No, it's always analysis. It helps to pick the right coin to buy. I always buy coins from polo and bittrex so the coins I'm trading aren't scamcoins and are not going to be delisted easily.
I think the op in a way is right, there is not a mathematical formula that can guarantee your success at trading so at the end a trader needs to take many factors in consideration and depending on how we weights these many factors then he is going to reach a conclusion about what to do, but at the end is just a guess.
mathematical formula in trading isn't works what you need elis a graph reading or the traders reading but as like you said its just a guessing or prediction that comes from analysis. The better prediction the much you may earn .