A one day ma would be the same as a 26 period ma on a 15 minute chart, no? 390 minute trading day / 15 minutes = 26
first of all I' d like to know:are we talking of an EOD system or an intraday system? EOD = if close > close-1 then go long @ close viceversa for short , always in the market. ???
No, not at all, the close is usually not equal to the sum over the closes of the last 26 15 min bars divided by 26. If the bars were all closing at the same level (say 900) then their sum divided by 26 would give you the close that is 900. Otherwise, this can happen in only very special situations, but never when you have a strong intraday trend.
did you read "How to Use the 4-Day, 9-Day and 18-Day Moving Averages to Earn Larger Profits from Commodities" by R.C. Allen? this mag http://www.technical-investor.de/ optimize the ma and found optimize values are 6 and 18 on the daily chart.
Most day traders use a 5 minute chart. That is why a 3 minute seems to work better if you are using MA for entries. I use 5, 15 as most programs go for 9, 18 it seems. Just trying to get an edge on the competition....
They just want to be fancy or catch the rebound before anyone else. The traditional MAs are just fine.