Screener — How to Sift Out the Strongest Stocks from Thousands

Imagine standing before a mountain of sand with a few grains of gold hidden inside. You could sift through it manually with a shovel for days — or you could use a sieve with precisely set holes, shake it a few times, and the gold will remain on top. The Screener in QMA is exactly this sieve. There are thousands of stocks on the U.S. market. No person can go through them manually. The Screener scans the entire market for you every day, scores companies based on five pillars of quality, and lets you filter them so that only the 10–30 names worth a closer look remain on your screen.

This article will guide you through every window, button, and column of the Screener. The goal is not for you to memorize names — the goal is for you to gain perspective: understand what each function does, how to combine them into a real edge, and how to integrate the Screener into the entire process from idea to portfolio position.

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What the Screener is Actually For

The Screener does not solve the question of "which one stock to buy." It addresses a higher-level question: "from the entire market — where should I even look?"

Most beginners do the opposite. They hear a ticker somewhere (from a friend, on YouTube, in a headline), buy it, and only then look for reasons why it was a good idea. This is called confirmation bias and it's the most expensive habit in the market. The Screener forces you to go the other way around and much healthier:

First, I define what a strong opportunity looks like (quality company + good timing + interest from smart money), and only then do I choose among such candidates.

This is called systematic selection and it's exactly what professional funds do. The Screener gives you the same tool — just in a language that even a beginner can understand.

★ Insight: The Screener is a filter, not a crystal ball. No screener can predict tomorrow's price. What it can do is dramatically narrow the field — instead of thousands of possibilities, it gives you 20 statistically above-average candidates. Your chances of finding a good stock increase not because the screener "knows," but because it eliminated thousands of weak names that you would otherwise spend time on.

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Anatomy of the Screen — Top to Bottom

The Screener has a logical structure: at the top, context (where the strength is in the market right now), in the middle, quick views and smart filters, and at the bottom, the table itself with candidates. Let's go through it step by step.

1. Sector Radar — Where the Wind is Blowing

At the very top, you see the Sector Radar: an overview of sectors (Technology, Healthcare, Energy, Finance…) sorted by current strength. It works like a weather forecast for the entire market.

The market does not move as one block. At one moment, semiconductors are leading, another time energy, another time banks. This shifting of money between sectors is called sector rotation. When you see Energy at the top and Real Estate at the bottom, it means capital is currently flowing into energy.

How to use it: Stocks from a currently strong sector have the wind at their back — even an average company in a strong sector often grows more than a great company in a weak one. Before you start filtering individual stocks, look at the radar and consider whether you want to search within the 2–3 strongest sectors.

★ Insight: "Go with the flow." Picking a great company in a dying sector is like rowing against the current — it can be done, but it takes much more effort. The radar shows you where the current is flowing.

2. Strategy by Horizon — Pre-set Views

Below the radar, you'll find a switch for views based on how long you want to hold the stock:

View	For Whom	What it Roughly Filters
Default	Everyone	Balanced view, sorted by Composite score
Short-term	Active traders (days)	Momentum, proximity to breakout, higher turnover
Swing	Medium (weeks)	Strength of setup + technical patterns + timing
Investment	Long-term (months–years)	Quality, ROIC, FCF, valuation, growth
Popular Screens	Inspiration	Ready-made "recipes" (e.g., quality growth, value)

These views are like pre-set programs on a washing machine. You don't have to manually assemble ten filters — you select the horizon, and the Screener sets a reasonable default combination for you, which you can then fine-tune.

Practical tip: Always start with the view that matches your actual horizon. The most common mistake beginners make is searching in the "Swing" view but then holding the position for half a year — the criteria for these two worlds are different, and you're mixing apples and oranges.

3. "Who's Buying Right Now?" — Tracking Smart Money

This is one of the most valuable parts of the Screener and where QMA does something that regular screeners can't. Here you'll find a set of chips (clickable tags):

• 🧑‍💼 Insiders Buying — directors and managers of the company buying their own shares
• 🏛️ Senators / Congress — U.S. lawmakers reporting purchases (they are required to disclose them)
• 🏦 Big Funds (13F) — institutional investors accumulating positions
• ⚡ All at Once (confluence) — multiple signals converged on the same stock simultaneously

When you click on a chip, the table filters only to stocks with this signal.

Why does this make sense? These players have something you don't: an insider knows their company from the inside, a fund has an analytical team worth millions, a congressman sees what's coming in legislation. You're not copying them blindly — you're just observing where "smart" capital is flowing and using it as one of the indicators.

