is ready and about to get started. She's talking to us about trading on the side of institutional money in gaps. And I just have a little bit, I think she'll tell us more about herself when she comes on, but I wanted to tell you, she's the founder and owner of an international education company where she teaches people how to successfully trade the stock market. And the method she uses, she created it, she teaches it, she owns it. It's unique to the stock swish. And the method is based on one strategy called golden gaps, which pinpoints institutional money in the stock market. Welcome, Melissa. And you just have to unmute yourself. And well, how are you? Terrific. Let me know if you can see my screen. Let's see. Can you see my screen? Yes. Wonderful. Thanks so much for having me, Sherry. Welcome, everyone. An exciting time right now and a great time to be speaking. If I wouldn't be talking to you, I'd probably have CNBC on live right now because there is a Fed meeting going on right now. And even though they came out, can you hear me? Yes, I said, wow, I forgot. I didn't forget, I knew about it, but I didn't realize it was right during today. That's okay. Well, they up to rates a quarter of 25 basis points, which I expected after all the bank collapse in the last two weeks. However, it's really gonna be what Paul says, which he's talking right now, that's really going to affect the market. So we had a slight bump up and a rally here in the last 30 minutes, but whether or not it holds, will depend on exactly what he says. So I'm sort of watching the sidelines and we have time at the end. I know I have an hour to speak today. I will pull up some charts and we can talk about that at the end. But this is a great topic for today to talk about trading on the side of institutional money-wide because this market, January, February, March, 2023's market, I found to be in a very, very, very range bound way. So you can pick a side to trade. You can play both sides of the market if you want, but we haven't had any follow through, any follow through at all since January of 2023. Actually, if you go back really till November, even October, we've had no follow through up or down in the overall market. So it's been a tough, tough time for traders unless you're choosing individual stocks to trade. If you wanna trade this five, if you wanna trade the QQQs, which I do sometimes train, the reality is you're not getting the commitment from institutional money in this market. You're just not getting it. You're getting slight moves up, you're getting slight moves down and every time people get in and think, oh, this is it, this is it.  So I think in this type of environment, the best thing you could do for yourself is to find selective stocks to trade. What did we do today? My live trading room, I run a live trading room, we shorted Nike. We shorted Nike, I called to put, it fell, it worked, we did it. So that was on earnings, okay? Nike had earnings out last night. Now, there are times when I do stocks, when I take trades that are non-earnings gaps, okay? So again, sometimes I will do specific stocks for other reasons, could be news gaps, could be something like today. Okay, you may have some volatility going into tomorrow, gaps to the market, whatever, things to have to do with market stocks that I may look at. But I think the best place to focus on right now, so far until we get out of the range in this market, is to focus on individual stocks, specific trades, and particularly earnings moves. And if anybody has a question, you can just plop it in the room and I'll see the question as we go along here today. So if you have questions as well, you can always email me after the fact at melissathestalkswitch.com. You can call me at 929-3200 Gap. You can follow me on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Skype. I also appear on TV, I appear on Fox News, CBS News, News Nation, Shutter. I pretty much am on every single network and I've been talking about the market and how I believe that the market that we could possibly go into a recession towards the end of 2023. Now, again, I will listen to what the Fed share says after my lecture here today. But the reality is that if they don't keep raising rates, okay, which is part of the problem why we had the bank issues in the last two weeks, which I can talk about a little bit more later, but if they don't keep raising rates, what is the Fed going to do to curb inflation? We have a situation where inflation has gone up and it's pitted off a little bit. I mean, in reality, it's hardly come down at all. If you look at where we were 24 months ago, three years ago, the cost of food has gone up so much dramatically and oil has gone up so much. And even though it's ticked down slightly, the cost of oil per barrel is still too high and the major problem with many of the things that we buy, food, everything, everything we buy, I just moved, I bought furniture, everything gets to you in a truck. So the cost of diesel fuel is too high. And unless that comes down, the Fed can keep bumping up rates and I'm not sure if it really gets a handle on inflation. And part of the reason why we have an issue right now is because this administration is not friendly to the energy sector. So I think that we're in for a situation in the coming six to seven, nine months, possibly could be even into 2024 where we will see a turbulent market. So the best thing you can do for yourself is have a plan of action to trade, know what you're doing, know why you're doing it, set your risk, and most importantly, get out of trades when you're up. Again, we get out of the Nike today. Bing, bang, boom. We were out, done. It continued, it went past where I get out of it. It doesn't matter. I made money. I was done, it was done quickly in the morning. I take trades, I'm usually out by 10 a.m. Eastern time. It's chunking it out to be successful. As a day trader, you must learn to book profits. It's too choppy. It's too choppy, like I said, even though people are very bullish in this market right now, I am not, okay? I'm cautious and I think that we are still in a range. Again, we're gonna know a lot more in the next 24 hours after he speaks and then we see how the market reacts tomorrow morning in the gap. Then again, any questions plop him in the room, feel free. But anyways, getting back to the overall market, 2022 was a great year to short. And for those of you that don't know me, I do prefer to short, okay? If you don't know how to short, if you don't know what to short, if you don't know when to short, then you missed out in a great year to actively day trade the market in 2022. And again, there's opportunities in any type of market bullish or bearish to short, but in this type of environment, you do need to know how to do both, okay? You really have to become an expert in both, both longs and shorts, all right? Now I put here the stats for all of last year, just to give you an idea, if you wish $2,800 per trade, this was our stats for the day trade and run a live day trading room. These trades were called in the room for 2022 for the whole year, $651,079 for the whole year. This is all the trades we did in 2022. Most of them were shorts. Some of them were longs, but most were shorts. This is, these are day trades on margin with an average risk of $2,800. Now I also do options, okay? The options that I do come not in a live room but on a newsletter where the trades are emailed to you live. I risk more money in my options. You can risk less. You can risk $100 a trade if you want. You can take one contract. So this is with an average risk of $8,000 per trade. You could have made over $3 million last year taking all my trades. Most of these were puts. We did use some calls. This is all the stats. Winners and losers for last year. We had, like I said, a very, very good year last year as far as win ratio percentage. And again, it was a great year to short, all right? Now this year, you have to be more selective. So this is the kind of year where people that are day trading that aren't doing well, they're gonna get cut out. Bing, bam, boom, okay? They're gonna have horrible years. If you really wanna get better at your trading, the market will push you and give you an opportunity to excel, to succeed, to push yourself to do better. Trading during these times, when we have the volatility, gives you an opportunity to make money if you know what to do, okay? If you know what to do. And again, nothing in life that is great comes without taking chances or risk. You have to be willing to take risk to make money in the market if you're someone that's been thinking about trading for a long, long time, and doing this actually for career, it's a transition, all right? It's a transition period. Everybody wants to have everything yesterday, today, tomorrow, everybody we're in a very impatient society, but the fact is that you have to be willing to do the hard work to get there. And if you do, you can. If someone said five years from now, you could be making a million dollars a year, what would you do to make that happen for yourself? So that's really how you have to look at it. Have goals and be willing to do what you need to do to achieve those goals. You take baby steps, but you have to take some steps forward or you're never gonna get there, all right? So there's a difference between risk. Gotta take risk to make money. And then there's also a difference between risk and risk for risk sake. So it's calculated risk. So when I get up in the morning and decide what I wanna trade, what direction, it's using calculated risk. And that's, again, where you set your risk, whether it's $2,800 a trade or $500 a trade or 3,000, whatever you wanna risk, I take the trade up, put in a stop, and if it stops me out, I lose. But that is still looking at it and using discipline with calculated risks to take a trade. And again, any questions, write it in the room. So unless you've been on vacation in an island with no internet, you know about the bank collapse of Silicon Valley bank that happened in the last two weeks and all the scuttle butt that happened preceding that. Again, I anticipate, you know, the meeting today and what Pal says as he's talking right now, we'll have, he's going to address that, all right? The Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, has been addressing it. She addressed it this week when she was talking to and obviously there was a run in the bank. That's what happened. So I spent 17 years in the banking industry. I started my career actually as a teller, used to cash checks. So I started my life in the world of finance. So I, you know, started it from the ground up and I understand very, very well how the banking system works. I've worked for some of the largest banks on the planet and I've also worked for small regional banks. In fact, I started out as a small regional bank that got bought and bought and bought. But the reality is that we need regional banks, okay? Regional banks would do loans for small businesses and individuals that large banks would never do. And so it's important to have them. And if you've ever seen the movie, it's a wonderful life and it's a Christmas movie. Usually it's on a Christmas time. If you've never seen it, you should watch it. It's a story where it kind of explains what happens when you have a run in the bank. Because a lot of people don't understand. And again, I do because of my banking industry. If everybody went and tried to take all of their cash out of the bank today, right now, tomorrow, at any point in time, they wouldn't be able to do it. Why? Banks don't have the cash on hand for you to go out and do that. And again, when banks, when you look at a bank, when you, if you ever look at a bank's assets, total assets, they're including many things in that. They're including stocks. They're including bonds. They're including cash as well. So what happened with Silicon Valley Bank, and I'll just quickly talk