Random Entry & Perception

[BSD]

Toast gems:

I'm just relating to you the way a pro trades without using the tools we deem essential to the task of trading - like charts for instance.




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Regular/Regurgitated Technical Analysis

You know MACD divergence, MA xovers, Stochastics - all of those common entry techniques often discussed in books on trading despite the fact they don't work.

I think this covers anything you read or learn in 99% of books & courses.

This is a problem with retail trade automation systems. It's the same with Tradestation

Since then, I tend not to help people with such things. It's not worth the ear bashing.

Can't even code a random system and going on about "retail ! systems" and advice to others lol !

The pretentious, completely erroneous presumptions being posted here are really priceless, straight from the school of Socrates, trying to imply that the poster is privy to knowledge or sources when when clearly nothing could be further from the truth as the presumptions are pure nonsense with zero connection to the real world of professional trading !

And any 101 trader knows about the shortcomings in ts without that being a major hindrance in coming up with very simple, net profitable systems.

 

[timsk]

Hi Markus,
I think that anyone following this thread is clear by now what your views are, and that they are the polar opposite of those forwarded by DT. As a 'fence sitter', by which I mean I read with interest anything written by both you and DT, I have to say that in my opinion, he is winning this debate hands down. He who shouts the loudest on internet forums is usually the one who appears to lose - even when they're right. Rather than attacking DT and making very spurious connections between him and the likes of SOCRATES, why don't you examine the content of his posts - his actual arguments - and say where he's going wrong? I know little about mechanical systems testing and so, for all I know, you could be right that DT is talking total poop. However, endlessly banging on about "smoke and mirrors" and such like does little to persuade me of the merits (assuming there are some!) of your argument.

Tim.

 

[meanreversion]

Put your toys back in your pram, is what he means !! haha

 

[BSD]

Hi Tim,

sorry mate, but I am honestly starting to believe I'll pack up for good here if you're serious and this is the level T2W wants to be at.

lol, where is he saying anything apart from disingenuos fact twisting ?

I keep providing proof after proof that random entry systems work, and all he has on offer is the slanderous lie he can't back up with anything that a CTA with a public track record curve fit and omitted data lol !

AND all his non-arguments still don't explain the MAIN logical fallacy behind this entire thread, why on earth someone like Market Wizard Basso on nothing more than a PERSONAL fact finding mission merely for themselves would con themselves.

That premise is nothing short of idiotic.

What on earth is hard to understand about this:

"As Anthony suggested I run 100 tests of the random entries-trailing stops at 10 ATR from 1982 until September 2007 on a portfolio of 69 futures with $100 for commission and slippage and the system made money 100% of the time as you can see in the following figure."

http://www.tradingblox.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3637&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0


100 runs in 69 markets from 1987 till 2007 (the year he posted that), profitable 100% of the time.

Or meanreversion having also found that random entry IS profitable !

There's a bunch of specious reasoning on this thread. It's very easy to say something that sounds plausible, e.g. "it's important to move your stop to breakeven as soon as possible, in order to retain profits and prevent losses". But is this actually borne out in real life?

Rather than assume this, or accept other commonly held beliefs, just go and backtest and see if there's any merit in it or not. My testing shows that random entry with coin flip (always in the market) allied with trailing stop, over sufficient markets, IS profitable. I've probably tested something similar to Basso and come up with similar results. Over a ten year period, there is never an instance of the random entry system losing money. That's good enough for me ---- exits are important, so focus on them as much, if not more, than the entry.

What more do you need, a guarantee from the great spagehtti minster in the sky ?

I'm amazed at you Tim, let facts speak for themselves, not pretentious, unproven bull**** !

I never posted here while Socrates was here who also a poser who lost money hands over fist when he once traded live, The Expert was of the same flesh, and DT is the exact same, and if this is gonna be the new old style her I'm outa here again, gotta better things to do than waste time on charlatans.

T2W don't need me, but neither am I in any way addicted to my daily dose here as my ever more frequent sabbaticals show.

 

[meanreversion]

BSD, please just unsubscribe from this thread, and forget about it. Many of your points are valid, but the level of vitriol is now pointless. If you want an example of this, there is a thread called "Final Holy Grail" under trading journals where some clown called medbs is still claiming to have a 100 pct trading success rate, even though three of the trades he called are between them nearly 3,000 pips underwater. His "Grail" is simply taking profit after 50 pips but using no stop loss.

Anyway, the point is I (and several others) got fairly irritated with this chap, as he wilfully mis-represents what he is doing and so on (I am NOT implying this applies to DT).

Ultimately I unsubscribed from the thread as it was a waste of energy. It would be a shame for t2w to lose you, so maybe just forget about this thread and take some time out.

 

[BSD]

Lol yeah Meanreversion I read sthg arabian I think wrote about that medbs thread too.

