Will Andrew Keene's S.C.A.N. system really make you rich? Is The 1450 Club worth joining? Of is this just another scam investment recommendation service that is sure to disappoint?
In this review of The 1450 Club I'll be going over what everyone should know before deciding whether to subscribe or not... including what you get as a member, the cost & refund policy, track record, pros v cons and more.
You can never trust the promotional material 100%. In the promotions they always make these sorts of opportunities sound like sure-fire ways to strike it rich... which they are not.
Overview
- Product: The 1450 Club
- Type: Trade advisory service
- Advisor: Andrew Keene
- Price: $5,000
What Is The 1450 Club?
The 1450 Club is a trade recommendation subscription service. Subscribers are told what to invest in (and shown in real-time) and when to invest on a daily basis, as well as alerted when to sell and take profits.
In particular, this service is focused on options trading, which has some benefits over regular ol' stock trading, such as it's lower cost of entry.
When buying options you aren't actually buying stocks, but rather you are buying the "option" to purchase shares of a particular company at a future set price. They can be confusing to understand if you are new to it all, but the video I found below explains the difference pretty well along with benefits of options trading...
Who Is Behind It?
Andrew Keene is the guy who runs The 1450 Club, and he works for Money Map Press, which is an investment advisory firm that provides various trade recommendation services, such as Money Map Report, Nova X Report, and more.
He is a self-made millionaire trader who has been featured on media outlets like CNBC & Fox Business for his expertise.
Besides working for Money Map Press, he is also the owner of Alpha Shark, which offers educational products on trading, and he is an analyst at Agora Financial, where he is the editor of the different "Alpha Shark" subscription services.
According to the legend (what we are told by Money Map Press), he became a millionaire before the age of 30, subsequently lost everything shortly after, ended up in Thailand, surrounded by Buddhism, teaching English to children... and it was here where he came up with the idea for his trading algorithm called S.C.A.N., which is responsible for making him millions and is what he still uses to identify lucrative trades.
How It Works
The 1450 Club is a follow-along trade recommendation service in which members are provided with trade recommendations from Andrew. However, it doesn't work like most of the newsletter subscription services out there where you are provided with recommendations, detailed reports that you have to read through, etc.
A subscription to this service makes things very easy. Members are provided with real-time trade videos that they can follow along with and more. Here is what this service has to offer:
- 3 Trades Per Day: Members are provided access to live trading sessions 4 days a week in which Andrew makes his recommended trades that subscribers can follow along with. This takes place Monday through Thursday and each live trading session is 1 hour long, from 9:30am to 10:30am. During a trading session his SCAN system will filter through the trades that have happened and provide recommendations in real time, which he will then provide research and analysis on.
- Emailed Instructions: After a trading session is complete, members will also be emailed an outline of the action plan with simple instructions. This is good if you can't make the live sessions because of work or something.
- Alerts: Members will also received notifications (Net Worth Boosted Alerts) when a trade has reached its target price and it's time to cash-out.
- Training: Members will also be provided with some beginner training that consists of short videos and focuses on the basics of options trading, which is good if you are new to this area.
The "S.C.A.N." System
There will be 3 trades placed each day and they all come from the S.C.A.N. system that he developed, which I briefly mentioned above but didn't go into detail on.
S.C.A.N. stands for Spot the Tell, Confirm the Signal, Automate and Execute, and Net worth Boosted... and this is the proprietary algorithm that Andrew and his team have developed to find potentially lucrative trades. What it does is identifies clusters of random near-identical trades that happen very shortly after the market opens, which could be coming from insiders that know information the general public doesn't.
In a nutshell, how this works is Andrew has his SCAN algorithm identify possible lucrative trades and then he handpicks the best ones.
I'm not sure if SCAN identifies normal stock trades and then Andrew chooses the options of those tradeIt... but this is what I'm guessing is going on.
But I'm not sure how much of what we are told about SCAN I actually believe.
