Trading strategies are the endpoint not a starting point and are developed only after taking the extensive effort to understand and recognize price development. THEN can a strategy be formulated and tested. The notion of "buy when this happens and sell when this" is the stuff of snake oil salesmen and the lazy and/or naive tools who believe them. Also if someone were able to do exactly what another does, maybe possible in automation (I wouldn't know about that) but not possible for a rule-based discretionary system. That such a thing would cause dilution of it's effectiveness is nonsense. None of us are Goldman or Morgan Stanley and our retail trades are just farts in the wind in a market such as the ES.
Schweiz knows this. It's a crutch so nobody will find out that 1), can't trade and 2), trades 1 lots if at all. He wishes he were cap-constrained.
Wait, you're not a Hersheyite? Sorry. You posts and Sprout's are almost interchangeable. I assumed you were on the same page.
I imagine your post is directed at me. Of course strategy comes after understanding. And it doesn't mean that if one of Schwager's MWs disclosed his method I would necessarily follow it. For any number of reasons it might not be possible. The approach may require more capital and resources than I have, I might not be smart enough to employ the strategy, I may not have the fortitude to stick with it, it might not be my "style," etc. Whatever. But to suggest that including such information would detract from the book is absurd. So then why isn't it there? Sure, most of us here, and especially me included, are small fry who couldn't possibly move a market. And most of us here use methods that the rest of us probably don't really want to know about anyway. But if you have something that you consider usable and repeatable, why would you broadcast it over the Internet? If it really does have any value, it would get around. And unless you're in front of it, I can't see any upside. Why do you think specific working strategies stop working? I'm guessing one reason is that they become broadly recognized and diluted. If what you have has any merit, why quicken the process? Perhaps I'm being naive. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
It was not directed at you Fred. I was addressing two points which come up often in here. 1 That a decent "strategy" can be simply defined lacking the cognition of the trader who built it and 2 copying a strategy (given the possibility) weakens it. If number 1 was reality, trading would be pretty easy.