See: Triple Exponential Average - TRIX.
A stock starts the week at $15 a share. On Tuesday, it rises to $15.50. It drops on Wednesday to $14.75. Thursday sees a rally to $16, only for shares to drop again on Friday to $15.10. Lots of movement...but movement that didn't actually take the price anywhere. It ended the week basically where it started.
A moving average is meant to strip out some of this meaningless price movement.
You're looking at a 50-day moving average. It takes the average price for the previous 50 days of trading. The next day, it does the average again...but of course, we've moved forward in time a day, so the data set changes by a single day. And so on. Each day, the data set updates by one day, taking a continual average of the 50 prior days. Then all those points (each day's average of the previous 50 days) are connected to make a line. That line represents the 50-day moving average.
The moving average is useful in tracking longer-term trends. Because it smooths out some of the day-to-day bouncing around, it better shows the true direction the stock has taken. However, there's a problem. The process that creates the moving average involves a lag. It's looking 50 days in the rearview.
The triple exponential moving average looks to fix that problem. It aims to accomplish the same basic goal (i.e. removing some of the near-term fluctuations in the stock to focus on the longer-term trend), but it eliminates the lag inherent in run-of-the-mill moving averages.
The math behind a TEMA is complex; it's enough to know that the TEMA provides a longer-term trend line. You can read prices in relation to the line; if a stock dips below the line, it might signal a move into a downturn. Conversely, a move above might signal an upswing.
Related or Semi-related Video
Finance: What are moving averages?7 Views
Finance a la shmoop... what are moving averages? ooh I need another tissue that [Girl crying]
average I just can't get enough so moving okay yeah yeah that's not at all
what this term is about here's a chart here's a set of trailing averages 50-day
the blue line they're hundred-day the black line and 200-day the green line
there... note that we say trailing average why trailing? well people we lost our
crystal ball yeah Warren we know you took it [Warren Buffett eating dinner]
so averages for normal humans can only be trailing because trailing stockticker
closing prices give us data we can actually use stock averages don't take
future data that we're merely guessing at on their charts... only
real numbers that we can actually point to so here's the 50-day average for [50-day average for coca cola stock]
coca-cola stock KO in 2012 and if we move forward a year and change well here
it's a 50-day average right there looks a little bit different and while the 50
data input elements from its closing price each day vary so the average of
those data points will move and why do moving averages matter well for
fundamental analysts kinds of investors you know the people who care just about [Fundamental analyst people appear]
the cash flow and earnings and margins and revenue growth of companies well
really don't matter but for chartist types of investors that is those who
focus really only about trading trends and shapes and curves and the metrics
behind what patterns of stocks take in the future well, they matter a lot then
in fact the 200-day moving average is generally a kind of Chartist living [Priests in church]
Bible for most Wall Street traders and taking meaning from it is all about
recognizing patterns and then imputing likely future patterns based off of
those shapes for example if you're looking here at the peak of a Head and [Head and shoulders stock price graph]
Shoulders chart, the trailing average of this
say 50-day set here of data points is the line about here but if you move
forward and look at the back half well then the moving average is about here [Moving average lines moves]
and if you consider the entire chart well it's about here and the lines are
there in theory to give color as to what direction the
market or this given stock is heading and yep sometimes it works and sometimes
it doesn't [Man eating dinner with Warren Buffett]