Michel Carignan is the founding president of Decision-Plus. He has been involved in the analysis of stock exchanges in Quebec for a very long time. His aim is to educate investors and help them make better decisions. A colourful character, he is not afraid to voice his opinions and he seldom leaves people indifferent.

A born technician

      In 1979, at the age of 26 years, Michel Carignan was hired by Esso Imperial Oil at the Montreal refinery where he was trained as a technician in refining. Monitoring, detecting, diagnosing and acting for the proper functioning of the refining systems, as well as taking emergency measures, are all part of the duties of a technician in refining.

      This job along with the necessary knowledge to exercise it, are very technical, which corresponds perfectly to the spirit of Michel. His other passions include hunting, fishing and golfing. He constantly makes reference to them because, according to him, each one is very technical and requires emotional control as is the case for stock market investing. He believes that in most cases, those who are not technically inclined can never get good results with regularity. It happens from time to time by chance, but in general and more often than not, they will come out empty-handed.

      In 1983, during the shutting down of the Esso refinery in Montreal, Michel Carignan was transferred to Esso’s Strathcona refinery in Edmonton Alberta where he took the opportunity to join an investment club comprised of 10 people. The group members used a computer, which was rare at the time, with no hard disk. It required the hand editing of the previous day’s quotes from quotes published in the newspaper, which were then stored on a floppy-disk. In this investment club, he discovered technical analysis of stock charts, which triggered his interest. He enrolled in training and devours all he finds on the subject: books, seminars ... Everything is good to complete his apprenticeship

      In 1985 Michel Carignan left the Esso refinery in Edmonton and returned to Quebec, he became an independent investor at home instead of seeking work in other refineries. He began by acquiring systems for news, quotes and professionals charts in order to make decisions and transactions. Through his research and work, he develops his first method of decision making which was based on technical analysis.