about this for a minute, was they were invested in long-term bonds, okay? Which usually in a low interest rate environment, which we are not in right now, but in an interest rate environment where rates are low or going down, those would be very good assets to hold, okay? In an interest rate environment where rates are going up, which we've seen the last six months, which consequently is where the market is at in the range. So ever since the Fed started bumping up rates a lot, going back, like I said, October, October, November, December, January, February, March, so six months, the market has been at a rage ever since the Fed's been bumping rates out to try to control inflation, which I don't think they've got a hold of, and they definitely don't. That's why they raise rates again now. People wanted them not to raise rates because of the bank collapse. They did anyways. Anyways, getting back to what I was saying, when you're in an interest rate environment where rates are going up, the value of long-term bonds goes down. Now, if you can hang on to those bonds until the end of the bond term, you're fine. You're fine, okay? However, people wanted their cash out of Silicon Valley Bank, and when they went to liquidate the assets then to sell the bonds, then they were worth less, and quite a lot less than what they were when they got them or if they had held the bond to the term, okay? So that's what happened really there with that. It was poor money management, poor management, overall poor risk management. So the one important takeaway from the Silicon Valley Bank class, which is a really big bank, okay? The important takeaway is that risk management is important even if you have a lot of money or a small amount of money. And again, I've been teaching people, I've had the stocks wish for 10 years going on 11. I teach people from all over the world. A lot of people complain. I don't have enough money, Melissa, to trade. I don't have enough money to trade. I don't have enough money to do your class. I don't have enough money for this, that. If you had 500 grand in account and you didn't have any risk management, you could lose it all. You could lose it like that, okay? So this bank had lots of money, poor risk management, and they went under, okay? So you can take a small account and trade, take one contract, a hundred share lots. You can trade and grow that account slowly and do well. All right? Yes, you can. Having a lot of money does not necessarily mean you are gonna be successful. Of course, everyone in an ideal world would like to have good control, good discipline, good money management, a good system, and a lot of money to trade so they can risk more, all right? But that is a reality for a lot of people. But the takeaway is you need good risk management no matter how much money you have, okay? So can you do well during these times when inflation is high, when we could be going into recession, when the markets are at an unknown point? Okay, we're nowhere near the highs. I don't even know why anyone is so bullish on this market because we're absolutely, absolutely nowhere near the highs. But the reality is that you still can make money during this market and like I said, you have to know how to short. Why so many traders? I have no idea why so many traders wanna go long, long, long, long, long. It doesn't make sense to me. I always loved to short. I've always loved to short. I've always veered to the short side first even though I sometimes go long. We went long Adobe. That was a nice trade. Probably gonna have that a little too early. But that was a nice day trade to the upside. It was a long and we did calls in that as well. You can look at that chart. We did it after the earnings too. But again, a lot of people work hard and they never get there. They never succeed. They never make a lot of money. They dream of doing it. They're not willing to take the sacrifices of the risk and they never do anything to really help themselves move forward, get ahead. So you can't, you don't wanna waste your time doing things that aren't gonna work. You don't wanna waste your time even though sometimes it's important to go to webinars and events like today. You don't wanna waste your time doing that forever. Eventually have to say, I'm gonna actually trade live. I'm gonna commit, I'm gonna learn something. I'm gonna be smart. I'm going to decide to trade and move forward. So I think it's important to understand that you may be impacted by this inflation cycle where you have a set salary, all right? But you can make extra money in the market. And you need to understand how to do that and you need a quality system to be successful too. So the central structure to trading results must be a strategy with a solid foundation that's based on accurately rating price action and advanced technical analysis. So that's how I make all of my decisions, okay? And I'll be the first one to tell you when trading times are easy and I will be the first one to tell you when it's choppy as well. And like I said, I believe this is choppy.  This has been a challenging market. In fact, two weeks ago I said in the trading room, I said, you know what, whatever you think the market's gonna do is, it's not. Whatever you think it's going to do, it's gonna do exactly what you think it's not gonna do because that's the times we're in. It's one of the things that people get frustrated about trading, but guess what? You either decide you're gonna get better, push through it, or choose specific stocks to trade that will go and have momentum moves on that particular day that have nothing to do with the market and they don't need the market. They don't need the market to move higher than on any market to move lower, okay? Because until the market gets out of their range, you know, you either play both sides or you're almost scalping, okay? So we're sterile enough in the year, still way early enough in the year to set your goals for the year. I'm a very goal-oriented person. How much money do you wanna make this month, this week? What's your risk? Put a plan in place to achieve your financial goals for 2023. It's important to empower yourself to trade the market successfully. You want to do well. So everyone that comes to my trading room has to have to take my class. That is a prerequisite for joining my room because I want people to be successful and if they didn't take my class, they're not gonna understand what I'm doing in the live room because the trades go so fast and they set up very, very quickly. Any questions here while I'm going along? I have the little chat box up if anybody has any questions. Is everyone listening to me? Are you listening? Are you listening to pal? I'll have to look later and see what the market's doing. Anyways, one nice thing about day trading is you can work from home, all right? That is a nice benefit. For me, I work from home. Again, you need a computer, you need live charts, okay? You need the pre-market, the post-market. You need live data and you can do it. And you can make your own hours trading. Now, personally, I like to trade in the morning between 9.30 and 10 a.m. Eastern time but some people will trade all day. I prefer to trade the morning, first half an hour an hour of the day when I'm trading and it's really a dream job in the sense that you don't have to work 40 hours a week, all right? So it's, the market's only open for six and a half and like I said, I don't trade all day. I might once in the blue moon, like today I'm watching what's happening. If I wasn't here talking to you, I'll be watching what's happening right now. Maybe I'd trade it but I'm doing this but in general, I'm done in the morning and I'm just done. And as you get better at what you're doing, you can risk more and that's where the idea of unlimited income potential is something that is very aspirational for people because if you're stuck on a job where you make say 75, 80 grand a year and then all of a sudden eggs are going for $7 a dozen, where are you gonna get the extra money to pay the eggs?  And this is where a lot of people are right now. Someone is saying about 25K about, well, let's talk about it. There's two things we can talk about as far as stats. Again, I'm not a broker but the rules are for retail traders in the US you need a minimum of 25,000 to have a margin account to actively J-trade as many trades as you want in and out. That's the rule. You get four to one margin. Now, if you want to do options, an option is you pay the cost of the contract. You can open up an options account with $2,000. Now that would be a cash account. You could set it up that way. That is not a margin account where you take the equity trades. That would be where you could do the options accounts. The options trades will be an options account. There are also prop places that you can go to. You can check out any one number of them where they give you 10 to one margin and you can put up say $5,000. You'd have 50,000 in buying power than with 10 to one margin. Or like I said, do the options. If you have less than 25,000, many, many people like to do options. Why? Because you don't have to worry about something called buying power, which we can talk about a little bit more later. Does that answer your question? And again, we were talking about the bank failures. Again, I don't want to get too off topic here. But 250,000 is the minimum FDIC. Depends how you title the accounts.  Now, they covered all of the assets with the banks that went under, which was highly unusual and very, that was very, that was something that came out that they have not made official whether or not they're going to do that. And Yellen didn't really address that the other day when she topped. It was controversial because they felt like they were bailing out big, big companies. But in reality, there were many companies that couldn't make payroll going into that Friday when the FDIC took over that bank, SVB. And if they hadn't covered the deposits of those many, many companies, they wouldn't have been able to make payroll and it would have been a trickle down effect where it would have affected a lot of people, a lot of industries. And it just, it would have been like a whole big mishmash. The problem is banks are connected. Everything's connected. This is where we live and it's sort of like a house of cards. And this is the problem right now and the challenge that the Fed is facing in reference to inflation. We had so much stimulus, so much free money. Congress keeps adding onto the debt. Interest rates were low for far too long now and now they're bumping them up too fast, which is why banks that were invested a long-term bonds basically got screwed in the last couple of months. But even last year, again, talking about risk management, SVB had no idea there was gonna be a run on the banks for the people to take their cash out, the deposits out. However, again, knowing that we were in an interest rate environment where rates were going up because the Fed said they were gonna keep raising rates, they could have sold some of those bonds at that point and saved some of the money, even though they would have been worth less rather than letting them go to where they were in 2023 because obviously as each month went on with the rate hikes, they were worth less and less and less. But you get something called civic insurance. If you have an account out of retail broker, these are all questions that you should ask the broker. These are all things that you need to know. You should also understand when you go into a bank and up and up account and make deposits, what's going on too. And again, I don't wanna get too off topic, but I'm very experienced in the banking industry and now trading as well for 15 years I've been trading. So my whole career between trading and banking spans 30 plus years and it's a very complex structure, but it's something that you need to know because you need to know where your money is and you need to be