In the promotional material Andrew first mentions that he came up with the idea while in Thailand surrounded by Buddhist monks...
HOWEVER, later in the promotional material (which is ridiculously long) he claims that the idea for SCAN was found in some old Japanese books...
It was the Japanese The Ichimoku Cloud indicator that he claims to have stumbled across, which is an indicator that "defines support and resistance, identifies trend direction, gauges momentum and provides trading signals"... but this doesn't make much sense.
Japan and Thailand are two very different countries... and have completely different languages... and I doubt there would be some Japanese books laying around in a temple in Thailand. So this story doesn't make sense and likely is made-up to some extent.
It doesn't sound very realistic... but this is just my opinion.
The Cost
The cost is steep... $5,000 per year.
Spending $5,000 is a lot no matter how you look at it, but the fact that we don't even know how well this recommendation service performs makes it and even tougher decision.
The good news: There are refunds available...
Refunds
They do have a refund policy where you can get all of your money back.
How it works is they claim that if you don't get the chance to 25x your money in the next year, you will be able to give their team a call to get a full refund...
The customer service team can be contacted at :
- 855-509-6600 or
- 443-353-4770 (for international)
*Note: It is worth mentioning that there are quite a bit of complaints with the BBB about refund problems with various services offered by Money Map Press. I wasn't able to find any specifically for The 1450 Club, but this is still worth noting.
Performance
In the promotional material it sounds like joining The 1450 Club and getting access to the SCAN recommended trades is a sure-fire way to get rich.
In fact, Andrew claims that he believes "anybody can use it to grow their net worth 50x"...
This is quite a bold claim... and along with all the successes he shares it certainly sounds like a great investment choice.
BUT, as expected, we aren't told at all about the losing trade recommendations made, which are conveniently left out.
There is no track record provided for this service and unfortunately I have not been able to dig up any reviews that mention its performance.
Members will get access to the model portfolio where they are able to monitor the performance of different recommendations, but for outsiders this is not available.
Is The 1450 Club a Scam?
Of course this depends on what you consider to be a scam.
One thing you have to realize is that Money Map Press, the company behind The 1450 Club, is well known for the over-the-top, misleading sales pitches for its various investment recommendation subscription services... which is the reason they have so many complaints with the BBB.
The 1450 Club is a legitimate service that does provide value... but joining as a member with the expectations that are laid out in the promotional material will probably lead to disappointment (but again, we have no clear track record as to this service's performance).
Nova-X Report and Money Map Report, two other subscription services by Money Map Press that I've reviewed, have also been seriously over-hyped... and I've noticed that this is nothing unusual. There are plenty of over-hyped teasers out there to lure in new subscribers (American Superpower Checks, "Cannabis Lots", etc., etc.).
Pros v Cons
Pros
- Well laid-out service (live recommendations, alerts, beginner training)
- Easy to follow (you just copy the trades shown... although I certainly don't recommend blindly following the recommendations)
- Professional recommendations (Andrew is a professional trader that has been featured on large media outlets because of it)
- Low cost of entry (options trading is generally cheaper to get involved with)
- Refunds available (although they might be hard to get)
Cons
- Lack of transparency
- Over-hyped/misleading marketing claims
- Lots of complaints about the company behind it (Money Map Press)
- Risk involved (as with any investment opportunity)
- Costs a ton
Conclusion - Worth Joining?
It's really hard to say whether or not a subscription service like this is worth joining when there is no transparency with how well it performs to people who are not members. It would be nice, if like The Motley Fool's Stock Advisor subscription, they would provide a track record... but they don't... and this is commonplace in the world of investment recommendation services.
The choice is ultimately up to you.
However, if there is one piece of advice you should definitely follow it is to not fall for the sales hype, which will surely lead to disappointment. I'm sure that "Lulemon Athletica handed me [Andrew] a 400% payday in one hour"--as stated in the sales pitch-- is true and that there are other amazing examples... but how many losing recommendations were made? There are guaranteed to be some losers and this we have no information on.
