Number of monitors and profitability
- Thread starter Pekelo
- Start date
These two guys must be raking in some serious $$:Quote from Pekelo:
Well, that's what I was driving at. My simplest trading strategy involves only 10-15 trades a year, checking the signal once a day, and when acted on it, leaving it alone for 2 weeks.
The funny thing would be though is to divide profits by the number of monitors one uses....Maybe we could call it simplicity ratio.
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=858342#post858342
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/attachment.php?s=&postid=720369
I think a good guidline would be just the opposite. Use as few indicators as possible and ultimatly strive to use none at all. I dont know many profitable traders who are bogged down in RSI, Stoch, MACD etc etc etc. Its all about having an edge and I guess if those give you one more power to ya, but I have not found it to the case for myself, in fact just the opposite, and from what I have seen in other traders who I would consider to be good/great that also applies. Less is more.
Brandon
What's the use of having 8 monitors if you're on 56k dial-up
Since this post is under Psychology....if having 10 monitors helps you pull the trigger easier then get more monitors.
As for myself do not own a Hummer because my neighbor has one. Believe it or not I trade/follow the market via my pocket pc phone due to my limited choice.
Just think of it this way....if you have one monitor you can always blame it on your one monitor when you lost $$ in a trade.
Since this post is under Psychology....if having 10 monitors helps you pull the trigger easier then get more monitors.
As for myself do not own a Hummer because my neighbor has one. Believe it or not I trade/follow the market via my pocket pc phone due to my limited choice.
Just think of it this way....if you have one monitor you can always blame it on your one monitor when you lost $$ in a trade.
Well, you don't know that, do you?
But you are right, in the example the traders had different strategies. So here is another example:
Let's say Joe has a pretty good system going trading high tech stocks, scalping them. He constantly monitors about 50 of those on his 8 monitors and buying and selling using 1 min charts.
Then one day he is introduced to futures and ETFs, and Joe realizes, that his strategy also works with NQ futures and on a longer timeframe. So instead of trying to figure out which stock to scalp, he now only has 1 trading vehicle, and now he only uses 1 monitor (or let's say 2) and a 10 mins timeframe, thus making way less trades. He can even watch a movie while trading, because his timeframe requires him to act only in every 10 mins.
The point here is, that although those big monitor set ups sure look impressive and I wouldn't mind to have one just for the sake of looking good, I wonder how many trader actually could simplicize their trading methods if they hired an analyst the same way as Joe did in the example...
Quote from Pekelo:
Well, you don't know that, do you?
But you are right, in the example the traders had different strategies. So here is another example:
Let's say Joe has a pretty good system going trading high tech stocks, scalping them. He constantly monitors about 50 of those on his 8 monitors and buying and selling using 1 min charts.
Then one day he is introduced to futures and ETFs, and Joe realizes, that his strategy also works with NQ futures and on a longer timeframe. So instead of trying to figure out which stock to scalp, he now only has 1 trading vehicle, and now he only uses 1 monitor (or let's say 2) and a 10 mins timeframe, thus making way less trades. He can even watch a movie while trading, because his timeframe requires him to act only in every 10 mins.
The point here is, that although those big monitor set ups sure look impressive and I wouldn't mind to have one just for the sake of looking good, I wonder how many trader actually could simplicize their trading methods if they hired an analyst the same way as Joe did in the example...
Hi Pekelo,
This I can relate too and understand your point of view.
However, I think your mixing up the words trading methods and trading equipement eventhough both fall under one unbrella.
I posted awhile back in another thread about being properly prepared to trade and ensuring a small problem doesn't cost someone hundreds or thousands of dollars in losses or lost income that should have been banked for profits.
For example, lets say your one of those simple profitable traders using only one monitor.
Lets say I'm using the same strategy as you are (a few trades every few weeks) but I'm using three monitors.
Now lets say we both have problems with one of our monitors and the screen goes black (blank) in the middle of a trade.