★ Insight: What 🏦 13F Means. Big funds must report their positions quarterly in Form 13F. When the Screener tags a stock with 🏦, it means that multiple large institutions are accumulating a stake in it. It's not a directive — it's information like "big players see value here." Note: 13F data is delayed (up to 45 days), so take it as trend confirmation, not a fresh tip.

Confluence is King. One signal can be a coincidence. But when on one stock an insider buys + a fund accumulates + a congressman adds in the same period, it's much stronger. The "All at Once" chip finds these rare convergences for you with one click.

4. Strength of Setup — 💎 ELITE and Presets

Next to smart money, you'll find the Strength of Setup filter and quick presets:

• 💎 ELITE — backtested combination of factors that historically worked best
• Ready to Trade — stocks with a complete, fresh setup
• Growth — emphasis on revenue and profit acceleration
• Advanced Filters — manual fine-tuning of everything else

💎 ELITE is the strongest sieve in the entire Screener. It's not "stocks with the highest score" — it's stocks where a specific combination of factors (quality + timing + smart money + technicals) has historically shown above-average results. ELITE is a narrow filter: often, only a few names remain. That's intentional — it's meant to show you gems, not a long list.

🚨 CORRECTION NOTE (31 July 2026). Specific performance figures (alpha, win rate, sample

size) are being withdrawn from QMA's public surfaces — which is why you will not find them in

this text. They were computed through a historical scores table whose older part was derived from

later prices, and since 31 July 2026 a stricter significance threshold applies, derived from every

trial ever run. The figures are not replaced by lower ones — the input data was never valid as

of the day in question. This text describes what the tool does, not what result it produced.

Only forward tracking since 18 February 2026 is probative.

★ Insight: The ELITE filter works like a bouncer at a luxury club. It only lets in those who meet all the conditions at once. When you see 💎 on a stock, it means "more things came together here at once" — and it's the convergence, not one standout figure, that tends to be the most reliable.

5. Classic Filters — Your Manual Control

Below the presets, you have a full palette of manual filters:

Filter	What It Does	Example Use
Region	Market (US, European…)	Focus only on U.S. stocks
Index	Membership (S&P 500, Nasdaq 100…)	Only large, liquid companies from the S&P 500
Sector	Industry	After looking at the radar, choose a strong sector
Size (MCap)	Market Capitalization	Avoid risky micro-cap companies
Min. Score	Lower Composite Limit	Show only the top-rated companies
Pattern (Grade)	Grade A++ to F	Only stocks with grade A and better

These filters are building blocks. The strength is not in one of them, but in their combination — we'll get to that.

6. Switch Stocks / ETF / All

At the top of the table, you switch between:

• Stocks — individual stocks
• ETF — exchange-traded funds (baskets of stocks)
• All — both

Beginners often appreciate the ETF mode: an ETF is less risky than a single stock (the risk is spread across dozens of companies). For ETFs, QMA shows clear data rather than a score (momentum, trend, relative strength).

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How to Read the Table — Composite Score and Grades

The table is the heart of the Screener. It looks like an airplane cockpit at first glance, but once you understand a few key columns, the rest will fill in as needed.

Composite Score (0–100) — One Number, Five Pillars

Composite Score is the overall rating of a company on a scale of 0–100. It is created by combining five super-pillars, each evaluating a different dimension of the company:

Pillar	Weight	What It Measures	In Layman's Terms
VALUE	25%	Value and quality of earnings	Is the company cheap relative to what it earns?
MOMENTUM	20%	Strength of trend	Is the price rising and has momentum?
SMART MONEY	25%	Activity of institutions/insiders	Are smart money accumulating it?
SENTIMENT	10%	Mood and news	What does the environment say about the company?
CATALYST	20%	Upcoming triggers	Is something approaching that will move the price?

Instead of reading through balance sheets, income statements, and reports yourself, you get one number that distills all of this. A score of 85 means "the company is above average across multiple dimensions." A score of 35 means "there are more weaknesses than strengths here."

★ Insight: Why Five Pillars and Not One? Because a company can be great in one and terrible in another. A stock can be extremely cheap (VALUE 90), but falling like a stone (MOMENTUM 20) — this is known as a "value trap." The Composite averages these contradictions with weights, so you don't get carried away by one tempting figure and overlook warnings in another pillar. Whenever a high Composite catches your eye, click on the detail and see WHICH pillars are driving it.

Important: QMA never falsifies data. If information is missing for a pillar, it shows "—" instead of an invented fifty. So if you see a dash in a pillar, it doesn't mean "average" — it means "we don't know this," and you should be more cautious.