Anyways... hopefully this review has been helpful to you... and if so, please share it to help spread the word and to help out my website here.
PS: For an investment advisory service that I actually recommend, check out my Stock Advisor review.
Also, leave any comments/questions below and I'll get back to you soon 🙂
kyle
Your review is very informative but it still doesn’t answer the question as to whether or not people actually have made money from this 1450 Club program.
I understand that the cost is now 1500 (still a lot).
My decision to join would be a lot easier if I could read that real people (others who have joined the 1450 Club in the past) that have made or lost money with this program.
Have you heard anything positive or negative from others who have joined this program?
If so I would love to read their reviews.
Thanks
Shawn
I am a charter member. Problem with the program is you have very little chance of entered his trade recommendations unless you attend his live-stream broadcasts because the prices take off too fast. If you don’t enter his trade within 30 seconds to a minute, then hos price limit is exceeded. His later email recommendations arrive way to late on am average of over an hour or more. Also, he has so far only averaged about 1 to 2 trades a day, sometimes none. I monitored his 1450 portfolio at money map press and his open trades are mostly negative or show no value. He only brags about his positive closed trades, never about is total profit after loses.
Thanks for the comment Phil. Unfortunately a lot of advisory services have this problem.
Kyle, your article is interesting, and the pros and cons thoughtful. I am a member of the1450 Club. I own stocks, But I am several months new to options trading. I take TD Ameritrade’s Options course, and the courses Andrew offers. Educating oneself on how to trade Options is crucial.
I trade options very conservatively and stick to the simpler trades because I don’t know enough yet. Have I made money? Yes.
One, I think folks go in thinking they will make an instant killing.
Two, in January so much happening affected the stock market.
Three, Andrew is upfront regarding losing trades. The losing trades are written in the notes and portfolio.
Fourth, Andrew cautions regarding managing risk, not to chase trades, and continuously reminds people to take advantage of the courses offered on his Website, and the free education offered by, for instance, the Thinkorswim platform.
I agree that there is way too much hype from advisory services. I also like the Motley Fool, but they do the same type of presentations that last forever, with a promise at the end to reveal the stock of the century at that will make one enormously wealthy. When the end comes the only thing revealed is the killer price to join. A delete key is a handy tool.
So, do I think the 1450 Club is a scam? No.
Hi Carla,
Thank you very much for the insightful comment. I agree, people joining most of these newsletters are often under the impression that they will get rich quick, which is largely due to the misleading ads.
But it is good to hear you are making money with the recommendations provided, and that there is transparency here.
Thanks again. I’m sure other readers will find this helpful.
I joined the 1450 club for a couple of months, and lost $3000 in just a week with a trading average of $200-400/trade. There are some good calls, but many bad “ideas” that will not make you any money, that’s why I lost most of the time. I did received a refund after emailing them a couple of times.
Hi Kyle,
I’m a 6 week member of the 1450 club. I’m taking the “SCAN” signals only and I started with $1500 and now I’m down to just over $600. I’m trading very small lots, and some times you can’t get in the trades he recommends at the price he puts out. Part of the system/rules is no chasing trades and no trading other methods until you start making money just trading the signals. Well, there aren’t any in the current group that have joined since around Nov purporting to be making money with scan signals – the big money maker he markets. He admits that the signals have not been good lately and is showing everyone how to do other types of trades. But we’re not supposed to use those until we make money on scan signals! It has been frustrating, and very educational. Fortunately, I’m using money I’m willing to lose or learn with. Chalk it up to an expensive education. I’m staying in and following the rules to the T until I can’t trade anymore – or I actually start making money! I’ll report back if I do! Glad I found your blog. Best – Wade
HI Kyle, regarding the above; you really made a difference in my and my family’s life today, Thank you! – Darla
Glad to help Darla!
