By William Bradstreet Stewart
One of the greatest joys in my work as a publisher is when a long-time client comes to us with their own individual research and breakthroughs that they would like to contribute to the field. This is the case of our latest author, Johannes Sundberg (nick-named Ola, as in the last two TW articles), who originally purchased some Ferrera works from Sacred Science Institute all the way back around the turn of the century.
It wasn’t until 2019, in response to our release of Sean Erikson’s Trading with Selene’s Chariot, that Sundberg wrote to me personally telling me of some fascinating discoveries that he had made some years back that were so powerful they literally scared him, such that he put them away for some years before daring to explore their profound implications. With Sundberg’s permission, I will quote a little from his first communication, as it is so interesting:
I have been in the field of technical analysis for 20 years and stumbled upon Gann in the late 90´s. After quite an intense research period in the early 2000´s, I stood in the shower one morning and suddenly just heard: "Why do not you try it this way?" I did try it the same evening and to my great surprise it worked! I was able to forecast the market months and even years in advance to the exact day!
I have developed this system which builds on astro and mathematics and now have 5 sets of strategies developed from this original idea and they all work quite well. I have also created systems for calculating future support and resistance and it is fantastic to see how beautifully the prices bounce off these levels. I pinpointed the low in 2009 after the financial crisis to the exact day.
I am 100% convinced that these methods were used by Gann. I am sure that he had more tools than this in his toolbox, but these strategies are nevertheless a standalone profitable trading system.
When I first discovered this method, it was just too much. I had to put it away, it was more than I could handle. After that, I have taken up the work from time to time and for the last year more seriously.
I have been thinking about what to do with this knowledge? It is sensitive, it is explosive…
That knowledge you now hold in your hands… after two years of slow but steady explanation, detailed elaboration, and extensive illustration, Sundberg’s insight from the shower now stands as this technical manual on astro-geometric forecasting and trading, inspired by and based upon original insights discovered but well-hidden by the great Market Master, W. D. Gann.
As to the aforementioned insights, clearly such an introduction would capture anyone’s attention, and even more so a lifetime Gann researcher and publisher. What are these fascinating insights that are so juicy even Sundberg had to take time to approach them? These insights crack into a branch of Gann Theory that I personally have always found to be overly complex and difficult to intellectually grasp and visualize. This branch centers around the principle of planetary time, or time-by-degrees as it is also called, and the manipulation of such time so as to project the future.
Everybody understands the principle of 360° being the measure of the circle which any orbit of any body revolving around an axis completes upon one full revolution. Our planet takes 365¼ days to go 360° around the sun in what we call 1-year, Earth time. So does every other body in our solar system follow the same rule in defining the period of its orbit, and similarly do the relationships of two planets to each other come back together at the 360° conjunction of their “synodic cycle” according to different time variables for each pair. These relationships are less commonly known outside the realm of cycle analysts or celestial mechanics.
However, the one thing that does not usually consciously register to most people is that all our references to time are based upon the motions of the Earth and the calendar that we Earth-dwelling humans have derived from such motions. Even when referring to celestial bodies that are not bound by Earth time, we still refer to them too by measures of Earth time, thereby limiting our perception of “true” time as defined by any individual object itself and its own motion.
This perception was something that Gann was the first to recognize and to redefine according to the true nature of each individual phenomenon itself, so that each planet, rather than being measured in Earth time, is instead measured in units of its own motion, planetary degrees of longitudinal movement, thereby allowing time to be defined by the perspective and motion of the observer, in this case any individual planet under consideration
The genius of W. D. Gann was in his ability to reframe perspectives, and in so doing, perceive patterns and relationships that would otherwise be invisible to a normal observer. He was the first to divide price scales into harmonic frequencies, his 8ths and 3rds and octave retracements demonstrating the musical patterning upon which the market scaffolding is clearly structured.
