What you get back
- A verdict — Buy, Wait, Avoid, or Risky bet.
- Conviction from 1 to 99, and a risk grade: Low, Moderate or Elevated.
- One plain sentence answering the question, 3–5 reasons tied to the actual data, and 1–2 things to watch.
What the analyst reads
- Two years of daily prices: the trend, the price versus a year ago, how far it sits from its 52-week high and low, how much it swings, and momentum (RSI — below 30 is beaten down, above 70 possibly overheated).
- Up to 15 years of seasonality: how the stock has done in each calendar month. It only calls something a seasonal tendency when the month closed up in at least 70% of years (or down in at least 60%), says how many years that covers, and never presents it as a guarantee.
- Dated catalysts in the next 30 days: earnings, Federal Reserve decisions and sector seasons. Earnings within two weeks are flagged as an event that could swing the price either way.
- Recent headlines. The analyst may only cite events that appear in them — no invented news, prices or events.
- You. Your answers to the sign-up questions (experience, goal, comfort with risk, how long you hold) shape the call: a cautious long-term investor and an aggressive short-term trader should not get the same answer about the same stock. Your profile also sets hard rules, such as the largest position size it will suggest and whether a Risky bet is allowed at all.
- Your trading history, if you imported it: your habits, and your own record with this ticker — "you already hold 12 shares at $98, so this is an add, not a new buy".
What the verdicts mean
- Buy — the data supports buying now, at a size that fits your profile.
- Wait — a decent company at a bad entry point. Often the most useful answer: the business is fine, the price is stretched.
- Avoid — the risks outweigh the case right now.
- Risky bet — only with money you can afford to lose. It is never offered if your profile says to play it safe.
The analyst is told plainly that a smaller number of honest calls beats cheerleading, so expect plenty of Waits.
Deep Dive: the long version
Pro members get 10 Deep Dives a month on our most capable model. A Deep Dive adds fundamentals (valuation, growth, margins, debt), analyst ratings and price targets, peers, 30 days of news and the full 15-year seasonality table, and comes back with a bull case, a bear case, what would change the call, and a written plan: entry, sizing, when to add or trim, the level where the idea is wrong, and the time horizon.
The limits, honestly
It is research, not a promise. It reads data and can still be wrong — markets react to things nobody sees coming. Nothing in WhatToTrade buys or sells anything for you, and nothing here is financial advice. If you want to see how our daily picks have actually done, every one is graded in public on the track record page — losses included.