I am just totally amazed at Tim who I always took to be a good, sensible chap, and how he as content manager of a trading and not comedy central site can side with a guy who proves again and again how clueless he is by posting total BS like pros not using charts or TA - regurgigated at that - being nonsense that doesn't work, all evidence I kept providing to the contrary.

A site like this should deal in provable facts like I kept providing, always backing up my stuff, not conjecture and spin by posers who never back up any of their preposterous claims.

But I agree it's been a total waste of time to no effect and I'm outta this thread.

Have fun.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Lol I sure as heck aren't gonna waste my time trading a long term daily or weekly or whatever it is system to assuage your belief or disbelief in a fund being marketed by Germanys second bank, you have gotta be joking !

And that IS the kinda time frame you need to get a classic trend following system to work.

Intraday one just gets chopped up with such systems, do you really not know that ?!?

No offense, but are there only two people on here who have ever backtested anything, or any more than 4 or 5 who actually make a living from this ?

This thread with all it's nonsense and that is predicated on nothing but a ludicrous lie that Tom Basso fiddled with data on a fact finding mission intended only for him is really the best example of why I'm getting bored more and more with boards.

Anyway, Commerzbanks system was widely reported in the media, and MACD is ALL that drives it.

Lol have you ever heard of the Turtles and their incredibly simple system and the unbelievable money it made them ?

Bill Dunn by his admission, another great trend following CTA with a decades long long history is another trend follower employing all of two parameters driving his fund. (Trader Daily, june / july issue 2006)

Trend following ain't about complex methods lol, it's about catching trends and riding em until they bend.

I said I wouldn't post again on this subject in this thread, so my substantive reply is here in another thread:

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/gen...ne-can-work-long-time-scales.html#post1149786

 

[timsk]

Hi Markus,
I'm sorry that you feel the way you do.
My job as Content Manager is to promote good content and to implement initiatives that will - hopefully - see standards rise. It certainly isn't to drive good members like you away from the forum! Rest assured, I don't want you to go and value (most of) your contributions here - as do many other members. So, why not take meanreversion's advice and simply unsubscribe from this thread and, perhaps, put DT on ignore if he winds you up as much as he appears to?

For the record, broadly speaking, I'm much closer to your general viewpoint when it comes to things like T.A., probability and money management etc. than I am to DT's. But that's not the issue here. The point is, IMO, DT does a good and worthwhile job in challenging accepted norm's and getting members to examine the things that many of them (certainly me) take for granted. If you look over all of DT's contributions (not just to this thread) and include those of 'Pedro01', his previous incarnation, I'd be extremely surprised if you dismissed all of his posts as BS from a poseur etc. If you did, I think you'd be in a very small minority. Like you, I often disagree with him, but I will defend his right to prod, poke and question accepted wisdom as that's how new ideas emerge and because so few people do it. Collectively, that makes us complacent, and we all know where that leads. Debates such as this one, if conducted in a civil manner with mutual respect on all sides, can result in interesting and insightful ideas from which everyone can profit.

The irony is, I'm defending DT not because he needs my help (he hasn't asked for it and would probably rather do without it, lol!) but because I don't want him to come to the same conclusion that you now have and leave T2W. On that note, I hope you reconsider and, as meanreversion says, if you want to lay into someone, expend your efforts on those members who really do have daft and financially ruinous ideas that need to be exposed for what they are. DT really isn't in that camp.
Tim.

PS. Just in case anyone was wondering, DT formally 'closed' his account as Pedro01 with admin' before returning legitimately later on as DT, so he's not in breach of the site guidelines for multi-nicking.

 

[BSD]

Hey Tim,

let's just agree to disagree on this on the basis of my level of knowledge, constructive criticism and input is always great, I totally agree, but all I'm basing my verdict on is the stuff he posted here and in "The Experts" threads, I didn't read anything from him prior to that as I wasn't here, and I had no idea he was Pedro before, must have been on one of my previous sabbaticals or sthg, I don't really remember a Pedro.

But you also know me well enough that I'm not gonna let a in the big scheme of things inconsequential and totally meaningless sthg like this get between us, you know that, and also that I never bear grudges, heck I'm just too positive for any of that, and you also know that I always thought you're one of the good guys around here.

No harm done mate.

 

[kimo'sabby]

Coin toss trades and perception trades both need managing, both entry methods are only as good as the trader in charge of them.

This is just another thread beaten down by the abstract nature of human endeavour within the markets.

Arguing the case for black and white within trading and the markets must be one of the most futile pastimes and person can indulge themselves in.

 

[ceydababy]

This 22 page thread has achieved....Nada. Probably the most pointless read on the www.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Coin toss trades and perception trades both need managing, both entry methods are only as good as the trader in charge of them.

This is just another thread beaten down by the abstract nature of human endeavour within the markets.

Arguing the case for black and white within trading and the markets must be one of the most futile pastimes and person can indulge themselves in.

