gray-box trading

Have any of you guys tried gray-box trading? Essentially the system designer gives you a tool you can tweak a bit but they don't tell you the exact math behind the signals...

just curious...

 

Don't say "gray box". Call it a "tweakable black box" instead.

 

Is it "tweak" as in adjust the length of a moving average or "tweak" as in curve fitting from optimziation?

 

As in they give you their proprietary tools and show you how to adjust them but not much more than that...

This is what started me thinking:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFnV-WMRSFQ

 

my firm uses gray box. the "trader" turns on the algo and can change some parameters if needed.

 

And it works? Aren't you a bit uncomfortable not knowing the exact math behind it?

The market is pretty dynamic, I would be worried about the system hittting a severe losing streak and then not knowing what to do about it...

 

we develop the algos in house. the trader is more like an operator than anything, they have no discretion