The screen was from the seasonalgo website: https://www.seasonalgo.com/system/m...AZCN21%2BZCZ21/BUY/2020-06-26/2020-10-08/5/1Y Anyways no man, the man I bought the course from is from my country and has no connection whatsoever with that lady from the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic woman must have gotten my phone number from when years ago I had opened a few demo accounts to start and trade stocks. Yes I have read that "trader workstation", the app of Interactive Brokers is a good broker, although it looks horrible. The author of the course has no connection with me whatsoever now. I could do what he said or do nothing at all so there's no problem with that.
Man, doesn't it take you more time to write me off rather than answering a question? Why do you think I am not reading your messages carefully? What did I miss? I have asked about how to calculate ticks from page 1, I have posted a few attempts I did on my own. I was told they were wrong and that's it. So I did exactly what you told me to do in this post and got no answers. I also looked now for "crush spread", watched this video and it has nothing to do with what I am asking. I am asking if someone can tell me how to properly calculate the monetary value of 1 point and 1 tick for each commodity, given that my attempts give inconsistent results. The way I understood it was to do 1 point, divide it by the tick and then multiply the result for the monetary value of 1 tick. Sometimes it works, others it doesn't, so clearly there's something wrong with that. Not sure why I am bothering you. I know I am ignorant in the field, I am trying to learn things as I go by. But what exactly is the purpose of a forum if all I should use is google? I suppose that some experts in this forum who have had these doubts when they were starting know exactly how to clear my doubts.
Hey man sorry if it sounded as if I disregarded your post. I wasn't brushing it off. I was just making a joke. I am not denying that he is an expert, I don't even know him. But simply I already bought a course. So it seems more logical to me to finish one, apply it and see how it goes rather than buying many courses in a row.
Everything you said is true. There's no denying that. But if you're suggesting that I should study quantitative finance, financial mathematics, financial engineering etc. before doing a move I have to disagree. The best way to learn it to act. I am studying my course, hopefully with the help of some experts here I can get some tips and clear some doubts, then start trading some. And if I like it, by making mistakes and learning as I go, I will expand my knowledge. But I don't want to paralyze myself without taking action. Yes you can do that, it's called intermarket trading.
What I'm saying is that without knowing about this stuff it will be hard to know why you might want to trade something, like say a crush spread, and why you might not. You should know about SPAN and how to get all the information you will need from the CME site (contract specifications, tick sizes, hedge ratios, etc.) You need software that allows you to chart and analyse the cash value of futures spreads (using the notional values). I'll give you my opinions on which spreads I think are useful for trading, even though that will be different for everyone (different styles, backgrounds, and capitalization levels). I like index spreads, rate spreads, and rate / index spreads. I also use basis spreads to help me get a read on the market. You can day trade, swing, and invest with these spreads. But, I like to trade stuff like rate and index futures outright, and I like to trade intraday. You should start with a type of trading you want to do, choose an appropriate market, and then consider the different types of spreads you could trade, intelligently. Nobody just trades random spreads without thinking of alternatives and differences between markets. Well, maybe some people trade hundreds of different spreads - @bone. Spreads can have too much (or not enough) volatility, be illiquid, can be hard to trade, or require that you trade specific timeframes. Some of them are inappropriate for some styles of trading, levels of experience, and background/education.
I think I finally solved the puzzle. My calculation was correct, it's the system itself that is inconsistent. In fact, "unit" for some commodities (seem to be the metals and energy ones) means 1. Whereas for other commodities (food apparently), "unit" doesn't mean 1, but it means 0.01. With this approach, all numbers seem to add up. A bit messed up if it is so and the CME site doesn't specify it though. What do you think?
My friend, of course it's faster to give you ready answer. But you won't make it this way. If I give you ready answer you have it and that's it. If I won't and you need to search for it, you will also come across many other topics and dig deeper and deeper, and that way you will get a lot of new knowledge. Maybe some day after long time you will understand what I mean and even thank me ? If you think that crush spread has nothing to do with what you asked for, this is exactly what I'm talking about. This is indirect answer to your question (purposely). But you are looking for wrong things. I don't know what is in this video, just scroll it fast. Your question was about ticks, points, value and going from that, ratios (for spreads). If you go be the "trace" of crush spread, you have some ratios already. From that you can start searching - "ok, I know what is the standard ratio for ZS-ZM-ZL crush, that's not exactly answer to my question, let's redefine enquiry and look what I can find". You are not bothering me. In fact I try to give you "fishing rod" not the fish itself. "But what exactly is the purpose of a forum if all I should use is google? I suppose that some experts in this forum who have had these doubts when they were starting know exactly how to clear my doubts.". Yes, and they had to go looooong way to know a lot of stuff, and believe me, any good trader I know was digging and searching and devotes his time (a lot of time) to get it. And why you think you still didn't get answer ? Not because ppl don't know, because a lot of them don't care to give you anything on plate if they see that, you don't want to do your job. Why should they ? This is the part you need to understand. I will give you some useful links and 3 tasks to do: 1. https://www.barchart.com - find here all the futures that you are interested and tell me what you see there. 2. Use any charting software, you can use tradingview.com or investing.com (for free) and tell me what is ATR (expressed in dollars) ratio for: ZS/ZM, ZM/ZL, ZS/ZL 3. CME margins - find here soy spreads and tell me what ratio you see there. You want to trade spreads using charts you presented, so most basic thing you need to know is what are the trading ratios (and chart ratios... but that's another story). I understand you wanted all the tick/point value stuff to construct spread.
Folio, spread trading is quite advanced. Seasonal trading has a small edge, and sometime you have to endure notable drawdowns for a seasonal movement to develop. Intermarket spread are even riskier, you have to calculate the value well, and enter contracts accordingly. Imagine if you had a calendar spread on CL when the front went negative, and all other months were positive. I am not saying is not profitable, but it's not easy, and definitely not guaranteed by the seasonal analysis. You can backtest that yourself by signing up to a research website like seasonalgo or Moore research. Like any strategy, it takes time and commitment, even through period of losses. Would you keep trading seasonality during a year like this? Although intramarket spreads follow price direction a bit, unless you are advanced in regular trading, hedging, derivatives and risk management... I would stick to price trading.