Well, I don't know about other people, but I prefer not to have to guess if, or for how long, a price move will continue. That is why I use "quasi-predetermined"
D ) scaled exits. It's either that or eye of newt. 
Chop vs. Trend
- Thread starter Yag
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D ) scaled exits. It's either that or eye of newt. Quote from Thunderdog:
Well, I don't know about other people, but I prefer not to have to guess if, or for how long, a price move will continue. That is why I use "quasi-predetermined"
Unfortunately, there is more "eye of newt" to trading than most of us care to admit.
Certainly the more confidence that people develop in their trading beyond merely careful, cautious optimism is a result of the "eye of newt" factor in one form or another. That's my opinion.
As an aside, that's a rather interesting name you have in view of the topic of discussion.
Sorry, just having some fun here. Obviously, with our reference to "eye of newt," we are implying an element of witchcraft and sorcery (wizardry?) in connection with some trading methods and their perceived performance reliability. Since a gnome is a mythical creature...oh, never mind.
In any event, I assure you that there was no offense intended, particularly since we are essentially in agreement here.
Oh, the literal definition, eh? You trade from your basement?
Quote from slacker:
I have a C/C++ system also working with IB data and once had it working with the MESA and Fourier routines downloaded at
http://www.nr.com/
If you can program the system will go together quickly. You will find you can define cycles in the past, but trading the next bar remains difficult.
"Every trader is Dr. Professor of the last bar;
and Mr. Humble at the next bar."
Good luck!
slacker
thanks. I'll give it a try anyway. My goal isn't to forecast the timeseries. Rather, I am just looking for a small but real statistical advantage within a short time window. anyway, I have used numerical recipes quite a lot before. I'm still trying to get used to developing in this non-scientific windows environment -- I find myself having to spend a lot of time on stupid winapi/MFC issues rather than the numerical algorithms themselves....
Your right, momentum strategies (trend following) profits are made on 20% of their trades. The focus on these types of strategies is to start by minimize your losses during directionless phases of the market which occur 80% of the time.