Right now I have a day-trading automated strategy with backtest results of 1/1/2008 - Today for ES: Only holding a maximum of 13 contracts at a time ($6,500 required)-- $120,000 net profit (1.75 Profit Factor) Max Daily Loss = ~$14,000 on some date in Q4 2008 Max Daily Gain = ~$11,000 a couple days after the prior max loss date in Q4 2008 Percent Winning Trades = ~66% On Live Trading Data (Paper Money) it has always been positive. However, I have only been testing on live data for a week. Since it had largest gains in 2008 (it makes more during volatile environments), I am not worried about another possible dip... So my question is, when would you go live with real money? Do you guys wait months? What are your profit factor requirements? Do you have a % winning trades requirement? What is your highest daily loss that you are willing to accept? What types of profit patterns do you look for in backtesting?
When i manage to run live for 1 year and have good positive returns every month, including the standard figures like sharpe ratio, win loss ratio, percentage, average ticks of win/loss ... bla bla etc...
I was on SIM for over a year, however I was also learning how to trade futures at the same time. If you are already a trader and think you have a proven strategy, if you follow your rules and can be net positive for 3 months in a row, why not go live?