I subscribed to 1450 club in November 2019. It is over-hyped and Andrew only paper traded….never use his own money. Please, please, do not join 1450 club. It doesn’t what it. By the time Andrew called a trade, the price already went up and when asked him to trade real money– he kept given excuses,
Wale
It would be illegal for AK to trade live thus the simulated paper account at TOS. Unfair to judge him when following lawful standard protocol. It is true that it is very hard to trade fast enough to catch his entry price thus the gains are less than he indicates. He offers a temp closed service called Option Hacker that he created and that is available about a day in advance of the alerts. That could possibly be a way to get into some traders earlier and rack up a good gain. I love the live sessions along with the 303 club and I also subscribed recently to SuperOptions. There are fewer alerts to buy there than indicated. Results so far are somewhat disappointing. I will wait to see how my track record develops over time.
I actually bought the project 303 basic training for only $129 They tried to upsell me the 1450 club but I am very skepital with these trading educational programs. You think 1450 club is expensive? it’s nothing compared to online trading academy’s cost. it was very complicated and I only had about 2% winning trades. They teach futures,forex,and options. they have a wall full of ex floor traders bank ceo’s and very educated people as instructors. That’s what sold me. That and their supply and demand zones where institutions and banks were selling and buying. Hardly any of them worked. What a ripp-off. Anyway. I figured I’d give project 303 a try. I don’t have much to lose.
Hi Charles,
I was wondering what you thought of the project 303 program. Have you had any success?
Thanks
I am also a fairly new meme er to project 303. The info provided above was pretty accurate. Recommendations vs price action is often hard to catch on time and I have yet to enjoy a winning trade. Part of this I hold myself accountable for as I am also new to option trading, however it would seem that unless you know how to automate an exit strategy by the time you hear about it it’s likely too late. That’s been my experience anyway. I am still looking for just one successful trade after more than a month with project 303. That being said I do continue to educate myself with TD Ameritrade and Think or Swim and hope to rely less on handouts and more on my own market choices & analysis.
Good Luck to all! My advice would be to listen to your intuition it will usually steer you towards or away from good choices. I say this , but still fall prey to a good sales pitch and hype from time to time. Usually at my own expense and disappointment.
Thank you for the info. I am a member of project 303 and for the price it is a good introduction to options trading, thats about it though. It is very basic , as far as the SCAN
program, not too sure, I think most of the info comes from Options Hacker program. he trades only calls at the moment and I find it strange that this SCAN program doesnt find any
puts, stocks also go down every day. His reasoning “we are in a Bull mkt” hmmm I am quite skeptical. also you have to be quick, institutions and pros have it all automated.
i just joined last week priced at $199 seem good for me after buying into belief that SCAN system is good and hard to beat but now i’m very skeptical bemuse the just recent XOM call that he also mentioned in the trading room saying they just pick up bad news in the press and how on earth would you recommend a call under scan, i know the expiration date is in September but, that just shows how unreliable the system is . stay away !
QUICK is correct. In live 1450 it is best to have ThinkOrSwim broker program in TRADE mode and then in options and go as if you are making a trade so that when it is definite announcement to complete the proscess and you just might catch a trade at his suggested entry price. It is very frustrating to not be able to catch it in time as the price generally increases at rapid pace.
I have been a member of the 1450 Club since March. I have had winners and losers. More losers than winners. One of the problems that many have written about is that the winners move very quickly. Many times by the time AK calls a signal at a certain buy up to price, the options price has moved too quickly away from the price. Many in the chat room during the trading hour are have bought option hacker at a high monthly price also from Andrew Keanes AlphaShark company. That is supposed to give you and edge to get the signal before it is called. I have just used it for the first time on Monday. It might help. I will say the customer support at AlphaShark is almost non-existent. They don’t answer phones and I have a dispute over the subscription price right now. I received a reply that said you were a day late to get the discounted subscription price. Even though they don’t have anyone answering the phone. Effectively the message was tough luck pay $100/month more for the service.
