Hello, I am a newcomer to the world of automated trading systems and am interested in programing some intraday trading strategies into a system so that they can be automatically executed while I work in the case of Forex and ES futures and while I sleep in the case of Euro Session Forex. I have developed these strategies based on both experience and some live manual trading. My questions are the following: 1. For Forex and Futures automated trading, which of the following platforms for system programing and executing would you suggest: A. Ninja Trader B. Wealth Lab C. Matt Lab D. Trade Station 2. How reliable is the Tradestation platform for executing systems intraday? 3. For Tradestation, as well as the other platforms mentioned above, is it possible to utilize position sizing algorithims to adjust the number of contracts based on market conditions and real time account size? 4. Any other thoughts or suggestions for automating a mechanical intraday system in Forex and Stock Index Futures. Any advice or suggestions would be tremendously appreciated. Thanks
So you want to trade automatically while you are sleeping. What about if something happens and your broker opens the spread 30 pips, market gaps, your stop is filled 300 pips away, platform freezes, internet connection fails, etc. Are you going to program all these cases too?
+1. The last thing the world needs is more poorly thought out robots happily trading away with no supervision, totally ignorant of market conditions.
This industry is full of illusions. The first illusion that was marketed was backtesting. Then they marketed neural networks. Then they marketed forex pools and dark pools. Then they marketed automated trading. All they have marketed are ways of getting the money from fools into the pockets of a few strong hands. LIke a very smart guy said here once but I forget his name, there are just ways of them setting up a game with the odds in their favor. The key to profitable trading is capitalization and risk control. If these two are right then you can put a monkey to throw darts and select your entry points. If you can average properly and you have enough capital your enemy will quit and you will win.
Can't say I agree with much of this. While neural networks are bullshit for a variety of reasons, backtesting is no "illusion". Nor are capitalization and risk control a substitute for a statistical edge. The problem with automated trading is not the use of backtesting in search of an edge. That's fine. The problem is that the automated systems frequently shit the bed when confronted with a situation that didn't appear in the backtest or which was filtered out in the process of preparing the backtest data - illiquidity, extremely large orders, trading halts, misprints, etc. So it appears I have to rescind my "+1" - apparently you were right only in a broken-clock sense.