Won't mechanical system stop working?

metatrader54 said:
What leaves you as a retail trader to be successful?
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As long as the market don't go flat & stay that way for years than there is nothing to worry about. If you take a intra-day chart of Amazon or any other stock or commodity, intra-day ranges are no different than they were back in the 90's before the PHD's invaded.

Trading costs have gone way,way, down & the retail trading platforms have gotten to be more like what the pros use. There are better instruments to trade now, like the emini's. Traders in this era are lucky.

A trader can no longer compete against the HFTs & win the bid-ask spread with any consistency, not a big deal since there still a zillion ways to make profits if you put your work in.
 
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comagnum said:
Trading costs have gone way,way, down & the retail trading platforms have gotten to be more like what the pros use. There are better instruments to trade now, like the emini's. Traders in this era are lucky.
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Funny, I don't feel very lucky these days. What used to work for me 10-20 years ago stopped working today. :(
 
Basically, infinite liquidity from my perspective and account size.

It is a different game managing billions of other people's money than your own accounts.

Of course all trading strategies have a life span.
 
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tommcginnis said:
Size Size Size.
If you've got something going, and you can work it without issue, try to size it up to a point where you figure you could *not* do it without brutalizing Bid/Ask/Spreads. I sincerely doubt you'll pass $10,000,000. The 100s of PhDs you're referring to are trying to work *multiples* of that, and they have no interest our little inefficiencies.

We (remain) speedboats in an ocean of tankers.
They will certain mow over us without blinking, should we not be as nimble as we are able to be. But as long as it takes them weeks and days to get into and out of positions, we will (still) have inefficiencies to exploit.

We are the grease of the economic gearbox. "Arbitrage: it's whats for dinner."

("I got a dozen more where those came from!" Yeah yeah yeah. We get it. :cool: )
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Partially true but since trading is computerized, they are not always building big positions (HFT funds). What they care about is the absolute edge potential in dollar terms. If something has the potential to return 100-200k per year, it's obviously inconsequential for their bottom line (effort/cost+risk).
 
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