So it looks like I'm going to be leaving my prop firm and starting out on my own at the beginning of August. That being the the case, I'm going to try and keep this journal going, to help others, and hopefully myself along the way. I'm a US treasury yield curve spreader, and plan on dabbling in the ZB, ZN, ZF and ZT. At times I will use the ICS markets (ie ZfZn) but the vast majority of the time I'll just be legging in and out on my own. dm
I'll be managing my money using a 5% var limit, but resetting quarterly- so at times this may lag and turn into a slightly smaller or larger amount. I know this is an aggressive management system, but had I been using it the last 5 years my largest drawdown would have been 30% (and I'm completely comfortable with that since I don't have my entire savings in my "trading account" and if I lose my entire balance I can wire over a new "buy-in" if you will). In general my s/l will simply be hit when I cross -5% for the day on my total positions, but I never generate a s/l individually for trades as I enter them. I always fade losers, hopefully setting myself up for a situation where I have three bullets per position and look for any opportunity to take a winner. Based on my willingness to lose 5%, my profit targets for the day are in general 1.75%+, because I hit my loss frequently enough that if I allow myself leave days only up 1% I lose over the long run. My goal will be 3-6 positions per day, with each one have the 3 bullets I referred to before, so on most days I'll actually be entering into at least 10 total trades. Next step right now though I think will be locating a brokerage account. I've used both Senex and Advantage futures in the past and had great experiences with either, I just have to look around and see where I can get the best commission rates these days, and likely will use X-Trader- so I need that compatibility anywhere.
alright quit today, will be running 200k in a new account hopefully by the beginning of august. i'll be running a 12k pukepoint from the beginning, as I can reload if necessary- but my worst historical drawdown would be about -63k at those levels, so I'm quite confident no reload will be necessary. I've decided i'm going to definately use x-trader in my new adventure, as i already have excel tools linked to it to define ICS spread values more accurately than the ICS (ICS does to .25 for example on the zfzn and I can calculate it to .08). My goal for the remainder of the year is +50k. with a 2011 goal of 200k to follow. I'm not sure if i'll refer to things in terms of % return or raw $ going forward, but if anyone cares that much i'm sure you can do the backtracking math to get either one from the other. I think i'll extend my 5 vs 10 margins to about 1.5x what i use in the 10 vs 30 or 2 vs 5, simply because i trade them a bit better and they hold together more than the other two do (imo). at some point i may add in the cash markets (basis trade) or eurodollars (ted spreads) but for now i'll limit myself to the treasury future curve to limit my fees.
made some phone calls, looks like i'm going to get 32 cents / round trip per contract after i buy an AM seat. matches best rates i've gotten at my old prop so i'm fine with that- hopefully will be trading by the end of next week. also started to get in contact with potential backers so we'll see how that goes- but when i left my firm i did so assuming i'd only be trading my money going forwards, so it's kinda like a freeroll in my opinion if i can land a few backers.