How do you know if a stock is a buy, hold, or sell? (the honest way)

1. The price trend — direction, and how much to trust it

The first lens is price. Extending a past trend forward gives a rough direction — but what matters is how steady that trend is. A jumpy stock produces a low-confidence projection. That's why a projection should be read as a range of outcomes, not a single line — a range, never a promise.

TICKR draws that projection and its range on each chart, and a trust guide warns first when the signal is weak. The shakier the trend, the less weight this lens deserves.

2. The fundamentals — is the business actually working (SEC filings)

The second lens is the company's actual report card: is revenue growing, what do margins look like. These numbers come not from marketing but from official filings submitted to the U.S. SEC (EDGAR). They move slower than price, but they reflect the real business.

Price reflects expectations; fundamentals reflect reality. When they point the same way the signal is strong; when they diverge, that's your cue to ask why.

3. Combining them — Strong / Mixed / Weak

TICKR combines these two lenses — a statistical model (price trend, 70%) and SEC-filing fundamentals (30%) — into a Strong / Mixed / Weak read. Instead of a hard "buy/sell", it shows how much the two lenses agree. The final decision, and the responsibility, is always yours.

"Mixed" isn't a failure — it's an honest answer: price looks good but earnings aren't following, or vice versa. Simply knowing that disagreement exists puts you ahead of most beginners.

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