Recent content by I$land

From dandx - "I believe stop should be based on market structure not an arbitrary number. Sometimes that means a larger stop than my account can handle so I pass. Oh well next trade." I know what you mean. I guess it all depends on how you trade. If you're a discretionary trader and you only...

bespoke - Thanks for the clarifications. You system seems to be a nice piece of work. You've given me some good ideas to work with. JSSPMK - I agree, if you take more risk you definitely have to reduce your size or else you're asking for trouble. The idea is to find a way of taking more risk...

"You can get stopped out in a nanosecond with a 1-1.5 point stop (after entry) when the ES starts to get busy and that excludes, of course, scheduled news announcements." So true... You can be away from your PC for 2 minutes and the beast will have moved 10 points !

bespoke - Do you use the daily or intraday ATR for your day trading system ? Could you give an example of how you would use it. Also, could you elaborate on how you use the VIX ? Edit : PM me if you prefer.

"But by using volatility parameters, there was less variance between each month which is what I like personally (for psychological sake, yes, I'm weak). " I know what you mean. Following a system can be very hard psychologically. When you're in a drawdown and you get stressed, just not taking...

Xuanxue - Very good info. Thanks ! bespoke - That's exactly what I'm aiming at. I just have to use the right parameters then it's a matter of tweaking them. Thank you for your input. How many months of data have you tested your system on and how many months of forward testing have you...

AndrewBee, I agree 100% with everything you said. What do you trade exactly ?

[Andrew Bee] "Ah, there's the rub. You still have discretionary inputs to an otherwise automatic system. " Actually, I don't. I trade the same system day in and day out but I noticed volatility seems to affect it a lot so there is always room for improvement. "I've found it's best to...

"If you increase your risk 2x then cut your size down. If the wider stop increases your expectancy then you can turn your size back up a notch." Thanks, I just saw this part of your answer Pa(b)st Prime. Maybe you added it after :) If you are a discretionary trader then I guess it's as simple...

The easy way is to just cut my position size in half, double my stop and be done with it, but I was hoping for a more mathematical approach to the problem. Maybe with ATR, volume, etc. Just looking for some ideas on when and how to modify risk/target based on volatility. Any and all ideas...

"I would emphasize though before hand that you not confuse randomness with a poor stop location. Did the market go your original direction after you were stopped out because you really didn't give it enough room per your methodology or was it just luck one way or the other?" That's a good...

Original stop. Basically, if you were using a 2 point stop say 2 months ago is it the same stop these days based on the increased volatility.

I have been recently getting stopped out a lot because of the increased volatility in the ES just to see it reverse and go my intended direction soon after hitting my stop. How do you guys modify your stops/targets based on the volatility of the instrument you trade ?

Bump