Grade (Grade) A++ to F

Next to the number is a letter grade — the same logic as in school. A++ is the top, F is a failure. The grade is a quick visual shortcut: when scrolling through a list, the eye catches "A++" faster than "87." The number and grade say the same thing, just in different languages.

Other Columns — Glossary

You can customize the table (turn columns on/off). Here's a translation of the most important ones:

Column	Meaning	How to Read
Timing	Position in price range (ICT)	"Discount" = cheap zone, "Premium" = expensive zone
Risk	Level of risk	Lower = smoother ride
Target	Analysts' target price	How much upside Wall Street sees
Seasonal	Seasonal pattern	Is this stock typically strong in this period?
STRATEGY	Membership in QMA strategies	Is the stock part of a verified strategy?
Conv	Conviction	How strong is the overall signal conviction
CONF	Confluence (signal convergence)	How many signals converged
MCap	Market Capitalization	Size of the company
7D / 3M / YTD / 1Y / 5Y	Returns for the period	Short and long performance
P/E, FWD P/E	Price / earnings (including forward)	Expensiveness relative to earnings
DivY	Dividend yield	How much it pays in dividends
Growth	Revenue/profit growth	How fast it's growing
ROIC	Return on invested capital	How efficiently it earns
FCF %	Free cash flow yield	How much real cash it generates
ND/E	Net debt / equity	How indebted it is
PEG	P/E relative to growth	Cheap relative to its growth?
vs HI	Distance from yearly high	Close to the top, or far?
Earn	Earnings date	When it reports (beware of volatility)
An#	Number of analysts	How many are covering it (coverage)
Beta	Sensitivity to the market	>1 = wilder than the market
SI %	Short interest	How much is bet against it
Volx	Multiple of usual volume	Unusual activity?
Insider $	Volume of insider purchases	How much insiders invested
🏦 13F	Badge — funds accumulating	Institutional interest

You don't have to track them all. An investor will focus on ROIC, FCF %, P/E, Growth. A short-term trader on Timing, Volx, vs HI, CONF. Turn on only the columns that match your strategy — less is often more.

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How to Combine Filters into a Real Edge

Here's the core of the whole art. One filter is weak. Combining filters creates an edge — because each additional condition cuts off more weak names and increases the probability that what remains is truly strong.

Think of it as stacking conditions with a logical "AND":

The company must be quality AND have good timing AND smart money must be accumulating it AND be in a strong sector.

Each "and" narrows the selection. From thousands of stocks, it suddenly becomes 12.

★ Insight: The Power of Intersection. When one filter lets 10% of the market through and another independent filter also 10%, their intersection is roughly 1%. Four reasonable filters will turn thousands of stocks into a handful — and that's exactly the handful worth spending time on. The key word is "reasonable": filters must be independent and meaningful, not five variations on the same theme.

Three Sample Combinations

A) Quality Long-term Investment

View: Investment
Min. Score: ≥ 75  ·  Grade: A and better
ROIC: high  ·  FCF %: positive  ·  ND/E: low
Sector: one of the top 3 on the radar

→ You'll get quality, profitable, non-overleveraged companies in a strong sector.

B) Swing with Smart Money Confirmation

View: Swing
Strength of Setup: 💎 ELITE
Chip: ⚡ All at Once (confluence)
Timing: discount zone  ·  vs HI: still room to go up

→ A narrow list of stocks with a verified setup where signals converged and the price isn't overheated.

C) Insider Trail in Large Companies

Index: S&P 500
Chip: 🧑‍💼 Insiders Buying
Insider $: high volume
Min. Score: ≥ 65

→ Large, liquid companies where managers are betting their own money.

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Practical Stock Selection Process — Step by Step

Let's unify it into a repeatable ritual you can use every time:

1. Look at the radar. Which 2–3 sectors are at the top? Search there.
2. Choose the horizon. Investing for months? → Investment view. Trading for weeks? → Swing.
3. Apply a coarse sieve. Min. Score (e.g., ≥ 70) + Grade A+ and better. This drops 80% of the list.
4. Add an edge filter. 💎 ELITE or smart money chip — depending on what you trust more.
5. Sort by priority. Composite score, or CONF (confluence), or yield — according to strategy.
6. Go through the top 5–10 and click on details. For each, ask: WHICH pillars are driving it? Is there a hidden weakness (e.g., Earn = earnings are approaching and volatility threatens)?
7. Check timing and risk. Is it in the discount zone, or overheated at the maximum? What's the Risk and Beta?
8. Save favorites to the Watchlist. Don't rush. Watch them for a few days.

★ Insight: The Screener suggests, you decide. The Screener gives you 10 quality candidates. Which of them you continue to follow is your decision based on your horizon, risk tolerance, and context. Never buy just because a stock has a high number — that number is the beginning of the analysis, not its end.