You (one monitor user) will try troubleshooting and if you can't fix it...
Your going to need to take your only monitor to the computer repair shop or buy another single monitor.
What if when such occurs is during one of those infrequent times when you need to close a profitable trade position ???
To only return back from the store to see all or most of those profits disappear due to some breaking world news event.
Whereas me...no biggie...I just move my broker execution platform and/or realtime charts over to my second monitor.
Place my trade and lock in my profits.
My point...don't make your trading methods, trading workstation nor trading environment so simple that when problems do occur (they will because nothing is 100% perfect)...
It either causes losses or lost potential income.
Simply, we both can sit here all day and think of situations where one workstation has an advantage over another workstation (one monitor versus multiple monitors).
So what's the point ???
Just because something is simple to you or to me doesn't imply it will be simple nor not cause problems for someone else.
Also, most of the traders I know that use multiple monitor setups are doing a completely different type of trading than someone using a one monitor setup.
That reason alone is why comparing one monitor traders to multiple monitor traders seems a like comparing apples to oranges.
Last of all...you'll be trading at a disadvantage if your trading only one trading instrument while not monitoring anything else going on in the market.
The best NQ trader I've ever met (former institutional trader) has 6 monitors...
He's monitoring (pun intended) ES, YM, ER2, Bonds, Indexs, Eurex, Bloomberg 24hr news and a private chat room of ex-floor traders (profitable traders).
However, he doesn't use any indicators...just a pure price action only trader that has a multiple monitor setup.
Yet, I'm not saying you need 6 monitors to trade NQ profitably.
In addition, if you want to use Futures traders as an example...
I'm the last one you want to try to fly by the notion you can trade NQ profitably (year after year) while watching nothing else and only via monitoring a 10min chart.
There's a lot more to NQ than a 10min chart interval and one monitor.
Tunnel vision and simplicity may not be compatible with your profit curve.
NihabaAshi
Thanks for your response NihabaAshi. At this point I don't have anything to add to the discussion, except I found a funny example today.
In another thread RC-Trader today posted a picture of his charts. Unless I am missing something, out of the 13 charts there are only 3 different ones, the rest are duplicates of the others.
I know they are charts and not monitors, but still...
So he could easily simplify his trading by deleting 10 (76%) of them... Keeping it simple...
In another thread RC-Trader today posted a picture of his charts. Unless I am missing something, out of the 13 charts there are only 3 different ones, the rest are duplicates of the others.
I know they are charts and not monitors, but still...
So he could easily simplify his trading by deleting 10 (76%) of them... Keeping it simple...
Quote from Pekelo:
Thanks for your response NihabaAshi. At this point I don't have anything to add to the discussion, except I found a funny example today.
In another thread RC-Trader today posted a picture of his charts. Unless I am missing something, out of the 13 charts there are only 3 different ones, the rest are duplicates of the others.
I know they are charts and not monitors, but still...
So he could easily simplify his trading by deleting 10 (76%) of them... Keeping it simple...
Hi Pekelo,
I saw that also.
Hopefully that was a mistake by him because I can't see how that many duplicate charts will lead to any efficient trading.
By the way...my normal trading workstation involves a desktop with 3 monitors and 2 laptops hooked up to an external monitor each...
Total of 7 monitors.
However, most trading days...
I mainly use one laptop and one external monitor because I'm wireless and can trade from anywhere at home including the patio (not stuck in the home office all day).
Right now I'm at the kitchen table...
Eating breakfast and trading.
Yet, the simple setup (laptop only) means I'm doing a lot more clicking around (physically more active) so that I can analyze the same amount of info.
NihabaAshi
I am just starting out, have 2 monitors, and I think it is helpful. I can watch my real time charts on 1, and I have my order entry window on the other above the webpage I surf while waiting for my indicator to go red light green light, I need something to fill the boredom as I only trade 6-10 times per day, unless I over trade 
SLEEPY