please read proflogics post objectively. mostly psychobabble with several obvious facts included. the best line--"price will always be stable since it can't be manipulated" think about this. LOL! no offense meant, professor. you seem like an ok guy, but these things you say need to be addressed since all but the obvious makes no sense. regards, surf
Please excuse MS. Common sense tells us that once a trade is placed and entered into the system (GLOBEX) it can not be be manipulated. Common sense dictates that the only variance is the datafeed itself but degradation of data in minimal when one actual researches the data and not makes wild comments as are seen here occasionally in ET. The explanation of each of the chart increments is self explanatory as well. MS, you can not fathom what it takes to do research on your own so you make it a passion to try to verbally discredit those that do. Just because "YOU" don't understand it doesn't mean others with common sense can't.
If you use tick charts then you need to calibrate them properly. Each data providor is different so you need to work out what is the number of ticks/bar from your market data providor. Fib numbers are not good enough sometimes because everyone has different data sources/ways ticks are aggregated - how can everyones settings be similar numbers? Go back over say 5 days and put in an arbitrary tick number ie 1000 ticks/bar and see how many bars you get per day on average. In 24 hour markets best to calibrate in the 11 hours from 6am-5 pm GMT for european products when the market is 'normal' and leave out the other 13 hours. Figure out the "normal hours" for your product in the case it is a predominantly US/Asian instrument that trades 24 hours. The reason for this is that you don't want the slow late US and Late Asian very early european hours putting a drag on the calculations during the normal trading periods - euro and US sessions. So in our european 24 hour instrument example if you get 550: 1000 tick bars over 5 days during these hours then you have 110 000 ticks a day. If you divide that by 11 hours - then you have 166 ticks/bar/minute. Monitor (do bar counts) as needed each week as new data contributors are either added or subtracted to your data feed - hence it will change the ticks reported over time. So your one minute chart in this example is 166 ticks and multiples of this can be constructed to figure out say a 5 minute chart - i.e. 830 tick for a 5 minute proxy. Volume bars don't exist in spot fx so tick bars are perhaps the best you can hope for. Hope this helps.
Here is where I have got to so far. I started with a 100 tic chart. Someone mentioned that a number before a big number is extremely helpful and so I immediately switched to 99 ... I cannot tell you what this has done to my trading. And then someone said that if I do not use a fibonacci number I will be fired. I immediately switched to 89. Then I read that I need an edge ( whatever that this) And so I switched to 94 which is a number discovered by Fibonacci's 3rd cousin, on his mother's side naturally. This number lies exactly between my 99 and Mr Fibonacci's 89 and is so secret that I am reluctant to discuss it with myself. Then someone said that all bets are off because different suppliers treat tic charts in different ways, something that I already knew. And so now I am back to boring old 100. Bugger!!!
No offense Specialist but please explain to me how you can get an accurate read on any market if you arbitrarily eliminate a portion of the data? That would be akin to tossing out a QB's 1st quarter numbers because he's just getting warmed up. It reminds me of that Metalica parody . . . 13 hours baaaad . . . 11 goooood. All of the transactions, shares, contracts . . . whatever MUST be included in the data to get an accurate and consistent read on a markets price movement, direction and strength. Even the data from the slower overnight sessions must be included. This is the sole reason why Volume Bar charts are the only consistent and stable viewing environment for the markets. This is because it isn't necessary to build in a bias against a certain segment of the data. It include all of the data conveniently. For Volume Bar increments use perfect squares to create you chart increments. Example: 9 9 x 9 = 81 9 x 9 x 9 = 729 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 = 6561 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 = 59049 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 = 531441 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 = 4782969 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 = 43046721 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 x 9 = 387420489 This is just an example but it gives you a starting place. Some markets like Feeder Cattle that are thinly traded would need a 9 Volume Bar Chart. The other extreme would be the QQQ's where you would want to build a Trend chart with a 4782969 for Intraday viewing or an even larger one for Swing or Position trading. You can even go so far as set up one Volume Bar chart as a Trend chart and the next fastest chart increment to use for entries and exits because it is incrementally perfect. A sub set so to speak. Enjoy a good portion (but not all) of my 12 years of research . . .