His geometrical angles define the angles of attack or slope a different market impulses or trends which are directly associated with energetic properties defining the power or weakness of an impulse vector initiated at a turning point in the market. Such analysis brought the first traces of quantitative science to a subject still considered to be, if not totally random, at least too qualitative to be scientifically quantified, at least according to “academics”, “economists”, and other such armchair theoreticians.
But traders are quite different beasts! “Whatever works!” is their dictum, and Gann’s tools have been proven for more than a century to work like no other market technology, with the caveat:
in the hands of a proficient Gann technician…
Unfortunately, there are not so many “proficient Gann technicians” out there, and even fewer who are willing to share their hard-earned wisdom with the public. Thus, we are quite fortunate to have the opportunity to gain access to the tried-and-true trading techniques of a proficient Gann technician. One who is not only willing to share his professional expertise with us, but who has taken the time and effort to present his work with the clarity and solidity of a scientific thesis.
For Sundberg’s intention here is not just to revivify a collection of Gann’s forgotten astro-trading techniques for a new generation of Gann analysts to profit from, but more so to demonstrate the absolute validity of this Theory of Celestial Influence, as it has been called. If we were to pander to the academic establishment, who would surely balk at the term “influence”, perhaps we could tone it down slightly to the Theory of Celestial Correlation, though that doesn’t have quite the ring to it. Perhaps we could compromise with the ancient’s term, The Doctrine of Correspondences.
Call it what you will, the purpose of Sundberg’s book is not to theorize about it but to actually USE it! Aside from my introduction, this is not a theoretical work at all. In fact, there is almost no foundational teaching on planets, astronomy, astrology, geometry or even Gann, really. The principles and techniques are so straight forward that they do not require any complex or prerequisite understanding of these subjects. What you don’t know, you can either look up to better understand, or just do the calculations without understanding and it will work just as well.
Further, there is absolutely NO astrology in this work as the subject is understood today. While these are astro-geometric techniques, they are purely astronomical, geometrical, and mathematical, and do not have any kind of association with what would be called “astrology” whatsoever! Sundberg does not make any horoscopes or track any planets through “houses” or read the energy of any “signs” to determine their “qualities” or “influences”. Square angles are not “bad” and trine angles “good”, nor are there other such qualitative designations in this work.
No, this is not that kind of “astrology”, and though Gann did also mess with some of that sort of analysis, that is not where the foundations or mechanics of this system lie! This system is better characterized by the term celestial mechanics, meaning the mechanical motions and dynamic interactions between the celestial objects that orbit our Sun, along with all forces and energies existent within our Solar System (sun, planets, moons, comets, asteroids, meteors, solar wind, plasma, energy, radiation, light, electromagnetic energy, etc.) but also coming from without as we move through deep cosmic space at speeds approaching fractions of the speed of light…
While celestial mechanics best defines the system we are operating within, astro-geometry better identifies the system of dynamic geometric relationships between celestial bodies as they progress through their individual planetary motion while simultaneously relating to secondary objects ranging from planets to their own satellites to the Sun guiding them through the cosmos.
Gann’s methodology focuses upon the motions of these bodies and the mathematical relationships defining how these objects interact with each other to create (or somehow correlate with) an order or synergy within the markets. There is something almost haunting about these unusual relationships between price and time, so much so that anybody would find something “magical” behind them, the kind of magic that magic squares or mathematical puzzles exhibit, as so much of Gann’s work tends to have, which is what attracts many of us to it.
This astro-geometry looks like what we all see as typical Gann geometry with angle fans, trend lines, crossing zero-degree angles, sequential cycle projections, individual cycle projections and many things that any Gann analyst will be familiar with. What is different is the shifted perspective, first of translating to planetary time and then of mathematically orientating all the geometric tools on the chart to that that active astro-geometry. The uninitiated may look at Sundberg’s chart and see nothing beyond an ordinary Gann style chart, but the initiated will see something more that is encoded into these lines when seen astro-geometrically.