Kyle,
I joined 303 club, to dabble in options trading, not really believing all of the hype, and glad I didn’t believe it, because I’ve seen some outright SHADY behavior, that i will outline below. The 303 club now feels like basically his way of getting opportunity to try upselling you 1450 club on a daily basis. Here’s why there’s no way I’m doing that, and will likely ask for a refund prior to my 30 day anniversary.
1. The record sheet he posts (an excel spreadsheet) looks really nice when you first get there (2-1 winners vs losers) but the truth is some of those trades he shows as reality were never available to a 303 member following his instructions. Read below to see what I mean.
2. You are told on the way in to execute the trades exactly when and for how much he tells you. That’s great, except for on many trades the info, when you get it is “stale” and either the opening price has moved beyond his max buy price, or when he issues a stop-loss sell order, the option price available has moved downward beyond his sell point hours before you get the email.
3. So, even though you can’t make the trades he’s telling you about because the info is not valid when he gives it to you, he’s still booking these trades as documented “winners” in his spreadsheet! That’s cooking the books. If you question him on it in a live feed chat all he says is he can’t control where the prices go. That’s a cop out. I’ve got documented cases where these would have been good trades 2 hours before the order got mailed out. Also, it appears that others (not sure who is who on the chats, maybe his analysts, maybe people in higher tier (1450?) clubs) know about the sell order hours before the 303 folks do.
4. To be fair, there have been a couple winners in the bunch. A few trades worked exactly as advertised. Got in at X. immediately set up sell orders for 50% total at 1.5X and 50% total at 2X. It worked. Made money. Awesome. It worked because it was on “auto pilot”. The issue comes in when it’s time to make timely trades to get out of something below the original 1.5 and 2X target prices, that’s when timely info is key and that is where this has been a real loser.
So, at the end of the day, my profit/loss sheet is showing major negatives while his show’s he’s doing well, and it’s all about timing. There are three possibilities to consider, and maybe its all of them to some degree.
(1) He’s calling these signals and getting the info timely to the premier members while the folks in the cheap seats get it too late to use it, while refusing to admit that is his problem/fault OR
(2) He’s actually using the folks in 303/1450 clubs to help “create” the buy and sell pressure so he/his can profit from both of those movements (not sure there’s enough folks in 303 to do that, but what a great scam if true. I pay him to let me be a foot soldier and create the moves he wants to profit from…) OR
(3) He’s outright cooking the books with revisionist history to draw more people in.
So, with those sorts of experiences in the past 3 weeks, and these sorts of thoughts on my mind, it’s difficult to want to continue working with this guy. I’m not done trading options, I’m just done doing it with/for him.
!450 and 303 are complete scams
Don t waste your money
Have your dog pick your trades. It will do a better job
I became a 1450 Club member on 11/21/19. I am formally requesting a FULL REFUND of my 2 yr membership $2,850.00. I am extremely disappointed with the product. Not only were the options difficult to get into, the ones AK recommended were often losers. Also, what I (thought) I paid for soon changed. AK always said “I pay 250K a year for scanners, so you don’t have to…”. Not true, as it soon became apparent that if you did not “upgrade” to Project 303, Super Options, etc… and/or purchase Option Hacker, you were not going to have the opportunity to get into many trades. AK soon became so focused on selling additional or upgrades ti memberships and scanners that it seemed that those of us with only basic memberships were no longer “important” to him. That is NOT what I signed up for. The “basic” membership should have covered ALL recommendations and given me the opportunity to make 25X my money. It did not…only if you purchased additional subscriptions or tools.
Don’t waste your time…it’s a scam…they don’t stand by their gaurantee
A SCAM. Do not enter. You have been warned. Just Donate that money since you will be giving it away. Their sales people will convince you with a money back guarantee. Another Lie. The truth is out there. It's ironic how they refer to their SCAN for detecting opportunities. They are taking your money and laughing at you. Robert Pasmanick