December 23, 2003 I am starting this journal to make me accountable to my system. My backtested results show approx. 2000 to 3000 pips profit in the past year. This applies to all major currency pairs. The system is simple. I use a 200 and 250 simple moving average. When the price crosses both moving averages, I take a position in the same direction as the momentum. Backtested results show a lot of small losses in choppy periods followed by a few big winners when it starts trending. Exit signal is when it crosses the moving average to take a position in the opposite direction. So in other words, long above the moving average; short below the moving average. Starting account equity: $750.00 Leverage: 50:1 max Brokerage: Oanda Charting: MetaTrader Time Frame: 1hr candlesticks
Good luck with your trading, dnaj65000. Sorry you weren't able to attend our Dec meeting at Tim Hortons last week. Since our group's first meeting, I decided to open a tiny account with 500 USD and post the activities in this account on my webpage. I don't know if you read OANDA's forums or not. I used to post the activities of my friend's 10k account until he asked me to stop. Anyway, this tiny account is traded totally discretionarily. You and others with mini accounts might want to compare your returns to this tiny account's, which is up around 67% for this month (thanks to the BoJ intervention and Saddam's capture). In case you haven't been to my webpgae before, it is here.
Hi Shellback, That is a very nice looking equity curve you have on your site. That's an even nicer looking boat. I'm striving for that type of equity curve on my quest of becoming net profitable. Sorry I didn't show for the meeting. I wasn't sure if anyone was going to show so I stayed at home. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! DNAJ65000
Unless I am badly misunderstanding something, you are risking way too much. This system could easily have 10 losers in a row.
I appreciate the concern. The worst string of losses where in June to July in CADUSD. 4 losses in a row with 1 break even punctuated with a decent 128 pip win followed by 5 more losses and one break even. Total loss is -187 pips. Next trade is a 420 pip win from July7th to July23rd. So assuming that the possible 10 losers in a row does not happen right away, I will have booked some profits to sustain such a losing streak. The other thing that I am working on is an even tighter stop loss strategy than the basic system signals. If I can cut losses to break even or around -20 pips per trade, I have faith that I will be in okay shape. Essentially, the space between the 200ma and the 250ma is my maximum loss zone. If I had a choice to "eat well, or sleep well", I choose to eat well. I realize that I am using a lot of leverage (25:1). I am in the process of running a backtest to see if it is mathematically beneficial for me to size out of a trade. So the question is, should I have taken 10k off when AUDUSD traded to .7440 this morning? This allows for discretion, which I am not too fond of because I'm a poor discretionary trader. The key to this system lies in disciplined stop loss management...a quality that I do not have. That is why I started the journal; to be accountable. Currently, I have my stop loss set at the 200ma at 0.7396. This is essentially a break even trade. My expectancy is to only have a winning trade ratio between 31% to 48%. DNAJ65000
just curious since I didn't trade futures much this year... but will begin in earnest in 2004 (although I have traded equities/options for many years).... ....when and where do you take profits???!! When do you add on or average up, if at all? Your posts are concerned with stop-loss... but make no mention of profit targets/goals! Coin flip? You ARE interested in, and expect to have profits... NO? :eek: So..... what are you "accountable" to?!! Only the loss side?! bonne chance in 2004! ICe