Every four years the Summer Olympic Games add a little more excitement to the season as we watch the world’s greatest athletes come together to compete for top honors in their respective sports.

Athletes are chosen to represent their country based on quantifiable metrics, i.e., time, distance and points. Those that rank the best are rewarded with a spot on their country’s team.

When the events are over and the winners are awarded their medals, it's just astounding to think that out of thousands of athletes that compete in these sports, the ones who end up on the medal podium are the best in the world.

Much like these athletes, stocks too compete for the right to be added to your portfolio.

Think about it for a second. Out of the thousands of stocks that are traded throughout the global exchanges, all of these stocks have to compete against each other on a day-to-day basis.

So, when one has to determine which stock, sector or asset class is worthy of that coveted spot on a team, meaning a place in your portfolio, it's best to start by putting each stock through its own competition.

One quantifiable metric that has a tried-and-true history of providing an objective measure of performance is price. Every day stocks compete in the market and every day the result of these competitions are recorded.

By recording the results of this daily competition, we can rank stocks, sectors and even asset classes in order to objectively see which areas of the market are performing the best, in addition to seeing which stocks areas are performing the worst.

The resulting rankings provides us with the ability to select holdings in a portfolio that have earned their way in the same manner that Summer Games athletes must earn their ticket to the Summer Games.

One investing approach that we believe can be effective in both rising and falling markets is point and figure methodology. Since the late 1800s, this technique has monitored supply and demand with an eye on developing trends.

Charles Dow, the original editor of The Wall Street Journal, was the methodology’s first proponent.  In a free market of any kind, if there are more buyers than sellers, the price will move higher. If there are more sellers than buyers, the price must move lower. If buying and selling are equal, the price will remain the same.

By charting this movement of prices in an organized manner we hope to ascertain who is winning that battle – sellers or buyers, supply or demand. With this ability to evaluate changes within the market, we have taken the first step toward becoming responsive to both bullish and bearish financial market cycles.

If you would like to learn more about this strategy, feel free to contact us and we would be happy to discuss this in further detail. In the meantime, kick back, relax and enjoy the rest of the summer.

<i>Material prepared by Tumlin Levin Sumner Wealth Management of Raymond James and brought to you by Hall Sumner, vice president – Investments. Raymond James &amp; Associates Inc., Member New York Stock Exchange/SIPC </i>

<i>Hall Sumner is a financial advisor with Raymond James &amp; Associates, Inc., Member New York Stock</i>

<i>Exchange/SIPC is located at 2015 Boundary St., Suite 220, Beaufor,t SC 29902. He can be contacted at 843-379-6100 or hall.sumner@raymondjames.com or visit www.tlswealthmanagement.com</i>

<i>Opinions expressed in the attached article are those of the author and are not necessarily those of Raymond James.  All opinions are as of this date and are subject to change without </i><i>notice.</i>