, a coup, a sanctions announcement or a trade war escalation can move crude oil five percent before most traders have had their morning coffee. Understanding how geopolitical risk flows through commodity markets doesn't make

Energy markets have a rhythm. Crude oil, natural gas and gasoline prices don't move randomly through the year — they follow recurring seasonal patterns driven by demand cycles, refinery maintenance schedules and weather. Traders who understand the calendar have a structural edge over those who don't. The

Federal Reserve announcements are among the most closely watched events in global finance. They move equities, bonds and currencies — but their effect on commodity and forex markets is often underappreciated by traders who focus primarily on technical signals. Understanding the transmission mechanism between interest rates and asset prices is essential

Most retail investors treat stock market indices as interchangeable. If the S&P 500 is up, the market is up. If the Nasdaq is up, the market is up. In practice, the relationship between these two major indices contains more information than either one provides alone — and when they

The gold-silver ratio is one of the oldest tools in commodity analysis. It measures how many ounces of silver it takes to buy one ounce of gold. When the ratio is high, gold is expensive relative to silver. When it's low, silver is expensive relative to gold.

If you trade corn, wheat or soybeans, there is one US government report that matters more than any other: the USDA's World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates, published monthly as the WASDE. Understanding what it contains and how to interpret the key numbers is as important for grain

Copper has earned a nickname in financial markets that no other commodity has: Doctor Copper. The idea is that copper is so deeply embedded in economic activity — construction, manufacturing, electricity, transportation — that its price effectively diagnoses the health of the global economy. When copper rises, the economy is likely expanding.

If you trade any commodity, equity index, crypto or forex pair and you're not watching the US dollar index, you're trading with one eye closed. The DXY doesn't just affect dollar-denominated assets — it influences the relative cost of nearly every major market on