up on these things. That's the best way that I can put it. Okay, getting back to what I was saying. Trading, do you know the right way to read a chart? Well, you should. If you do not, you should not be trading at all because you need to know when somebody's going up and you need to know when somebody's going down because you're only gonna make money going long, something that moves higher and you're only gonna make money shorting when something falls. As simple as that sounds, it's something that people just don't pay attention to. So my strategy involves gaps, okay? And one strategy is all you need to be successful in the market, that's it. You do not need a general overall broad-based view to make money. Tons of people have that and they fail all the time. There also is no magic indicator that will tell you what to do and exactly when, specifically in these times, but all the time, there isn't. If there is, everybody would have it and it would be worthless actually as an indicator. So those things are overlays. You should not be making trading decisions based on them. If you can learn how to read institutional money and price patterns and gaps, then you don't need to do anything else because if your reason for doing this trade is to make money, this will make you money. So it's following the patterns of institutional money in the market. Now I was talking about this earlier goal setting. Think about where you wanna be at the end of the year. With your trading, if you're trading now or even financially. So you're not even trading. You're thinking about doing it. Do you wanna start trading, start making money and by 1231.23, be in a better place financially than you are now. Have more money in your checking account, more money in your saving account, more money in your trading account. This is important. Success in the market is about mastering a skill. You gotta get good. And that's how you make large consistent profits and you need to know how to do it in any market. This market, bullish markets, bearish markets, the whole event, okay? Now getting back to when I like to trade. I like to trade in the first half hour of the day. 9.30 the market opens, I'm in Manhattan and I like to be done by 10, 10.15, the latest, okay? I'm looking for gaps. And like I said, my strategy is called the golden gap. Where did I come up with that? It's like finding gold in the market. If I find one, Nike was one of those today. Like I said, we sure today, you can pull up the chart. It looks at 26 points of the daily chart of a stop. The rating system is a checklist. The checklist tells you what to look for in the price of the stock. The points is what you learn in my class and that predicts price direction correctly when a stock is gapping. So in the case of Nike, I saw it last night. I knew we were gonna do it today. I knew if the gap held, we were gonna do it today. I knew we were gonna short it and it worked. The points tell you where the money is flowing. So what happened today with Nike? It got dumped, boom. It got sold off plus shorts were in it too, okay? That's how you know where to take it to get the right direction for profit. So since I devised a system, it took me about three years. Like I said, I've been training for 15. I realized that gaps have 80% of the move in the first half of the day. So there's no point in training for six and a half hours. It's the money move. You get in, get out. You play the move, you're done. This also makes it possible for people who are doing other jobs to trade in the morning and do other things. You just want that big move. That's it. You get the big move. You don't have to worry about the shakes and jitters. You don't have to worry about the Fed talking at two o'clock in the afternoon. You need momentum to make money in any type of market and the volatility pains you when you get it in the right direction, okay? Any other questions here as I'm going along? So I was talking about the market. I just clipped here about since January. Well, since the first day of the year here, which was the third. So let's talk about gaps. What is a gap? A gap is a doing through the close and the open. It's simple. How do we start out the year? Let's take a look at it. So this was the last day of the year. The 30th closed here, gaped up. Started out the year up. And then what did we do? We fell. We didn't start out the year that great actually. So we failed on a bullish gap up to start the year of 2023. That's not giving me the warm and fuzzings for the year. Just so you know. Now we did rally in January and everybody got crazy bullish. We lost it all in February. Again, I'm just showing here February and March. Now, success and large profits come from what? Quality, not quantity. One trade a day, that's it. That's all you need. The more trades you take, the higher potential for losses. So the idea is to do one trade, make the money and stop. It's not trade, trade, trade all day. It's like if you go gambling, go to Atlantic City or something. I've never been big in Atlantic City. But the reality is that you're gonna give it back at some point if you're ahead. So you stop when you're up. The philosophy behind my 26 point system is to find stocks to trade that have never won a high probability of directional bias for the entire day. That's what I want. Big moves on the day, chunking it out, $1, $2. Early confirmation of my bias in the move in the morning between 9.30 and 10 and precise entries with follow-up route and a good risk to reward because that's really what I want. Now, oh and all the things were happening about the banks.  We had a big trade in this. Again, you could have done an option if you don't have a margin account. You could have bought a put in this or you can do it as a margin trade. We did this as a day trade. Entry was 135.35 with 4,000 shares. It's an average of $3,000. This is not the buying power. This is a risk where you put it in a stock. This would have failed, which it didn't. You would have lost three grand. Now, the buying power you would have needed is what? It's always the cost of the stock which varies times the share quantity divided by the margin you have which if you had an account, I'd save it someplace like Ameritrade. I appear in Ameritrade's network, it's four to one. Okay, so 25 grand would get you what? 100,000 in BP. You need a little bit more than that to do even a thousand shares of this across the 135. This was a nice move though.  This was a short, fell $4, boom, out of the sky. Profit was 14,600. Let's take a look at it. Today here was big, fat, red bar. Now, again, what do I trade? Gaps, stock close here, gap down. Stock close here at 138, boom. Open in the morning, 136 and change, fall off a planet. I could have even gotten a better exit in this again. This kept going. So a really nice move to the downside in JPM. Oh, here it is again. So this is the daily. So this is institutional, what? Selling, the dump. A dump down, dump the stock. Again, all banks were under pressure during that time. Regional banks, many of them were halted. We did not trade them. It's scary to be in a stock that's halted so we didn't do it, okay? What if you had a smaller risk? 2,000 shares, 1,500 risk. You could have made $7,300. Divide this by two again, 750. You could have made over three grand. Again, you have to be normal. You have to look at your risk. You have to look at your cash. Again, the problem with the bank failures was they were betting out too big. They were taking too much risk in a wrong interest rate environment. So you see, again, you have to be considerate of your cash and your risk, but you can still make money. You need quality trades. So I'm looking for gaps of rate over 20 points per my system. You wait for the ones that are good. You look for high odds. That's what it has to be. This is the same in anything. This is like if you were playing sports or going through an interview for a job. My niece actually is a dancer. She's a ballerina. I encouraged her to audition. She's in New York going to ballet school. I encouraged her to audition for the Rockettes. She's, I'm trying to get her up on it. She's like, oh, it's so hard. I said, go for it, go for it, go for it. Again, you go for it. You gotta go for it in life.  She's a good dancer. She's got good headshots. She is gonna stay positive about it. Hopefully she gets the first call back, the second call back, and so on and so forth. So you put, you do everything you can knowing that the competition is fierce. That's all you can do. That's all any of us can do. When we go into the market, when we take trades, when you take a trade and you make money, you're taking money from somebody else, okay? I'm sure there were people that went along with JPM and other stocks too, after they crashed thinking they were gonna bounce and you know what, they didn't. So you have to be conservative and have goals, you can have lofty goals, but be conservative in your timeframe of those goals. Be realistic, okay? And I think there's two, I think what part of the problem with the industry, the industry I've been as far as an educational industry for the stock market is too many people are out there telling people this thing, that thing, and the other thing that are educational, that teach classes and so on and so forth like mine or run live rooms and they tell people things that are unrealistic. Like you can take a $500 account and make a hundred grand in 30 days or 90 days. That's not realistic. Could you, yeah, once at a blue moon, but probably not. I couldn't even do that and I'm good at what I do. It's not realistic. So be realistic. Is it realistic for you to risk three grand and make three? Yes. Is it realistic for you to risk $300 and make $300? Yes, okay. Is it realistic to have a $2,000 options account and make 20 grand in a week? No. Could it happen? Yeah, if you get some huge trade, but probably not. Okay. Any questions here? Okay, I'm gonna keep going. This is another one that we did. Snap. Snap close to your gap down, fell, boom. So, stack close up here. The night before 1175, this was earnings. Came down here in the morning, 1125, fell. It's a little, little tiny one, but it had a good move and it worked. Again, something like this has moved a million miles, but it was a good trade. It was cheap, okay? This was a trade on margin. 