2/03/2009
My father passed away
1. I need to be able to lose all the money I am trading with and not have it be a problem.
2. In order for this to be true, I need to be able to make that money back by working and saving in about a year or two.
3. If the above points become true I would do some of the more mundane stuff Bright does because it seems the psychology of it would be the same issues, and I may as well keep it simple. When the guys I met who trade with Bright now and have for a while told me what they did, it seemed very personal but I could understand it, yet for them to make money with it meant that they had some other process going on that ended up accumulating money. For me I might know some things but last year I did not make money. In this historic market that is not acceptable. Plus I'm just sick and tired of everything.
My fathers obit:
http://paleincomparison.com/
11/10/2008
10/27/2008
10/21/2008
for this discussion http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=142074
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=142074 I hate posting at elite trader so here is my post.
One thing I am recovering from is the idea that if something doesn't move in your favor, that therefore it will move forever against you. The reality of the market to me is more about a lot of overlap, as anyone knows from watching something that "stopped" you at the worst moment only to return to your "breakeven" entry. This is true I think for equity stocks in the U.S. I don't know about all the other markets.
Another thing I notice is that the closing price is often a very meaningful price as far as the days price action.
One idea to take advantage of this overlap is to use a soft stop and try to work a favorable exit from that point. You can still have a hard stop farther away in case you are dreadfully wrong. If your gains on a trade are larger than losers then you can have the occasional larger loss, if this tactic saves you on all the other losses.
Here is that idea with some back tested versions of a trend following strategy that is supposed to trade those nice daily stocks. The only results that are profitable use that soft exit tactic along with a stop based on the average true range.
Long version:
| -320.67 | -597.24 | -113.44 | -284.21 | 153.11 | 547.52 |
Short version:
| -694.90 | -1481.96 | -1440.65 | -1212.12 | -2078.57 | 383.00 |
10/19/2008
10/16/2008
10/15/2008
Steenbarger blog:
10/14/2008
10/13/2008
Biggest one day percentage gain in DOW:
10/12/2008
10/09/2008
10/08/2008
10/07/2008
Bollinger Bands on SPY:
My trading:
I programmed a script in NinjaTrader that I am using now as one big complicated indicator. Just as at times an indicator won't work due to the overall trading circumstances, so it is with this strategy coded in NinjaTrader in C#. So far by being discretionary in stock selection and market bias (based on direction and conditions) I have been beating the performance of the strategy if left all on it's own. Maybe over time I can code some of the discretionary decisions I use. Today I was long and made some money but my long bias was wrong so I am flat, up and out.
Abu Dhabi:
10/06/2008
Perspective:
Here is one nation that might bite the dust soon:
10/05/2008
Some tax breaks in bailout bill:
10/02/2008
I wish I was more learned:
State intervention in economic production arises only when private initiative is lacking or insufficient, or when the political interests of the State are involved. This intervention may take the form of control, assistance or direct management. (pp. 135-136)
Benito Mussolini, 1935, Fascism: Doctrine and Institutions, Rome: 'Ardita' Publishers.
9/30/2008
Statistics about 9 29 2008 decline:
Gillibrand:
9/29/2008
Man on the street:
I'm not an investor:
9/28/2008
Here is the worst case scenario:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/max-keiser/the-black-scholes-atomic_b_114197.html
Written in July, so we can start to tick off the list of 7 predictions.
9/24/2008
Any decent stock trading forums out there?
Stochastic Pop
Recently I have been using indicators again. Mostly because I now have some use for them in finding price patterns that I know I want to trade. Indicators are a way to find these that can be coded and back tested. It's not perfect but it can be done. I find that moving averages work well in terms of showing current direction, but when this direction is shown by a moving average it is likely too late to be a real trade. When coding and back testing in NinjaTrader it is useful as a filter despite the flaws.
I also find stochastics useful when used with moving averages. This has a limitation in that a stochastic can just as much be a "trendometer" when it is at an extreme. Even so, at least between moving averages and stochastics it is possible to code and back test some decent ideas.
Here is a novel use of the stochastic:
http://trader.online.pl/ELZ/t-sm-PopSteckle.html
