Welcome to NexusFi: the best trading community on the planet, with over 150,000 members Sign Up Now for Free
Genuine reviews from real traders, not fake reviews from stealth vendors
Quality education from leading professional traders
We are a friendly, helpful, and positive community
We do not tolerate rude behavior, trolling, or vendors advertising in posts
We are here to help, just let us know what you need
You'll need to register in order to view the content of the threads and start contributing to our community. It's free for basic access, or support us by becoming an Elite Member -- see if you qualify for a discount below.
-- Big Mike, Site Administrator
(If you already have an account, login at the top of the page)
yes, you are definitely right I have some "conflict" with market profile and I working on that.
You see the big big limit of market profile is that it organize the data in "days" and this is a bias.... by using MP you tend towards mean reversion trades and you lose many swing trades that would be much more interesting.
I still think there is something about MP, but I try to put it in contest as much as possible and I challenge my views using other concepts such as supply/demand or price action.
Concerning backtesting Jim's concepts it's not easy but nowadays I don't think it's that difficult. He insist that backtesting his ideas is tough, however we are in year 2023. To put this in perspetive: open Microsoft excel in your mobile, right some random numbers by hand on a piece of paper....you can import those numbers with your mobile camera and ask excel to sum them etc.. This technology some years ago was unconceivable.
Now if you want the code to do just that you will find it free on github.
What I am trying to say is that technology has evolved, programming languages have evolved.
Many people will tell you that something cannot be done, but nowadays you can backtest everything, it's just some hard work but it can be done.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
I have posted this link quite a few times since 2013 and it is still valid. Very good info, i am sure it will inspire you to build some stats based on these ideas:
For swing trades, there is a very good video from Dalton: .../watch?v=9ZCjolhkYvM&t=95s
He talked about three ways to get started with a swing trade then how to monitor it. It would start as a day trade but evolve as a swing trade.
I am a professional programmer and have written complex back-test code. Yes in theory you can backtest anything but in reality it is very hard since some of the concepts involve observing tempo of price changes thru bid and ask moving in various speed. You would need to have those bid/ask detailed data with precise timing to simulate such conditions. This kind of data is close to impossible to obtain. That's why Dalton always emphasized "experience", "experience" is basically real-time backtest from which you can build confidence and conviction for the method.
I don't find it that difficult to obtain. Any of the usual data vendors provide it; IQFeed, CQG, Denali via SierraChart. Feel free to direct message me if you want to discuss details.
there is also another interpretation on how to read this empahsis on "experience": if you need experience you will just buy his courses. You will pay thousands of dollars to have something which is not even backtested. It's a great business model: since it's impossible to backtest it you must just trust "Old Jim" basically because he is old.
I don't fall into that trap.
Honestly I think he should at least post his broker statements as many traders do:
if you invest in a fund you can see its past performance
you can see traders performance in eToro, collective2, darwinex etc... and copy their trades
you can watch videso by Ross Cameron (warrior trading) and download all his broker statements
you can see performance of etf etc.. in morning start
you can purchase automatic robots in metatrader, Ninja, Ctrader etc... and you see the performances and even try them and backtest them
...but good old Jim does not provide anything, but he is old and he was head of trading at UBS, come on!!
If you are a trader you play by the traders rules: you want to sell courses, show me that you make money.
Honestly I woudn't be surprised if someone get a little bit more "curious" and the SEC ask him to provide some real documents.
It happend to Jason Bond, he seemed so professional, he talked about advanced spreading startegies in fixed income derivatives.... then the SEC discovered he never made any money trading and he ended up in Jail.
Also let me add something: why does he use WindoTraderBlue? to display market profile?? check the prices below!!! you want to pay 290USD per month to "just" display market profile? you cannot even trade from the platform.
Smell a little fishy.
This discussion is getting just a little too heated and has gone well beyond the original topic of the thread, which was about someone wanting to contact other Dalton graduates to get together.
