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I am will start my combine next week. I start with one contract as well and add, but not as soon as you. I like to add at around 30t and move stop to BE+ a few for the new entry price. I trade CL and GC, and will probably focus on GC for the combine. I watch the candle OHLC, Bollinger Bands and GOMI CD to make my decisions to enter. Good luck to you!
Bob
Huge volume, two day's worth packed into one. Several trades, one really good, took 30 ticks out of it, around 60 was available, but TP was hit in a blink of an eye. Was using 3 and 5 lot position sizes. Can't complain, though, nearly half of LTP target is there in one day.
Was working on complimentary setups, looking very promising.
Can I ask you why you chose the 150k combine ? 30k is a joke for loss limit for crude and gold but 50k and 100k are ok too if you are going to be trading 5-10 lots. I am leaning more towards the 50k but 100k doesnt look bad either. The smaller profit goal should be a consideration, no ? Or are you thinking of when you are trading live you want to trade bigger ?
Very good question nobody asked before and it took a lot of consideration and thoughts.
Two factors and you named them both: large dll and large size to trade live.
First gives you the highest chances to do rollover among all combines if you are disciplined enough and not swinging all 15 cars from the start. My plan was to start with just one and add after winning days. It worked and also comoletely removed the pressure about not hitting dll or max dd. You can do similar with 100k combine but why settle for less? 150k is toughest to win but easiest to roll over if your target no1 is not to blow it, which minecis. I simply traded it like real money. It worked nice in the end:-)
Second factor you named right - why trading for peanuts. I can fund myself but TST gives a lot of structural benefits, tight risk management and social aspect. If I have uo pay a profit split it better be from tge highest numbers otherwise game is not worth it.
And a third, I did not consider it at the beginning but worth thinkin about - yoy have to built same cushion with both 100k and 150k combines, 10k, and it is faster to do with more firepower.
Listening to John Hoagland on a recent webinar (Post Trade Analysis: )
One of the things that is clearly his belief about traders , and he qualifies to have beliefs ... it seems he is specialized in not only "trading" but also "traders", is that in the long run he likes to see how they perform with about a 50% win rate.
I'm not challenging you or saying your system isn't the best thing since sliced bread or anything, I am interested in and also challenging you to discuss your risk management ideas.
How are you monitoring slippage on your stops - you have mentioned that this is one of the bigger risks that you want to know about in real time?
Getting filled in real time is certainly one of your risks , how are you monitoring that ?
What does your system look like with 50% wins ?
If John comes to you and says (cue gravelly voice):
"OK Xelaar. Nice job. Great Combine, great to see that people on Big Mikes are watching too. Great approach to the LP. You had a couple of good days. Very encouraging and I know that you have put a lot of work into this. Let me tell you though, and I don't mean to be in any way dismissive of your efforts, I've been working this floor man and boy, and there is little evidence to suggest that there are 90% traders out there. Show me how you will manage risk with what is in the end my money and yours when you are winning about half the time with some horrible slippage. I want to see you succeed and I don't want you to be discouraged or blow out of our strict risk management parameters too early".
I think that not only for John but also for you that having this picture in your mind will allow you to punch hard. So far you have not had to take one on the chin ... but knowing that you can is very empowering !
Thanks for sharing with the group - you are an example of what can be done. We've seen the trades and now show us where the confidence comes from. Absolutely delighted with your progress man !
I do respect John a lot and his experience and wisdom, but all people usually see things from their perspective. John as far as I understand is a discretionary trader and always been exposed to an environment of discretionary traders and pit scalpers. I can clearly see why he's challenging any traders with high win rate percentage. Because it can account to a streak of luck and very favoring market conditions, since even longest Combine is only covering 2 months of trading at most, so they have to work with quite limiting data set to draw conclusions.
I did quite a bit of pure discretionary trading and it is not my thing. As I told Mike I am a systems trader. I do apply discretion, mostly when to use it and when not to. The system I trade now is also very discretionary in regards to targets and exits. But very stricts with entries and risk. I traded different manual systems I developed over several years. None work forever. But why would you think anything should? Nothing stays same forever in our lives. Things change, even most fundamental ones. My approach to trading is to find what works now, test and do stats, optimize, and start trading it, by slowly getting in, using profits as cushion to trade more. Once profitability fades - scale out and stop. Constantly look to tune things, adopt to changing environments.
The longest I traded one set of setups was 1.5 years with very slight changes. Very very profitably, with win rate above 80%. Most trades were just above scratch so if you count them in, my risk-reward was probably little bit above 1:1, but if you cut out all slightly above or below 0 trades, you get 3-5 to 1 trades. Yeah sometimes maybe 5-10 trades per months, but very profitable.
Another system also traded for a run of around 10 month, very profitable, but in the end it completely collapsed. I cut it once it stopped looking good, first by slashing risk to 25% and then to 1% and run it for some time to see if it recovers. It did not. But the run was excellent and very profitable.
Markets always bring opportunities, imbalances, imperfections. I aim to trade them with both high win rate and high risk reward. Maybe there wouldn't be so many of them, and maybe you can't trade them just as well on multi-million dollar account, but this is the reason they exists - if one can trade it with 1000 lots, they will be exploited and removed from existence very fast, by HFT firms and hedge funds.
But if you want to examine my system in regards to its win-reward ratio and profitability with just 50% win rate - you can easily do it yourself, my report is available.
But let me help: I did 130 trades during the Combine, average winner is 343, average loser is 216, in case of 50% win ratio, we have 65 winners and 65 losers, or 127x65 = 8255. It's up to you to decide whether it is good or bad.
I don't get what type of conclusion this sort of exercise should bring, because it's just one setup, developed for favoring market conditions. I have 3 others in testing now. Once I have enough data they will go either live or in LTP.
John refers to discretionary traders, who strive to trade every day and every market. I beg to differ, I strive to trade when I see an opportunity, not when I want to trade. Here is a huge secret revelation: I don't like to trade. I like money and lifestyle that comes from trading. I like the mental aspect of developing ways to beat the market, see it succeeding, winning, thriving. But not the actual trading. I don't like to risk money. But I have to, to win. Trading is not my hobby, I have hobbies elsewhere and trading is not among them. It's business. J.O.B.