1130 was the cost. We got out 1102. Target was 11 close enough. You were 3,000, you could have made 3360. Here's the daily. Again, stack close to your gap down. I rated it that it was gonna fall. Sell off. And it did. We shorted it in the room as a day trade. What if you took less risk? So you would have needed what? On 66,000 and buying power to take this position or so. That's not that bad. That's really not that bad. I mean, we don't, sometimes we do expensive stocks, which you could do a put in an option if you think it's too expensive with your margin account, or you do the day trade. And again, you could have made 1,680, risking 1,500. That's a good trade. You turned it over one. Turning it over a half is a good trade, in my opinion. Now, we also did Google. This was wild yesterday. This was a big rally yesterday, actually. The day we did this was Valentine's Day. Funny to look at, again, these are all shorts. Stock close to your gap down, fell. We shorted the tail, the gun ain't got out before the bounce. Again, I get in, get out quick. Entry was 93.75, 2,000 shares. Risk was, again, your risk should be the same on almost every trade, 2,900. We added above the price, because I liked it, thought it was gonna go. Total shares was 4,000. Average price was 93.87, and then boom. Again, looking for a dollar in and out. Nice trade, 42.60. So this, you would have needed, figure out the buying power slightly more. Again, you could have done an option. You could have done an option in this. You could have bought the put. If you took less risk, 1,000 shares, 2,000 total, you could have made 2,140. So again, it's the idea of playing momentum, playing the gap, and getting in quick, in and out. Any questions here so far? How are we doing? So let's get back to talking about why trade gaps. Why do they work so well? And why do they pay so well, because of the big moves? Because gaps are created with large institutional money. That's what makes a gap in the first place. The professional gaps that happen, and play out in stocks are formed by one thing, and one thing only, large institutional money. Therefore, you need a way that will help you pick the correct direction to play the gap, okay? And then confirm that the large money will flow with it. So by having a formula to reign and qualify the gap, you get confirmation and conviction that the large institutional money is on your side and you play it. Again, whether the side is up or down, but I prefer it to short. Gaps are an event. They create a sense of urgency. Hurry, hurry, hurry. You must get in here. If you don't get in here, now you're gonna miss it. Everybody can see the momentum after the fact. What good is that? JPM falls off a planet. Well, you missed it. You can't do a trade like that late. Timing is important for trades. Anyways, the sense of urgency comes where you must make a determination to do it, and rather quickly, but the prep work I do is in the pre-market or the post-market, and I decide if I wanna do it. And that's an action that's being forced by participants of the stock. This is why gap trading is incredibly powerful. Trading gaps is a powerful and profitable way to trade because you're trading on the side of power. That's what you wanna do. So every time I look at something and every time I analyze the gap, my whole philosophy is to analyze the daily chart. I look at a large timeframe to make the trend decision of the directional bias for the gap. A directional bias meaning is this a long or short? All large traders of every kind look at large timeframes to make decisions, particularly institutional traders. And someone was asking before about accounts and margin and this and that, no one should ever be afraid of margin. You actually, most active traders, even big traders, trade on margin, okay? Again, when you're taking something that is an option, you're not taking a margin position, but big traders trade options, and they also use margin, okay? So institutional traders take big positions. Banks, again, you know, trade the market. So that is part of their portfolio of assets. So you need to look at really what's going on and who's behind the move in something. Any questions here so far? I'm seeing the market's tanking. We have time, we'll bring it up. So you want to look to make entry decisions and exit decisions based on a small timeframe, the one minute chart, which has a high degree of focus and accuracy. Using the daily chart to make the decision for the stock pick allows for the accuracy and direction. Using the one minute chart allows for good risk toward trades with accuracy. Now, we were talking about options. And I say, but options is what? You can just pay the cost. So we did a spy put, expired in 310. Again, this is a newsletter, it gets emailed out to people. It costs 175, 50 contracts, which is a lot. But again, you can't lose more than you risk, okay? You could have made 171% on this trade. Beginner risk, six, 1,050, you could have made 1,800. That's a great trade. You could have spent $175 and doubled it. Now, when did I call this on the seventh? So let's take a look. Here, oops, now we're in March. So stock closed your gap down. I called the 400 puts, boom. Fallful planet, boom. See it? So again, if I'm in a trade and I'm up, I'm probably not holding the last day. I get this question a lot. I do not always have the best exit. I got told you earlier, I didn't have the best exit on Adobe. But the reality is that this fell even the last day. 385 down in here broke 385, called it here. This is momentum people. This is selling to the downside. We're seeing selling right now in the market. I don't know what pal's saying, but we're selling off. So let's talk about Tesla. I called the Tesla puts. These were very recently reprised. 235, 35, 82, 25 risks, sold at 675, profit 15,400. 187% return on investment. 2200 is your profit if you risked 1175. These are just cheap. You could spend 500 bucks, $235. Let's look at Tesla. The date I called this was March 7th too. Right in there, stock closed your gap down, fell. Boom, boom, boom. And again, I could have held this a little bit longer as well. So again, you're looking for momentum. This is selling people. Again, the market's selling off right now. It's about having a trained eye to read what's happening in the price action before it happens. Because after it happens, it's too late. It's too late. And then the risk assessment, the risk is too great. You understand what I mean? You have to assess what to do before it happens. And people say, well, how do I do that, Melissa? I don't know. I don't know how to do that. Yes, you learn it. You learn it. It's a skill. And you learn how to read the charts to learn it to predict what's gonna happen before it happens. Does that make sense? I'm so happy the market's selling off. I predicted this would happen. Like, I'm really, really, really excited right now actually that we're selling off. We'll see if we have time to talk about it. So let's talk about precision and detail. Accuracy counts and all trading fronts. Quality strategy, good risk to reward. Right entry, correct size, proper exit. Think about the lesson like I said in the bank class. What's the takeaway? Doesn't matter how much money you have. You need to have good money management, okay? And you can be successful with a small account or a large account. There's no guarantee if you have a lot of money you'll be successful. Being successful in the market takes detail. And it's certain level of precision, detail matters. It can make a difference in your making a lot of money one day or losing one day. So guess what? You have to learn what to do and when to do it. Without a good strategy, you will never make a dime in the market. You will never, ever get there. So how much money do you need to do this? You need a day trading retail account to do the day trades with prop or retail. You can do options with an options account which can be a cash account. And you can take my class, learn the system. You can open up an account anywhere you want. You can ask me, you need day charts, okay? There are paid scanners or free scanners. You can ask me about that too. But that is what you'll need. You also need to block out between 9.30 a.m. and 10 a.m. to train. So focus on the right information which is the price action in the charts and you've gotta have a plan for booking money. The nice thing is, like I said, you can work from home but it is about making money. If you were losing, you're on the wrong side of things. Like I said, the market has been choppy and anyone that tells you otherwise is just, doesn't have a clue, okay? Today again is 100% confirmation to me that we are still in this range. And I think the reality is that we could be range bound, the range may widen, the range may tighten. It could be for the next couple of months into the summer of this year, could go into the fall, could be all year. So what are you gonna do to make money if you wanna trade? And if you're trading, you better learn what to do. You better know what to do. You better be careful with your trades. You better take profits off when you're up, okay? And pick specific things where you don't need the market. Although, like I said, sometimes we play the market. Any questions here so far? So in today's world, it's just not the same as 25, 30 years ago. It's just not, even before COVID when you think about it. People are trading and they don't understand why things aren't working the same as they used to. Even the Fed said inflation was temporary and they were wrong. Part of the problem with the situation right now with the bank bailouts and everything else and again, I don't know what Jerome Powell's saying but it's a lack of confidence. It's when reality was helping the system that seems to be collapsing and then the lack of confidence too. Yellen, the market started falling the other day when Yellen was talking, market has no confidence in her. So it's, we live in a different environment. You can be a great employee, productive, outgoing, hardworking, it may not even matter to your employer if the company can't keep you on. I truly believe that the unemployment rate is gonna take close to 4% in the coming months, could be over 4%. What the Fed, that's maybe that's when the Fed then will stop raising rates or lower rates, actually lower rates then. But the problem is, one of the Fed's job is curbing inflation and keeping unemployment down. Unemployment almost has to spike for them to cut back rates. And when you look at all the companies, Amazon, Facebook, that are delaying people off Disney since the beginning of the year, you just say, well, wait a minute, how can this unemployment number be barely ticking up or seeing the same? Something doesn't add up. It's eventually gonna come to roost. Again, the unemployment number is a retroactive number. So eventually we're gonna see the outcome of it. Again, I don't know when, but if you are somebody that wants to make extra money, you can trade on the side. You could do it two days a week. You could do options on the side. We have a regular job, but you have to know what to do. Whether you're risking $100 or $1,000, you have to know what to do and you can empower yourself to learn what to do. There's a cost involved, studying up an account. Time out of your life. My class is on a weekend. That's a weekend you have to spend studying, but it's to your benefit if you wanna understand it and get somewhere and get ahead. And again, nothing in life that is great comes without taking chances or risk. And you've gotta come to terms with that.  That is not reality.  If it was that easy to trade, no one would ever lose. That isn't working this year and it didn't work last year either. So you have to understand what to do and when timing is critical too. Let me see if there's a couple questions. How much of this risk are you willing to lose? Well, I told you my risk on options in day and trades. That's it. 2,800 for a day and trade, sometimes it's 3,000. The options I'm risking a grand. Which institution is best to open an options account? Which do you recommend? I think any of the big ones are pretty much all the same. Again, if you wanna go to a place that has civic insurance, you should go and talk to them and find out that information because again, anything can happen. Schwab is a big bang. The first thing that you should do is go, take a look at that. In fact, I should have put that in here. What are the top 20 banks? Like you wanna focus on being in the top 20 banks right now and then you can open up a trading account in one of the top 20 banks. Like I feel like that's, I think the SVB was a once off. I think they were 16 or 17 before the class but they were once off. Like they just had poor management with that money management. So go look at the top 20 banks and if you wanna feel some kind of security, go and you can open up a trading account with one of them. As far as me recommending anybody, I don't have a relationship with anybody where I say, oh my gosh, I love this place, you know, whatever. Every place has problems and every place has situations. Some I don't like the platforms or the charts or whatever or the service, some I do, some are open 24 hours. So you gotta do what works for you but try to go to a big place. It's my recommendation. Somebody's saying, what is the most you spend in an option? Eight grand, $8,000 the cost of it. So it could be whatever it costs. So if something costs $10 a contract, then I'm doing eight. Does that make sense? The key to the system though is the 26 points. This is how I'm able to predict