Search results

Interesting thread, just found it. I watch a lot of ag spreads as well. Specifically, I have been watching the December to January soy meal spread, based upon the explosion in soy meal prices due to a perceived shortage on the east coast. Here is the 2- hour chart of that spread. I think it...

Weakness again in the feeders and live cattle. I've been watching the soybeans over the past week. Option expiration is today on Nov. options, and we rallied 30 cents yesterday on strong export numbers. I like to play the bean spreads, lower margins, good volume and you catch some decent...

Wow, look at that 15 minute sell-off. My question is to what extent are the funds playing games with this market. I have looked at the Commitment of traders, but can't really glean what is going on w/ their positioning.

Looks like there is some resistance at around $169.50 right now. I'd be hesitant to short as well. We could easily blow through that and rally higher.

Close to limit up on Feeders today, while hogs stay down. Volatile like everything else right now.

Another aspect of this cattle market puzzle I have been paying attention to is the Commitment of Traders. The funds have had pretty long positions in both feeder and live cattle for a while now, although the COT is a "lagged" indicator. You can't tell what funds are doing on a daily basis, and...

Other people I work with are talking with cattle producers. They are saying that farmers with lots of cheap grain who don't want to sell at these low prices are buying any and all cattle to feed it to. This may be supporting the cash side of the market right now.

All the ag commodities are green today. Dollar is down somewhat, but still surprised by a strong bounce in the grains over the past two days.

Interesting response eusdaiki. I have been debating whether to take the plunge and spend the time learning R or Python, or keep trying to work in Ninjatrader. I have also put up a self-imposed developer label as well. Getting through that block will take some work, but it is certainly doable...

I am interested in back testing some automated futures spread trading strategies. I am using Ninjatrader and slowly teaching myself very basic R programming. I am not good enough on either of those platforms to do back testing on spread trades. Does anyone have some recommendations? Thanks.

I think there will be some pretty significant support at $144 on the October Live Cattle contract. Will likely have to break through that level to make another move down. A close below $208 on the October Feeder contract would appear to be bearish though.

Close to limit down on the live and feeder cattle today. Friday's Commitment of Traders shows more funds getting out of long live cattle positions.

Exports to Russia account for only 2.18% of all exports. Understanding this, it seemed like the cattle market needed some sort of an event to change the trend. The Putin sanctions appear to be that event. We've had a fairly substantial retracement at this point. The feeder cattle seem to be...

A lot of the move down today may be attributable to the Putin sanctions on the import of beef and poultry. Lean hogs down hard as well today. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/08/06/russia-bans-us-ag-imports/13682737/

I'm currently taking a look at Amibroker. I am also working with NinjaTrader as well. I want to be able to back test systems, and forward paper trade live. The license feel on NT turns me off, as well as the cost for data feeds. I am not sure if Amibroker is much better on data fees. Any...

Just wondering, what program or programs are you using for this project?

I've been learning a lot my following this thread. I would have assumed that your system would be much more complex, especially integrating an Aurdino controller into the whole setup! But with an SMA being the most complicated technical analysis indicator, that is really interesting.

Thanks for all the responses. There is a lot more info for me to review now!

Thanks, that it some great information. I will look up those books. I wanted to use Ninjatrader as sort of "training wheels" for backtesting. I am not good enough in R or any other program to do backtesting as of yet. I do agree with the need to learn statistics as well.

I would assume that any edge for basic trend following systems has been essentially arbitraged out of the market. It's more of a case of being interested in systematic trading, and needing to start somewhere. Thus, anything that can reduce the learning curve is to my advantage. I don't...