Do you trade it using Tradestation Securitities platform? If so would you recommend them? If not, how do you do it? Thanks, wally_
Thanks for your post. One of the most helpful I have found on this board so far. Now, I am somewhat surprised that you do not get even 2 trades on the average with your system. How often do you take trades depending on the time of the day? Do you have any statistics? Are the trades mostly in the morning and then in the last 2-3 hours? Also, I have been thinking about developing a similar system but using the first hour of trading as a starting base, but I guess your first half an hour could be better. What results are you getting? Average number of points per trade, wins/losses ratio, etc. Thanks once more... Thanks, wally_
damonjanis Thanks for the spreadsheet. Kind of a rough PF and AvgTrade not to mention win%. A filter would probably work well for the entries. Good trading.
for those folks comtemplating a MA CROSSOVER system emotional discipline is critical. Almost every month on the emini sp will have a "runner" of 30-40 points. Cutting profits early at say 20 points will usually transform a potential winning system into a certain guaranteed losing method.Trading real $$$ will definitely test your discipline level.
This is distilled from actual trades over the last year or so. no of trades 300 Win rate 73% Avge win 5.2 points Avge Loss 3.6 points These are real, and include all charges and slippage etc. Natalie
I use TradeStation for backtesting and charts/quotes. They don't support automated trading with futures yet, so I write my own systems in C# and use Interactive Brokers to automate. I've used RealTick in the past. TradeStation is all I use now for charts/quotes.
I agree with you on the filters. You do have to be careful, though, as a filter that elimates catching the few bigs profitable trades will cause the system to lose. This rough system is profitable, but it does have big drawdowns. As others have mentioned, a trader really needs to stick with it to make it work because of the low percent profitable. There are better systems that are still simple and profitable (even more profitable), and much easier to follow. I threw this out here as an example more than anything that simple can work.
right damon, and the whole thread is just the way it goes in real life. You start with a simple system, and then you notice a few problems, and then you start tweaking and adding, and before you know it, you have a very complex system, and usually by that time, the original system in it's simple form is making money again.
damonjanis, that is really impressive that you automate, very nice. I noticed a slow ma of 53 and a trailing atr stop of 5 will double the profits and cut the maxdd nearly in half. I think you are right though in that an entry filter may lose those huge outlier trades. Good trading.
Thanks Natalie, I appreciate that. Did you do some theoretical testing as well? I am curious how the theory compares to real life. wally_