Did Altucher fail as a trader?
- Thread starter Gueco
- Start date
Agree with most of what you say - just want to bring to your attention though that some funds might be trading with a multi-month hold periods. If trade hold period is in months, 72 trades is a very reasonable and respectable number to have in a backtest. E.g. consider going long when MA50 crosses MA200.
I haven't read Vishnu's book - so I might be off here. Have no idea of his strategies. My gut says - Vishnu didn't work as hard as we pikers do, because I have strategies which backtest for 8 yrs and have been consistently profitable for 2 yrs. Backtest had 400 trades or so, forward test 100 trades or so
Edit: Also consider if hypothetically a strategy tests for a date effect or something like that, over the last 10 yrs, you will get only 10*12 = 120 data points. So, Vishnu is correct in saying that depending on model, even 20 trades can be significant. What if you test only for Fed days - surely the whole population is limited - so your sample set can't be too big.
For the 1000th time, no. I did very well. then i did very well with a fund of funds, then I did very well as an entrepreneur.
I did not do this to sell books. Every day more people read my blog than have bought all books combined.
And every day I probably made more money trading than all my book sales combined.
I trade life. I do what i want. I eat what I kill.
Trading for me just lost its fun. I also felt that after 2008 the only guys in the game are the traders and the computers, which made it a lot less fun.
Quote from gmst:
Agree with most of what you say - just want to bring to your attention though that some funds might be trading with a multi-month hold periods. If trade hold period is in months, 72 trades is a very reasonable and respectable number to have in a backtest. E.g. consider going long when MA50 crosses MA200.
I haven't read Vishnu's book - so I might be off here. Have no idea of his strategies. My gut says - Vishnu didn't work as hard as we pikers do, because I have strategies which backtest for 8 yrs and have been consistently profitable for 2 yrs. Backtest had 400 trades or so, forward test 100 trades or so
Not sure what a piker is but i was probably working on trading 22 hours a day, which is part of what made it lose its allure for me. I have a family with 2 kids. I like to spend time with them. Its part of what I enjoy about my life.
Oh a piker means someone who trades with a low account size - 5k-10k-50k-even 100k. not trading millions basically.
If you really worked that hard, I am really surprised why you think nothing works in trading any more - mid frequency type - like hold period of few hrs to couple of days.
Btw, pls read my last post again - I edited it a bit - am not only attacking you, am supporting you also
Quote from gmst:
Oh a piker means someone who trades with a low account size - 5k-10k-50k-even 100k. not trading millions basically.
If you really worked that hard, I am really surprised why you think nothing works in trading any more - mid frequency type - like hold period of few hrs to couple of days.
Btw, pls read my post again - I edited it a bit - am not only attacking you, am supporting you also
My peak trading size was about 50mm (for trading, FoF was bigger). My holding period averaged a day.
Very nice of you to quote a number. Now that makes it a very meaningful contribution. 95%+ on this site haven't traded even 10 mm notional, forget about 50mm. I am curious what was your highest annual PnL though (feel free to PM me if you don't want to answer that here in the forum). Also, was 50mm notional limit present when you were trading for Niederhoffer or someone else (I assume you traded for Niederhoffer, could be wrong though)?
Trying to learn here.
I just can't help commenting. This thread is unbelievable. I liked ET better when it was full of the crazy poker players.
Dear wannabies:
Ignore this discussion and go work out your own strategy looking at the charts for yourself!
Yes, you can make steady money trading a plain old retail account with lousy 100K+ in the account., certainly enough to live on, using simple lowbrow swing trade techniques.
Thats holding a trade from 1 day to two months+ depending on the market climate. Right now, its buy and hold if you dare.
Take a look at the charts right now ..up.up.up!
(no rocket science involved)
Dear wannabies:
Ignore this discussion and go work out your own strategy looking at the charts for yourself!
Yes, you can make steady money trading a plain old retail account with lousy 100K+ in the account., certainly enough to live on, using simple lowbrow swing trade techniques.
Thats holding a trade from 1 day to two months+ depending on the market climate. Right now, its buy and hold if you dare.
Take a look at the charts right now ..up.up.up!
(no rocket science involved)