People say that trading is a matter of probabilities, although that has been argued by some on T2W (not me), in the past. While I think it is, I think it is also a bit more than that. Another aspect of it in my opinion is that it is a matter of making approximations, and as you get better and more experienced, you begin to make better and better approximations. This is one reason why discussions (on other threads) about averaging down (or up), interest me.

Trading and simplicity: well, I think we know more or less what BSD thinks about this, and I agree and sort of disagree at the same time. I think trading can be simple, but there is a difference between trading simply and wanting trading to be simple. My own trading is simplicity itself - charts with nothing on usually except 3 MAs, which I rarely use in making actual trading decisions, but I like to have them around - but it would not be simple to explain, and certainly not on this thread, which has become rather frought.

The most important things about descriptions of apparently simple trading methods are probably inherent in what they do not say more than what they do say.

 

[rathcoole_exile]

toasted blueberry bagels with peanut butter on them - still currently digesting.

still currently disgusting

 

[rathcoole_exile]

Hi Markus,
To accuse DT of being substance free is unfair and untrue in the extreme. To suggest he's clueless really does you no favours at all, as even the greenest of newbies will conclude quite quickly from his posts that he's a very smart cookie and extremely knowledgable about the markets.

i have to agree. I actually met DT once at Ankara airport, and I have to say, he is one of the smartest, most switched-on 17 year olds I've ever met.
I think in the next few years he will prove to be a super trader, maybe even one of the ones that Markus is so fond of quoting

 

[rathcoole_exile]

If I said "The sky is red tonight", you might reply "The sky is Not purple, don't be ridiculous", then you'd post some downloaded pictures of a blue sky, a picture of a nice car under a blue sky, some blue text and a youtube video of the sky.

yes, but knowing Markus there would also be pictures of ladies with big boooobies too !

 

[squall321]

Hi Markus,
I think that anyone following this thread is clear by now what your views are, and that they are the polar opposite of those forwarded by DT. As a 'fence sitter', by which I mean I read with interest anything written by both you and DT, I have to say that in my opinion, he is winning this debate hands down. He who shouts the loudest on internet forums is usually the one who appears to lose - even when they're right.
Tim.

godssake, who cares who "wins" an internet debate?

if someone is using random entry, technicals, fundamentals, whatever, and its working for them, it shouldn't even bother them that some total stranger on the internet, who you don't know from adam, has a different opinion. it shouldn't faze them AT all.

just because someone writes something on the internet, doesn't mean they're right.

 

[rathcoole_exile]

Thing is Toast only started this thread to rebut a point Rath and I made on another thread.

and the only reason I brought coin-flipping up in the first place was to challenge the latest holy grail guru claiming that Gann was the latest new thing, big certainty

 

[rathcoole_exile]

If market goes to 90, we stop out and hit our target, end result is 0 minus transaction costs. If we go to 115 we make 5. But if we go to 110 then back down to 90 without ever hitting 115, we lose 20.

hey ! thats the way I trade !!

 

[DionysusToast]

i have to agree. I actually met DT once at Ankara airport, and I have to say, he is one of the smartest, most switched-on 17 year olds I've ever met.
I think in the next few years he will prove to be a super trader, maybe even one of the ones that Markus is so fond of quoting

"Ankara Airport" being Ratchoole's pseudonym for a night at the Bulls Head pub drinking Guinness followed by a seedy ramble around Soi Cowboy...

 

[timsk]

Hi cloud321,

godssake, who cares who "wins" an internet debate?

As a bystander, not involved directly with the debate at hand, I'm completely impartial and don't have views which favour one side more than the other. As such, I don't care who 'wins'. However, presumably, the main protagonists in any debate on T2W (and elsewhere) do care. Otherwise, why would they bother expending valuable time and energy reading and writing posts? And that's a good thing in as much as this would be a boring place if no one gave a ****!

if someone is using random entry, technicals, fundamentals, whatever, and its working for them, it shouldn't even bother them that some total stranger on the internet, who you don't know from adam, has a different opinion. it shouldn't faze them AT all.

That's a different issue. In the coming weeks, the odds favour a few heart felt and emotional exchanges in threads relating to the World Cup. Some posters will be newbies, some will be seasoned pros; some will be profitable and some won't etc. Our off forum trading lives are completely seperate from our forum personas and the discussions we chose to get involved in - regardless of whether or not they're about trading.

just because someone writes something on the internet, doesn't mean they're right.

Indeed! This is exactly my point and precisely why I made the comment about DT appearing - to me - to be winning the argument. I might be being duped by him when, in reality, BSD is in fact 'right'. On that note we turn full circle, as this concept is central to DTs whole argument. Many of us will accept something unquestioningly, simply because it's produced by a well known publisher, written by a well know and respected author - about someone (traders in this case) who have made a few bob.
Tim.