What is particularly handy about this point is that since the chart geometry is set according to the active planetary geometry, there is never any need to square one’s charts. The adjustment is made in the setting of the tools to correlate with the planetary geometry so that the chart tools square to the chart rather than the chart to the tools, as is common practice. This makes for considerably easier application of the tools and allows for the use of hand drawn charts or charting software that changes the x/y-axis relationship, usually such a problem for Gann’s geometric techniques.
After revealing Gann’s ingenious method of mapping planetary time to the geometry of our charts, Sundberg applies an unusual intellectual dexterity in interpreting and manipulating Gann’s unique mathematical calculations implied by his cryptic references to the Circle, the Square and the Triangle. What does one do with such ideas to take them beyond mere intellectual ponderings in Natural Philosophy to meaningful applications in analysis and trading?
Sundberg illustrates how these structures serve to measure facets of the price/time geometry of the financial markets. But in order to do as Gann intended with such techniques, the price/time geometry must be planetarily orientated or else it is inactive and powerless. Principles such as the “squaring of price and time” define astro-geometric power points where the coalescence of planetary energies peaks or troughs and the market rebounds with energetic charge producing short, explosive moves or instigating longer consistent trends that are easily tradable.
Sundberg’s shower breakthrough led him to a creative discovery and application of Gann’s projection methodology which was “hidden in plain sight” using, as Gann explained it, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, as forms of advancing and declining at varying speeds and with varying relationships. Squaring ends up being a similar means of advancing and declining but with a different output than these other methods. The combination of all these variables produces an output of high-quality trades setups such as Gann was famous for.
One begins to understand Gann’s cryptic references as relating to key variables in an algorithm which defines a moving system of objects, orbits and forces operating in vibratory resonance with one other and the market. It is complex system of interrelating objects and energies in a constant state of flux, which at times brings certain points into sympathetic resonance activating key changes in the market. Determining where theses points of resonance will occur in advance and capturing the best of them in the primary intention of this work.
This freedom of transformative mathematical thinking led directly to Sundberg’s insight into this Secret Science of Squaring that lies at the intersection of astronomy, geometry, mathematics and music, the great Pythagorean Quadrivium, also called the 4 Liberal Arts, which lays at the foundation of the scientific knowledge of the Western world and forms the basis of the original University systems of Pairs and Oxford.
This system of Traditional Cosmology, Cosmology being a term invented by Pythagoras to describe exactly the kind of science that we are using in this work, was well comprehended by the ancients, and encoded into architectural and artistic time capsules preserving this advanced wisdom and technology for future seeker like W. D. Gann to decipher. This is an ancient science that has been around longer than recorded history itself, since it was first to document the 25,000-year cycle of the Precession of the Equinox, which the ancients supposedly learned through direct observation over 1000’s of years, one sign of movement through which takes a mere 2100 years.
This mysterious ancient system of universal knowledge was the source of Gann’s insight into this market wisdom, and now, after 20 years of labor as a professional investor and tireless researcher, Sundberg has come to unveil some of Gann’s secrets and to explain them in a way that is finally graspable and usable by a wider group of Gann analysts and traders.
Once you come to understand these calculations and relationships and how they truly operate, the simple pleasure of being able to project back and forth from major tops and bottoms in the past and into the future, often catching them to the exact day, even over many years, is a very intellectually satisfying exercise.
Though not nearly as satisfying as projecting a future trade setup, capturing the trade, and banking the profit in your trading account, which is the sincerest wish of the author and myself in your future endeavors… may your future trading pay for this course many times over…
For more information on Johannes Sundberg’s, The Secret Science of Squaring: W. D. Gann’s Lost System of Market Forecasting, please see his author page at The Institute of Cosmological Economics:
https://www.cosmoeconomics.com/EZ/ice/ice/sundberg.php
or email institute@cosmoeconomics.com for more information or to reach Mr. Sundberg.