It is fine to disagree with a trading vendor and to debate whether there is any value in his material or any merit to his methods, and some back and forth between someone who finds value in it and someone who does not is perfectly normal and can be valuable.
This discussion is right on the edge of becoming personal, however, and is in danger of going over that edge, which will require moderator intervention.
Please tone this disagreement down, make it about Dalton and not about each other, and keep it non-personal. If you can't, then just walk away and let it rest.
Bob.
When one door closes, another opens.
-- Cervantes, Don Quixote
Yes, Jim does trade, and he trades every day, or at least every day that he sees an opportunity in the markets.
He is not a swing trader, he is a discretionary short term trader, his trades last from a few hours to a couple of days. He also applies hedging and he may hold the base position for longer and trade around it. His primary trading vehicle are options, particularly ES options which he uses as a substitute purchase or sale of the underlying. When he has a long option position he will trade futures or SPY around them. This way of acting allows him to limit his risk.
He does not show his trades, nor does he call them out, at least not directly. He also doesn't provide you with setups, because that's not something we should be interested in. He teaches total market understanding and independent thinking in the markets. Having said that, I attach two screenshots from his webinars where some of his trades are visible. They are visible not on purpose, he claims that he shows them by mistake. I'm not sure if that's true or whether he pretends to make a mistake in order to satisfy such people as you, who think that it adds credence to anybody's conviction whether to enroll or not in his trading course. I for one wouldn't join his programs if he did concentrate on setups and calling out trades. That is not what you want from a trading educator. It might seem attractive, but it is a trap. It's a best way to lie, to show some of your winners and build your image on that, while saying nothing about the losers. Jim has no problem admitting that he had a losing day (something that happens very rarely). I have taken with him several Intensives and have also taken a quick glance at the Foundational and the Advanced Course.
What you really should be interested in are the trading results of his students. I will take myself as an example. I am based in Europe where trading with bucket shops through CFDs is legal and as I am a small trader I use that vehicle for my trading. You can see my long term results here: https://www.forexfactory.com/easytraider. I also trade futures for a prop firm. i attach a screenshot of some of my results.
You have obviously scratched the surface and are missing the bigger picture.
To elaborate on my earlier post, I wanted to add, that Jim is not a broker. He has a very wide spectrum of experiences. Yes, he did own a discount brokerage. He is currently a retail trader like you and me, he has also been a floor trader, so he knows the difference between floor trading and on-screen trading, he also was exposed to information about the successful and unsuccessful strategies among different kinds of traders. He was clearing locals on the floor, so he knew the success ratio among them. He worked as a Vice President during the formation years of the CBOE. And, last but not least, he was the head of an institutional trading desk. It was not a small institution, but the biggest investment bank at the time in the US. He was the head of Paine Webber, and continued in this role after it was taken over by the UBS.
You say that he is old and that he doesn't change with the markets. I have never met a person who is more adaptive and elastic in what he believes, knows and takes advantage of. He is constantly learning, even at 83 years of age. He is aware of modern trading techniques, like statistical arbitrage and algorithmic trading. He just doesn't analyze them, he provides enough information to be able to trade with them, or against them depending on the market conditions. His age is an asset, not a liability, but you are welcome to whatever opinion and prejudice you wish to hold.
The things that he repeats constantly are just simply true. People go out to seek 'the smart money'. Smart money go to extreme measures and spend millions of dollars a month trying to hide their activity. 95% of the time the market is under control of short-term emotional and not so knowledgeable traders. You want to learn from them? Be my guest. Short covering and long liquidation are powerful forces in the markets. Your other quotes I will not even mention. If you disrespect them, you just obviously don't know how the markets operate. And going for a walk and meditating can be extremely beneficial, I myself find the best value in taking a hot/cold/hot shower, especially after my emotions start buzzing.
I highly recommend taking Jim's courses while he is still doing them to anybody who is serious about trading. He will not be making them forever.