the move stock make so accurately including the market but even I have gotten the market wrong sometimes this year and I'm very good at winning the market. Now I got it right today. I thought we would fall on this move. So I'm happy about that but there's times when I've been caught on the wrong side of this market since it became a year. I never anticipated we'd have the rally we did in January. I lost in options trades in the market in the queues and the spy in January where I was on the wrong side of things. We didn't have follow through to the downside and then in February we did. Now March has been back and forth chopping. You saw the rally we had the last week. Now a lot of people never thought this sell-up would happen here now today. Again, I don't know why they wouldn't think it because the Fed has said nothing except for the fact they're gonna continue to raise rates. They haven't said anything different. So people thought the Fed was gonna come in and not raise rates today or say they're gonna lower them. I don't know why anyone thought that. Again, listen to what the people are saying. Don't listen to the pundits, okay? What are you saying here? I buy, puts, and sell them. I buy, calls, and sell them. I'm trading directional bias in the options and in my trades for the day trades. That's what I'm doing. I'm not doing complicated option strategies whatsoever at all. I'm trading the momentum in them. Nike, again, is a good example, did puts. It's fell, okay? Anyways, getting back to what I was saying. You follow the process. If you come and you take my class using the checklist, this is what I teach in the class. It's called the Golden Gat course. I think we're gonna have a few minutes here that I can pull up my charts and look at the market when I get through this. But the Golden Gap system is a 26 point professional bearish gap rating system. If you wanna learn it, the purpose of the system is to help you evaluate which gap to trade each morning using the checklist. That's how I do it. It's a class in how to find, pick, and play professional bearish gaps. The class is this weekend. Now I know that's close. The class from March is the 25th and 26th. You'd have to sign up by no later than Friday. The class for April is April 15th and 16th. If you're interested in that class, you can sign up for that too if you can't make this weekend. It's 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. class tuition is $69.99. If you wanna sign up, you can email me to get the forms they are not on the website. Now, I'm doing a combo tuition special though. If you sign up for the combo, which is $74.99, you get the trends class, the Golden Gap class, which is a 25th, 26th, and March 28th, and you get the trading room free for one year. And the Gap Options newsletter free for one year. This is a special going on through Friday, March 24th. If you can't do the March class, and you can do the April class, the 15th and 16th, you can sign up paying by Friday, the 24th. Get the special for the combo and then do the class in April. And you can start in the room, you can start trading the newsletter, you can start it. So again, this is then in three weeks. This is the April class here. Here's some testimonials, let me look and see if there's any other questions. And then I think I have to, I might have to stop and start with this to show my charts. Do I need to do that sharing? I think I might have to. Let me see. Yeah, yeah, if you only shared one window, then yes you will. Okay, let me see if I can do that. Stop showing screen. Yes.


So, once you've signed up for Firefly, you can choose to use it directly on their website.  Not a problem. Assuming you already have Photoshop, go to your Adobe Creative Cloud window that holds all of your apps. You can go ahead and update to the latest version if you want. But the important part is to go down under Beta Apps and install Photoshop Beta. You will need to install at least version 25. Anything after version 25 should have Firefly on it. If you've already installed a beta version, just uninstall it and get something after 25. After it's finished installing, you're done. From this one on, any time you select an area, you will see a new option to use Generative Fill. Just type exactly what you want like so. Hope that helps and as always, I'm gonna have a fantastic day and I'll see you around.


The next item of business is a statement by Derek Mackay on response to the report of the Barclay review of non-domestic rates. The cabinet secretary will take questions at the end of his statement, so there should be no interventions or interruptions. Cabinet secretary, 15 minutes are there abouts please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Three weeks ago today, Ken Barclay published his report into the non-domestic rates in Scotland. He and his team of Professor Russell Griggs OBE, Isabelle Dynverno, Nora Senior CBA and David Henderson produced a third report, and I wish to take this opportunity to convey my thanks again to them and commend them on their contribution. As members will recall, I said when I received the report that I would respond quickly. Last week, the First Minister set out in the programme for government that we would immediately take forward four of the recommendations from the Barclay review. Those were to hold more regular evaluations, introduce a new relief for day nurseries, expand fresh start relief to create a greater incentive to bring empty properties back into economic use and to review plant and machinery evaluations. A key matter is the frequency of evaluations. I agree with Barclay of the need for more regular evaluations, and, as the review suggests, after the 2022 revaluation, it will take place every three years. Crucially, we will also ensure that the tone date will be brought forward from two years prior to one year. Combined, that will help to ensure that our rating system is more flexible to the changing economic circumstances that businesses face and reduce the large shops such as those experienced by some earlier this year. I propose that the new relief for day nurseries will commence on 1 April 2018 and will be a full 100 per cent relief. Scotland has always been a leader in education and childcare, and this is the first relief of its kind anywhere in the UK. Fresh start, a relief that I introduced in 2013, will also be expanded from 1 April. I accept to Barclay's proposal that the relief should increase from 50 per cent to 100 per cent for the first year of new occupation and should be available after a property has been empty for six months rather than the current 12. Those are suggested to help to bring empty town centre properties back into use. However, to stimulate the whole economy and reduce the number of properties sitting vacant, I will go further still and make relief available for all types of property, including industrial property. The Barclay review of plant and machinery will commence shortly, and I will ensure that this fast-tracks the valuation of hydro schemes, as I believe an early look at this area, is essential to secure inward investment in Scotland. Following on from the swift acceptance of those four recommendations last week, I will now outline my fuller response to the chamber. That has been informed by a number of meetings that I have held with a range of organisations since the publication to discuss the report and how it should be implemented. It is a measure of the importance that we place on the economy that we commissioned the Barclay review in the first place. The Barclay report made 30 recommendations to boost economic growth, improve administration and increase transparency and fairness, and they did so within their remit of revenue neutrality. Turning to those recommendations not covered by the programme for government, I can confirm to the chamber that it is my intention to move now to implement the vast majority of them, subject to any legal or regulatory considerations, the budget process and, of course, the will of Parliament. We will consult further on some before taking a final decision before the end of the year. I will now turn to the first and the flagship recommendation made by Barclay, the business growth accelerator. Of all the recommendations, the Barclay review felt that that would give Scotland the edge in attracting investment in growing the economy. I agree. Developing our economy and supporting business to invest and grow is central to this Government's activity. I accept that recommendation and will include it in the draft budget for 2018-19. I am firmly of the view that that will give Scotland's businesses a competitive advantage and provide the economy with a welcome boost. However, in that crucial recommendation, I want to go beyond Barclay. From 1 April next year, I will ensure that every new-build property does not pay a single penny in rates and till it is occupied for the first time. I have met the assessors and they have agreed to the principle of delaying the entry of new property on to the valuation role. I will also withdraw the 2009 completion notice guidance issued to finance directors. I urge the business community and developers alike to consider precisely what that means. A new-build property will not pay rates until it is occupied and then your tenant will then benefit from a one-year without rates throughout the growth accelerator. That means that, combined with the more favourable rates of LBTT on commercial transactions, that will mark Scotland as the most competitive place in the UK for business to grow and invest. Of the other 19 recommendations, I will set out our position on each. I note that Barclay concluded that the large business supplement should be reduced to £1.3 and, over the course of this Parliament, I will do so should it become affordable and will consider that in future years budgets. Barclay made a number of recommendations about the provision of information and standardised billing, and today I issued invitations to stakeholders to sit on an advisory group to inform some of the administrative reforms. Long term, or longer term, this group will also feed into the development of online billing. I agree with Barclay that transparency over how relief is awarded will also help to improve understanding, and so I accept recommendations to publish data on which properties are in receipt of relief. The Government is committed to the small business bonus. However, as recommended by Barclay, a review will be undertaken of the scheme to ensure that we maximise the economic and social benefits of the scheme. Barclay recommended that, at a number of areas where the assessors need to improve their service and having met the Scottish assessors association last week, it can confirm action to address this is already under way, and I have asked them to present me with their implementation action plan by the end of this month. Rape payers must also play their part in improving the system, and they need to provide assessors and councils with the necessary information that they need to do their job, and so I accept recommendations to create new civil penalties. If the information going to the system is better, that should mean that valuations are more accurate and reliance on appeals should reduce. I also agree with the principles that should underpin the appeal system as those move into Tribunial Scotland in 2022, and I agree that the appeal system should allow rateable values to be corrected upwards as well as downwards from that point onwards. And councils also need to improve the service that they offer, and I will remind them of the need to issue prompt payments to rate payers. Debt recovery for both local taxis, council tax and non-domestic rates need to be brought into line with each other, so the time for rates debt recovery will be brought forward. This Government is committed to reducing tax avoidance, and where we have control we have taken steps to do just that. I welcome the