YoungTrader, Those are some good points and there was buying today, so tomorrows report could be a disappointment to the bulls. I guess I was referring to the bigger trend in crude. Crude is just such a crazy trade with all that volatility. It wouldn't surprise me to see it down a couple bucks tomorrow at all. Do you trade crude often? I think there is alot of potential in that market. I just have no idea of how to figure out how to trade it. I have been watching it to see if there becomes more demand to trade in the back months. If so it could become a very good market to arb spreads in. Euros used to be like that until everyone set up there black boxes. But like wit all Quant stuff, as it takes one angle away it creates another..... Are the AG markets you trade all electronic, i.e. coffee,sugar etc., pit and or side by side? I guess I was wondering if it would be possible to put an auto-spreader on those markets, since so many traders over look those markets.
YoungTrader, I dont blame you on the school thing, I hated school when I was there. Be thankful that you have found your calling and you know what to do an how to do it. You are probably 10 years ahead of your piers. I got a kick out of that college thread they had going. The funny thing about that is most of the die hard college kids on there have never evan traded or have traded very little.....lol That thread kind of showed why so many people have trouble learning to trade, they think there is only one way to do things. They think in terms of black and white and with trading there is no one way to make money and anyone who thinks that will most likely have a hard time learning how to make any.
You bring up some great points about the auto spreading. Yeah im trying my damndest to get a job lined up at the MGEX so I can arb between the pit and the screen. I wish I was 18 right now and I would just pack up my bags and leave for minneapolis but no such luck lol! I actually have half a mind to just hire a trader to arb between the pit and the screen all day. The softs trade side by side but the vast majority of the volume is on the screen now. I usually trade all my softs in the pit (I try to contribute and keep the open outcry alive even if my volume amounts to little). In feb they are shutting down the ice pits though so I will place my trades on the screen then. I trade crude every once in a while and more often than not it has been good to me. My dad is a big energy trader so I keep up to date on the energy complex fairly well. I believe there are remarkable opportunities in the energy complex! I am working on a stratagy intra day for the crude market (when summer comes I will start trading it). It requires lots of volatility, which is why crude is one of the only contracts it works on. I don't expect this volatility in crude to disappear any time soon though. It is basically based off of the extentions of price to put it simply. Kind of a momentum scalp on a bigger time frame chart if you can imagine that. Im not a very complex person so my stratagy can't be overly complex. The KISS rule works just fine with me lol! Yeah quants have taken the "easy money" thats for sure. Once enough of those bastards get competing for the same buck it will all come crumbling down on them. Then you seperate the men from the boys. The people who can actually trade and not just get little edges here and there that are surefire. Its deffinantly a time of change!
I agree 100%. People think college is their golden ticket to success. Most of them just end up getting a dead end job that they hate. They get an average car, average house, average wife. They work their job for 40 years and hope to get just enough saved up to retire and live like rats the rest of their days. That doesn't exactly sound like something im willing to stand in line for! You have to take risks to get ahead in life. You have to scratch and scrape your way to the top! There is no easy way to success. All college kids along with there parents get brainwashed into the same thing every year. I can't tell you how many times I have heard a parent say "I want johnny to get a degree so he can have a good job with a good company and retire early". What the hell? Who wants just a good job? I want the best job! Who wants to work for a company? I want to be the company! Who wants to retire early? I want to retire 5-10 years after I die! Its all just different points of view I guess. I plan on going to college just to get some sort of degree and experience the college life but as far as it making a huge monetary difference in my life......I dont think so!
YoungTrader, I spoke with a guy a couple months ago who has a locals clearing firm and he said that no one knows how to make money anymore since crude has gone on globex. So the opportunities are huge in crude. He alot of his guys have just took there stock and kind of retired. So I think there could be alot of edge if a person can figure out a way to make markets in it. IMO the reason for the increased vol in crude is because so many of the MM have left, reduced size and have widen their spreads do to the fact they dont know who is on the other side of thier quotes since the majority of the volume is electronic. That is the market to figure out how to build a model for lol..... I have thought about trying to build a statisical history of how price responds to flow at diffrent levels of net change through out the day and see if it would show any patterns. But just been day dreaming so far....lol
Get a degree in business administration/finance so you'll know how to setup your hedge fund ... I'm not kidding. Happy Holidays Kid, I
That doesn't suprise me. These guys have literally been printing money over the past and now that energy trades mainly on globex they don't have a clue. This is not a new trend and I have heard that same complaint from many locals on different exchanges. Thats a good observation on the mm's. I can believe that would contribute to the added volatility. Thats why black box systems seem to be better mm's when everything goes electronic. Im not much into building models and would drive myself insane trying to program a computer to do this when this happens at this time in this market lol! It seems like to much wasted effort. I would rather just watch the market and try to draw conclusions on the chart as to why price did what it did. But thats just me. Your a smart guy though so if you want to make a model and take money out of crude then you can do it.
Thanks for the advice. Im thinking something along those lines. Probably econ because I heard its a little easier than finance lol! Anyway.....Happy Holidays to you too! P.S. For those who give a shit I just got short one feb crude at 96 not to long ago. Taking a gamble here but its a calculated gamble.
YoungTrader, I am not into programing either, that is what the college kids and their degree are for. I just got to come up with the logic for them to program. Models dont necessarily have to be programmed, they are just a form of analysis of the market and the variables that effect the product in question that try to quantify the risk/reward of market conditions and or trades.