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5 Tips for Long-term Success with the Screener

Tip 1 — Start with a wide sieve, then tighten. Don't start with ten strict filters at once (you'll end up with zero stocks and be frustrated). Apply 2–3 coarse filters, see how many are left, and gradually add conditions until you have a manageable list of 10–20 names.

Tip 2 — Confluence > one standout figure. A stock with five good figures and no excellent one is often a better bet than a stock with one dazzling number and four weak ones. Watch the CONF column and the "All at Once" chip — convergence is more reliable than a lone star.

Tip 3 — Respect timing. A great company bought in the "premium" zone (just below the yearly high, overheated) can stagnate for years. The same company in the "discount" zone offers a much better risk-reward ratio. The Timing and vs HI columns are your friends.

Tip 4 — Keep one screen and repeat it. Find a combination of filters that suits your nature, save it (or remember the recipe), and use it regularly. Consistency beats random searching. Professionals don't improvise every day — they have a process.

Tip 5 — Beware of data traps. Micro-cap companies (very low MCap) and stocks with low coverage (small An#) tend to have volatile, less reliable data. Extremely low P/E or gigantic dividend yields are often warnings, not opportunities. Filter for reasonable size and liquidity, so you don't drown in noise.

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How the Screener Fits into the Entire Workflow

The Screener is not an island. It is the first step in a chain that takes you from idea to position:

SCREENER  →  WATCHLIST  →  STOCK DETAIL  →  PORTFOLIO  →  STRATEGY
(filter)    (watch)      (explore)        (hold+monitor)  (integrate into plan)

1. Screener finds candidates. Buttons next to each row allow you to save the stock directly to the Watchlist or add it to the portfolio.
2. Watchlist is your "waiting room." Here you put favorites and observe them for a few days before deciding — you don't rush.
3. Stock Detail is a deep dive. You click on a candidate and see the breakdown of all five pillars, chart, fundamentals, insider activity, technical zones. This is where decisions are made.
4. Portfolio holds your actual positions — it tracks profit/loss, risk, tax impacts, alerts.
5. Strategy is the framework. The STRATEGY column in the Screener already shows whether a stock is part of any verified QMA strategies — the connection is thus bidirectional.

Additionally, the Screener offers Export (CSV/Excel) — you can download the results and further analyze them in a spreadsheet — and a Portfolio Simulator, where you can model a basket from filtered stocks and see how it would behave.

★ Insight: The Watchlist is your buffer against impulse. The most expensive trades are the impulsive ones. If you establish a rule "I won't buy anything until it's been in the Watchlist for a week," you'll filter out most emotional decisions. The Screener gives you candidates quickly — but the pause between finding and acting is often the most valuable thing you can afford.

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Common Mistakes to Avoid

Mistake	Why It's Bad	What to Do Instead
Chasing One Number	High Composite can hide a weak pillar	Always click on details and look at the breakdown
Too Many Filters at Once	Ends up with zero stocks, frustration	Start coarse, tighten gradually
Ignoring the Horizon	Swing criteria ≠ investment criteria	Choose a view based on the real holding period
Overlooking Earn (Earnings)	Earnings = high volatility	Check the date, consider the risk
Micro-caps Without Coverage	Unreliable data, low liquidity	Filter for reasonable MCap and An#
Blindly Copying 13F	Data is delayed up to 45 days	Take as trend confirmation, not a fresh tip
Mistaking "—" for Average	Dash = missing data, not neutral	Be more cautious where data is missing
Action Without Pause	Impulse is the enemy of returns	Let the candidate sit in the Watchlist

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Summary

The Screener is the most powerful tool for the search phase. It turns an unmanageable ocean of thousands of stocks into a clear list of a few strong candidates. The key to its profitable use lies in understanding three things:

1. Read Composite Score through Five Pillars — one number is a distillate, but decisions are made in the breakdown into pillars.
2. Combine Filters into an Edge — the strength is in the intersection, not in one criterion. Confluence (convergence) beats lone stars.
3. Integrate the Screener into the Chain — Screener → Watchlist → Detail → Portfolio → Strategy. The Screener suggests, you decide with perspective.

When you master this systematic ritual, you stop being a victim of random tips and start working with the market like a professional: first, you define what a strong opportunity looks like — and only then do you choose among such.

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It does not constitute investment advice or recommendations to buy or sell any security. Scores, signals, and filters are analytical tools, not directives for action. Investing in financial markets involves the risk of capital loss. Before making any investment decision, consider your own situation and consult a licensed financial advisor if necessary.*