Barclay recommendations to close off specific known avoidance tactics and the creation of a general anti-avoidance rule to help future proof the rate system by closing off loophalls and avoidance tactics that may emerge over time. Shorter term, a commercial rateable value finder product will help ensure all property that should pay rates does pay rates. Errors may also occur in the award of relief and with immediate effect, Scottish Government will initiate administrative checks of the various data that it receives for errors. After engaging with stakeholders, I believe that a small number of recommendations merit further thought and engagement. This is entirely in keeping with the recommendation number eight of Barclay, that wherever possible the Scottish Government should consult on changes to the rate system in advance of those being implemented. Those recommendations that require further consideration and engagement are those that remove charity relief for certain recipients, including allios, independent schools and accommodation by universities, reform of relief for sports clubs, empty properties and properties in active occupation and the levying of rates and parts. On each of those areas, I will continue engagement to fully understand the impact of and any wider implications and possible unintended consequences in each of those areas. Before outlining my position in the implementation plan, I proposed to publish later this year. Those issues will each be considered individually and the most appropriate route forward taken for each. Finally, there are two recommendations that I have decided not to take forward at this time. I will not progress the option to put farms on evaluation role and to levy rates on commercial agricultural processing. That would create a significant administrative burden on the assessors at a time when their focus must be on improvements to the service that they provide and the move to more frequent re-evaluations. More importantly, in not taking those recommendations forward, I want it to be clear to this sector that the Government recognises the invaluable contribution that it makes to our economy. My message to business after announcing this package is clear. Come to Scotland, invest in Scotland and grow your business in Scotland. Today, I publish a full response to the Barclay report, and I commit to a full implementation plan before the end of 2017. As members will be aware, there are a range of actions that are required to enact the recommendations that are accepted. Before I close, I want to take this opportunity to announce that the cap for offices in Aberdeen city and Aberdeen shire and all but the very largest hospitality properties will continue next year with an additional 12.5 per cent cap in real terms. I also encourage the sector and assessors to work together to explore alternative methods of valuation. Additionally, until such times that the review of hydro plant and machinery valuations has concluded and any recommendations are implemented, I will offer a 60 per cent new relief for hydro schemes from 1 April 2018, subject to an upper value threshold. That Government leads and innovates when it comes to using the limited powers at our disposal. Today, I am using those powers to create a fairer, more transparent rate system that better supports economic growth. That statement outlines the Government's position on the Barclay review, the recommendations that we will take forward and the additional measures beyond Barclay that I have announced today demonstrate our ambition for the economy and our desire to work with the business community to deliver upon that ambition. Once implemented, we will have a rate system that is fairer, more responsive and geared for growth. I commend that statement to the chamber. Thank you, cabinet secretary. The cabinet secretary will now take questions on the issues raised in his statement. I intend to allow 30 minutes or so for questions after which we must move on to the next item of business. It will be helpful if members who wish to ask a question were to press the request-to-speak buttons now. I call Murdo Fraser. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I start by thanking the cabinet secretary for his statement and for advance sight of it. I would like to join him in thanking Ken Barclay and his team for producing their report, which gives us all much to consider. A great deal of what the cabinet secretary has announced today, we would agree with. Can I welcome in particular the move to three-year evaluations, the standardisation of bills, the new relief for day nurseries and the new exemption for hydroschemes? I also welcome the proposals to exempt from rates empty new-build properties and the indication that there will be a reduction in the large business supplement. Although I would gently point out to the cabinet secretary that what he is doing here in both those cases is simply reversing damaging policy choices made by his predecessor, Mr Swinney. I have two specific questions for the cabinet secretary. Firstly, the cap on increases for hospitality premises and offices in the north-east is stated to be an additional 12.5 per cent in real terms for next year. For the avoidance of doubt, can the cabinet secretary confirm that this figure is cumulative with this year's cap, meaning that the business that is affected will be facing increases of up to 30 per cent or so over a two-year period? Secondly, I note that the cabinet secretary is keeping alive the possibility of ending rate relief for sports clubs and local authority arm slents organisations that run swimming pools, gyms and leisure centres. A measure that I have pointed out before would undermine Scottish Government policy in encouraging active lifestyles and tackling obesity. Why won't the cabinet secretary join with us today in ruling out the damaging SNP swim tax? I'm now not surprised that the Conservatives didn't submit evidence to the Barclay commission and when challenged also didn't submit any thoughts after publication for me to consider in advance of today's statement in fact the only political party in this chamber that took it seriously was the Green Party who offered suggestions. So it would appear once again that the Conservatives, other than welcoming a range of actions that I've committed the Government to and a welcoming you, welcoming so much of what I'm proposing today, but the Tory party is bereft of their own ideas as to how to improve the rates system. I can only imagine how depressed Murdo Fraser was when he read my statement and realised what a fantastic package we were putting forward for Scotland. In terms of the questions that I've been asked, two specific questions. First of all there are areas that I've said requires further consideration and allios and sport clubs are in that category of requiring further consideration engagement and keeping with what Barclay has recommended to engage further on that and absolutely that's what I'll do because the Government has certainly moved very swiftly on this issue but I think it's appropriate to take the time to get it right but you see once again the Conservatives are arguing for more spending and tax cuts at exactly the same time showing their economic mess that they don't understand what is before them. In terms of the requests around the hospitality sector and the cap that I proposed for the north-east by way of offices, I have had correspondence from both the hospitality sector and the north-east and when asked what feels like a fair increase recognising the recommendations of the assessors who are independent of Scottish Government but Scottish Government intervened to place a cap on the increases in the hospitality sector and also for the north-east, that 12.5 per cent real terms cap was welcomed by that sector and certainly that part of Scotland and both the chamber of commerce in the north-east and the British hospitality association and in terms of the hospitality request felt that a further and additional cap of 12.5 per cent would feel fair and that's exactly what I'm proposing today. Jackie Baillie, can I welcome much in the cabinet secretary's statement and the Barclay recommendations in particular exempting children's nurseries, something suggested by my Labour colleague Daniel Johnson and indeed the relief for hydro schemes, which will help potentially projects in my constituency. At the start of the review, the cabinet secretary said that it needed to be revenue neutral. Today you've announced measures that I believe are well in excess of £55 million but you've given no indication of revenue-raising measures so is it still revenue neutral and do you therefore anticipate the gap being taken up by sports clubs, local authority arms length organisations and others? Secondly, I do welcome the extension of the 12.5 per cent cap but it is the case that businesses are still struggling. Business organisations tell me that local authorities are managing the cap in very different ways. Some are manually adjusting the bills so the cap applies immediately. Others insist that they apply for a rebate and that takes time and businesses in the meantime have to pay in full all their rates. That is also true for those caught up in the appeals system. Will the cabinet secretary therefore take practical action now so that businesses fully benefit from the 12.5 per cent cap? I'm sure that Jackie Baillie and what could be characterised is quite a generous contribution. I'd point out that the Labour Party failed to submit anything to Barclay and failed to give me anything in terms of what was a priority coming forward. The Barclay review was commissioned before Daniel Johnson was a member, so that's some feat to be able to influence it before Mr Johnson was a member of Parliament. I think that the new relief for nurseries will be very warmly welcomed. There's very much in keeping with this Government's policy of supporting nurseries and the expansion of childcare provision. It's good going for the Government to receive a request from particular sectors, and by that I mean specifically a 12.5 per cent real terms cap and for the Government to agree to that. That's why we've been able to take a range of actions before, during and after revaluation to support businesses. I look forward to the response of the business community on the recommendations that I've accepted today, indeed going beyond Barclay and gearing for growth, our strategy going forward. In terms of revenue neutrality, it's correct to say that the remit of the Barclay panel was to be revenue neutral. The decisions that the Government takes will be taken in accordance with the budget and the negotiations that I have, so it will be for Parliament ultimately to approve the budget. However, what I'm announcing today is Government intention, and that will require parliamentary support. In that sense, I look forward to the positive engagement of all parties in the chamber, working with me to deliver a budget that delivers the recommendations that the opposition parties tell me their support. In that sense, it's a wee bit harder to do all the good stuff and not to tackle some issues for revenue raising. However, on those areas that I'm not progressing with today, as I've said before, I want to explore thoroughly to make sure that I engage and consult together at right and take into account the views of stakeholders, and that's what I've been doing since the publication of the Barclay report. I have 15 members who wanted to ask questions. The clue is in the word, questions, concise questions, please, and concise responses would be helpful. Mr Doris, followed by Dean Lockhart. I welcome the Scottish Government will consult ahead of any reforms of rates relief to allios. I would ask the cabinet secretary to approach any change, with great caution, to ensure that those using leisure facilities such as Glasgow Life do not suffer any unintended or detrimental consequences, but also to be similarly wary of any blanket exclusion of allios applying for sports club relief, which could have similar unintended consequences. I think that that was a question, cabinet secretary. Oh, it was too. Yes, Presiding Officer, I'll take the time to engage with people to make sure that we have a balanced approach on that and other matters. Dean Lockhart, followed by Gillian Martin. The cabinet secretary will be aware that a number of organisations have raised concerns about the methodology used to calculate rates in the hospitality sector. Something I reminded him about in writing only yesterday, rates in this sector are calculated... No, I want a question. Can the cabinet secretary therefore explain what substantive measures he will be taking to change the methodology used in the hospitality sector to calculate rates? Because the temporary sticking plaster of a cap does not address the underlying concerns raised by the SLTA and other leading organisations? No, you are being too cute there, cabinet secretary. First of all, let's see what the hospitality sector says about the package that I've announced today. I'm beginning to wonder if Dean Lockhart has read the report, or indeed understands that I can't direct the assessors in the fashion that he's described. It's a matter for the assessors to judge what methodology they use, but, yes, I do agree, and I've said this directly to assessors that they should consider issues of methodology, but no matter what, I'm proposing a cap for that sector nonetheless to support that sector as the issues of methodology are looked at to see if there is a better way to value those particular premises. I know that that will be warmly received by the sector, and assessors will engage in that in a constructive manner. Gillian Martin will follow by Andy Wightman. I am very pleased to hear about the transitional relief for the north-east, and it's going to be continued by the Government. The cabinet secretary will know that both Aberdeenshire and Aberdeenshire city councils have implemented local relief schemes. Will he join me in calling on both councils and ministrations to match the Scottish Government's commitment to the region with the continuation of those local relief schemes? Yes, I concur with that point. Under the Community Empowerment Act legislation, any council can devise any scheme that is appropriate to reflect local circumstances. Three councils have chosen to use those powers, and I would encourage all councils to look at those powers to see what else is appropriate for local circumstances. However, for those areas that I have delivered a local scheme, I would encourage them to continue with that, especially in view of the commitment by the Scottish Government to continue with the support that we have announced today. Given the remit of Barclay review and the fact that it asked only one question, does the cabinet secretary agree that such a narrow remit and one solitary question is not the thorough and comprehensive review of the whole system that was promised by him in 2013? In his statement, the cabinet secretary claims that adding farms would be a significant administrative burden, but since most farms will soon be on any way because of the reintroduction of sporting rates, will he therefore reconsider that opposition? First of all, on agricultural matters, if there is no intention to tax those properties, I do not really see the value in adding them to the role on the matter of wider consideration of alternatives to a property tax. It is not true to say that Barclay did not consider those matters, and they put it in the report of why they have rolled it out and came to the conclusion that a property tax, whilst not perfect, did not find any perfect property tax anywhere in the world, but they came to the conclusion that, with refinement, it can absolutely deliver. Willie Rennie, followed by Daniel Johnson. As the finance secretary has effectively admitted that those proposals will not be revenue neutral, how much of those measures are going to cost? Oh, absolutely. It is a sparkling question to put in. You taught them all that, cabinet secretary. My estimation of the cost of the announcements today is approximately £80 million. Daniel Johnson, followed by Kenneth Gibson. Given that some nurseries in my constituencies were facing a doubling of their bills, can I welcome the cabinet secretary listening to my calls and advice on nurseries? I am very appreciative of it. However, those increases raised the question about how the evaluations were arrived at. I know what the moves on data collection, but what reform will the cabinet secretary take forward to improve the transparency of the calculation on revaluation, so all businesses can understand how their rates bill was arrived at, not just how much it takes? Cabinet secretary, Mr Johnson, it is a nice try for taking credit for my announcements, but I am afraid that my announcements are my announcements. In the spirit of consensus, if the Labour Party has any further ideas that they want me to consider, please do so constructively within the budget process, specifically to the question as to how assessors arrived at the values that they have. Maybe Mr Johnson, like many other members in this chamber, should realise that it was not me who undertook the revaluation. It is the assessors who are independent of government, and Mr Johnson would be well advised to direct his questions to them. The cabinet secretary rightly focused on growth and investment to make Scotland more competitive. Can I advise the chamber that impact anticipates the changes that will have on economic growth on an annualised basis, once fully implemented? That is a very good question. It is difficult to quantify at this stage what it means by way of growth, but I am convinced that the recommendations that I am progressing with today will generate growth, will support our economy and will allow for a fairer, more transparent rate system. In terms of showcasing what Scotland can do, it gives us that competitive advantage on non-domestic rates and sets up in a number of areas that do not exist elsewhere and should deliver on our economic strategy. Thank you. What assessment has been carried out on the affordability of reducing the large business supplement in this year's budget? It may be news to Mr Bowman, but I have not produced this year's budget. I understand from announcements that the UK budget may well be 22 November, so I look forward to constructive dialogue with all the parties as to what may be in this year's budget. I hope that the Conservatives will take a far more constructive approach than they did last year. Richard Lochhead, followed by Elaine Smith. I warmly welcome the cabinet secretary's statement, in particular the on-going 12.5 per cent cap for hospitality businesses and exemption for nurseries in my constituency, which I also call for very loudly. Is the cabinet secretary aware that the rates valuation had a disproportionately negative impact on Murray businesses that was out of sync with local economic factors and therefore that his reference to the sector and assessors having to work together to explore alternative methods of valuation is extremely important if we were to avoid that in the future? Will he attach a timescale of when he expects to hear back from that work? There was a question there. Is the cabinet secretary aware that it was a cute way to do it? I think that it is fair to say that Mr Lochhead has been very proactive and vocal on those matters, including implementation of the reliefs that were announced earlier this year in March, if memory serves me correctly. I agree with all the points that Mr Lochhead has made. Elaine Smith, followed by Fulton MacGregor. Given the Barclay review states that unfair advantage has been gained by private schools due to charitable rates relief and should be removed by 2020—something that I agree with—when exactly is the further report going to come forward on that and what opportunity will it be to scrutinise the Government's decision on that specific issue? By any standard, the Government's response is swift. We received the report some three weeks ago. The First Minister responded on the first day back in Parliament. I am addressing matters now, publishing a statement of intent on our policy position on the recommendations. Further, I have said that there will be an implementation plan, because many of those recommendations will require statutory legislation, some secondary, some guidance, and some direction. Therefore, I propose to come back before or by the implementation plan, which will be concluded by the end of the year with a position on that and all other remaining matters. Can the cabinet secretary expand on what measures he is taking forward on the back of the Barclay review to ensure that more vacant property such as there is in my constituency of Cochbridge and Chryston, particularly in the town centre area, is brought back into use? Barclay had specifically suggested that he is looking at empty property rates relief and further incentives for occupying an empty property. As one example, I will be expanding the fresh start relief that I introduced in 2013, and hopefully that will be a further stimulant in reocupying empty properties. Liz Smith, followed by Clare Haughey. Could I ask the cabinet secretary what assessment the Scottish Government has taken in conjunction with local authorities about the likely economic impact on small independent special schools, which look after some of our most vulnerable children, should they no longer be eligible for charitable relief? I want to get the detail absolutely right on this, so I will write to the member, but it is my understanding from the recommendations and what I am proposing today that there is no change to the status of those schools, but I will absolutely confirm that. Clare Haughey, followed by James Kelly. Can the cabinet secretary outline what measures he is taking in response to the Barclay review to support the development of renewable energy sector? The support that we are expanding includes things that renewables would benefit from, whether it is small business bonus in other areas. However, the expansion of the hydro relief will certainly be very welcomed by the renewables sector. James Kelly, followed by Ben Macpherson. Can the cabinet secretary guarantee that the £80 million of funding measures that he has announced today will not result in a consequential £80 million of cuts in the local government funding settlement? The funding package is all a matter for the budget, but I think that it would be a misdirection to suggest that what is happening today will be funded through a reduction in the local government settlement. That will be all part of the budget negotiations that it will undertake with parties as I present the draft budget in due course. Ben Macpherson, to ask the Scottish Government how they will support SMEs in the hospitality sector, such as those in my constituency in Leith, following the report of the Barclay review of non-domestic rates. Generally, we have lowered the poundage for all rate payers. We have expanded the threshold for small business bonus. We have expanded the threshold for large business supplement, and specifically the cap for hospitality will continue in the fashion that I have described. I am sure that that will be welcomed across the country. To go back to Elaine Smith's question on special schools, I thought that I heard you correctly that you said independent special schools. That is the point of clarity that I want to give you. I do not think that there is any change for those with that specialist nature of service provided. That is different to the overall category of independent schools, and I will make sure that you have that detail. That concludes the minutes to the cabinet secretary. I will suspend for a few minutes to allow front benches to take the place for the next item of business.


Hey, this is Brett, and this 2016 Ram 3500 Crew Cab Long Box Dual-Rear Wheel Laramie is stock number 1-4165Z. I am here at Summit Automotive in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, your new and used heavy-duty truck headquarters. This 2016 Ram 3500 has the 6.7-liter Cummins diesel engine. It's paired up with the 6-speed 68 RFE automatic transmission. This truck has been fully safety and inspected by our service shop. It has a fresh oil and filter change. All the fluids have been checked and topped off. And this truck is 100% ready to go. Very nice condition all the way around. That's exactly what I'm going to do in this video. Go all the way around, show you the inside underneath, start it up, take a look under the hood, and just give you the most accurate representation that I can of the truck. Brilliant black crystal pearls color. I shoot all my videos in 4K. If you like the video, you can subscribe to the YouTube channel, click the bell notifications, get updates on the videos I do each and every day, as well as having access to one of the largest catalogs of vehicle walk-arounds on YouTube. This one comes with these 17-inch polished aluminum wheels. They're in really nice condition. And you get El Dorado Sport Fury AT tires. These are LT 235 80R 17s. I would say that they have probably about 80 to 90% of the tread left on the front here. Frame and underbodies in really nice condition. This is a clean title history, clean car facts, two owner out of Ohio. Front fender is absolutely perfect. No major dents or dings on there. Comes with the projector lamp headlamps, LED running lights, factory fog lights, and the front bumper is in excellent condition. No dents or dings. You also get the front bumper parking sensors. You get the chrome-trimmed grille on here. And the hood is in fantastic condition as well. No major dents or dings on there. You do get the cab lights up top. Passengers' side front fender is in great shape as well. And the passenger side front wheel is in very nice condition as well. Brilliant black crystal pearl. Check this out. It's got a lot of metal flake in it and a lot of colors that you wouldn't expect to see on a black. It's got purples and teals and gold and even some yellow in there, along with blue. So a lot of really cool colors, especially in the sunlight. This thing really pops. And as you go down this side of this 2016 Ram 3500, take note of how clean that body is and, once again, how reflective and mirror-like that paint is. I take these HD videos, so if you're far away or even if you're close by, just cannot make a trip down, but you're still interested in purchasing the vehicle. You can see the truck. Hear the truck and have confidence in the vehicle that you're looking at before you even get here. So when you do get here, there's absolutely no surprises and you can make a smart and informed buying decision from wherever you're at. Now, if this video helps you make that buying decision, let your salesmen know that you saw the video that I was helpful and that Brett sent you. Back wheel's in very nice condition as well. And in the back, we have Firestone TransForce AT2 tires. These tires look like they have about 60 to 70% of the tread left. Frame and underbody, once again, is in really nice shape. You get the rear, some rear airbag suspension bags back here. And the underbody is in really nice shape all the way underneath. Somebody has undercoated it. We did not undercoat it, but somebody did and it looks really good, really well done. Lower rockers and cab corners all look fantastic and you get the really nice factory chrome step bars. The Dually Tub is in really nice shape. You can see it still has the 3M plastic rock guard on there. Doing a nice job keeping that Dually Tub looking good and down the rest of the side, you can see that the rest of the box looks really good too. No major dents or dings on there. Coming around to the back, the rear bumper is in fantastic condition. No dents or dings on there. It does have the backup parking sensors, full towing package which includes the receiver hitch four pin and seven pin wiring. This is where you pump up those rear airbags, those valve stems there. And the tailgate is in fantastic condition as well. No dents, no dings on there, looks really, really good. Comes with a very nice spray and bed liner, fifth wheel and goose neck prep package, seven pin wiring. You also get LED bed lighting back here too. And that spray and bed liner goes onto the tailgate which is a really nice thing to have as well. Going down the driver side, just as clean as that passenger side. No major dents or dings on the box. Again, the Dually Tub looks really good. And for full disclosure, this back wheel is in really nice shape as well. And down the rest of the side, cabin doors all look fantastic. Very nice and clean. You get the heated fold up tow mirrors built in directional signals. They fold up like so, they fold in like that. Take a quick look at the back seats. Back seats are in nice shape. No rips, no tears on there. Power sliding rear window. These seats fold up. There is a load floor here which is nice. You got muddy boots or tools, put them on there.   There is storage underneath here. Here are the rest of your pucks for the fifth wheel and goose neck prep package. Factory floor mats, there are your heated seat buttons for the outboard side of the back seats. Then you get in-floor storage with removable bins for easy cleaning. You can put ice and drinks in there. And it's like you have too many coolers wherever you go. Or if you're non-Wisconsin, just extra storage space. And you do get child safety locks on the back doors inside and bottoms of the doors. All look really good. Here is the VIN sticker. No Canadian trucks here.  No rips, no tears on these seats. They're in really nice condition. You get the driver's side lumbar, memory driver's seat, factory floor mats, auto headlamps, power windows, locks and mirrors. You get the leather bolster, the wood grain trim. And these mirrors do power fold in. I always like showing both sides so that you know that both sides are working properly. Top and side, check out the miles, the radio and everything that this truck has to offer on the interior. You get that nice Laramie animation at the beginning here. And you can see this truck has 45,268 miles on it. You do get these seven inch LCD display. You can see you got all your tire pressures there and digital speedometer. You got range to empty, temperature and you can change all those corners to read whatever you want. Instrument cluster is very nice and clean. Comes with the heated leather wrapped steering wheel, cruise controls on the right, Bluetooth and information center controls on the left, audio controls in the back of the steering wheel. This one comes with that shifter for the six speed 68 RFE automatic transmission. This one has the Uconnect 3C radio and it does have the factory navigation system. There's highway 41, so you can see that is working nicely. You get AM, FM and Sirius XM radio capabilities, heated seats, cooled seats and heated steering wheel controls. You can check out your backup camera here, which is working nicely. And you can check out the cargo cam to see what's going on in the bed of the truck and that is working nicely as well. Then you get all your different apps on here and yeah, really nice radio. Hook it up to your Bluetooth cell phone, of course. There's your Alpine badge letting you know you have the good sound system in here. Turned out four wheel drive, more tactile climate volume and tune controls. You also get factory brake controller, heated and cooled seat buttons, heated steering wheel buttons, stability control, tow haul, factory exhaust brake and you can turn those front and rear parking sensors on and off as you please. 115 volt, 150 watt plug-in and your keyless entry with the remote start. This is a nice feature as well, passenger side format and seat. Once again, no rips, no tears. Smells very clean inside this truck. I don't think it's ever been smoked in. Headliners in great shape. You get map lights, power side and rear window controls, home link buttons for your garage door security systems and lighting systems, assistant 911 buttons in the rear of your mirror. Let's start it up and take a look under the hood. Starts right up, no check engine lights or anything like that. Really a nice truck for a 2016. And I personally want to thank you for checking out the video today and hopefully from this HD video you've been able to verify just how nice this 2016 Ram 3500 is inside and out. Under the hood, we have the 6.7 liter Cummins diesel engine, engine base very clean, runs very smooth. Once again, this truck has been fully safety and inspected by always service shop. Has a fresh oil and filter change. All the fluids have been checked and topped off. And this truck is 100% ready to go. There's the emission sticker. And I would highly recommend this truck from a quality and condition standpoint. I would ship this one to anywhere, California, Texas, Florida, back to Ohio. Whoever's gonna get this truck's gonna be very happy with it. And to see more pictures of this truck from one of our other 550 new news cars, trucks, SCVs, minivans, Wranglers, halftones, three quarter tons, one tons, you name it, we gotta go to the website right there. Summitauto.com, full pictures and descriptions of every single vehicle all at summitauto.com. And if you'd like to check out more HD videos go to youtube.com slash summitauto. Click the bell notifications, get updates on the videos I do each and every day. As well as having access to one of the largest catalogs of vehicle and heavy duty truck walk-arounds on YouTube. In fact, in a second you will see a link to subscribe to my YouTube channel in the upper left. You'll see a link to all the Ram 3500 truck videos like this one in the upper right. Link to this vehicle on our website in the lower left and a link to one of our latest YouTube videos in the lower right. Click those checks out. We're super excited to help you with this Ultra Clean 2016 Ram 3500. Crew cab, long box, dual rear wheel, Laramie and brilliant black crystal pearl. Thanks again for checking out the video. Remember to like, subscribe, and share on the YouTube channel. I really appreciate it. Thanks again.