Linda Bradford Raschke and ''Street Smarts''

[fastnet]

I wondered if anyone was a member of Linda Bradford Raschke’s LBR Group website? Her medium term, mainly contrarian trading style is one which I feel suits me best. I’ve sung the praises of Alex Elder on this site before – he is another advocate of position trading using, among others, pullbacks to EMAs and oscillator divergences.

LBR’s site gives a daily list of possible set-ups and talks you through past trades. There’s a lot of historic background material for free but you have to pay for the real meat.

Does anyone have any experience of membership of this site?

I have also read the past discussions between Mr Charts and Helenq regarding LBR’s book ‘’Street Smarts’’ – the reviews on Amazon dot com are very mixed – I wondered if anyone had further comment to add about this book. Have the main set-ups leaked out into the public domain anywhere? Turtle soup plus one is a set up I know is available after a quick search.

Grateful for any advice –

Cheers

 

[mmillar]

When I search Google for 'Turtle Soup plus One' I just get lots of recipes for 'Grandma's delicious turtle soup. Can you be a bit more specific?

Thanks

 

[fastnet]

Try tradingmarkets dot com - you might have to sign up for free temporary membership -

Cheers

 

[okwon]

When I search Google for 'Turtle Soup plus One' I just get lots of recipes for 'Grandma's delicious turtle soup. Can you be a bit more specific?

Thanks

:cheesy: Turtle Soup plus One is a trade set-up discussed in LBR's book based on fading breakout signals on the assumption that breakouts fail more times than they succeed. The name comes from the Turtles, traders taught by Richard Dennis and his partner, who traded a famous breakout system.

I've heard from other traders and my own study that most of the set-ups from Street Smarts do not work as well today, but I still enjoyed reading the book and following the reasoning behind each set-up.

 

[fastnet]

Thanks Okwon -

From the comments on Amazon US and the free articles on the LBR site it seems that there are a vast array of methods contained in the book. From what I can gather some are robust and still pretty effective (Grail trades) where as others are either very short term or more suitable to the US markets.

Of course according to Mr Charts and others we should all be trading the US markets but in reality few of us are.

My own preference (governed more by circumstance than choice) is for short term (few days) position trades with auto limit and stop orders.

Turtle soup does really interest me and I have debated the original turtle vs turtle soup elsewhere on this site without a conclusion.

Would you have any more to add to this discussion about TS+1 set up? Does it work for you? (as it were . . . )

Cheers

 

[DaxTrader]

Hi, replying a bit late probably.

Bought "Street Smarts about 5 yrs ago, and have tested and tried various methods in the book.

I think she is one of the sharpest traders around, and incredibly flexible with trend techniques and counter trend techniques.

Did some testing of Turtle soup in the FTSE 5 min/ 15 min data going back 15 years on Tradestation , conclusions from that were not too surprising - ie you have to use it in a range bound market, otherwise you get stopped repeatedly.
Same applies for trend entries in the book such as Grails, Anti, Short skirts etc - very good in trend mkts, no good in rangebound.

I use the Grail technique with extra visual/time of day trend filters to increase it's effectiveness and it seems to work well for last 3 yrs or so in Eurostox/Dax. Key is NOT to be mechanical.

Trade one countertrend technique which works a treat ( in the book) "three little indians" - or 3 pushes up/down at the end of a move - shows up well on 1 min charts.

The book is worth every penny - some of the entries were too complicated for me, but others made sense. You can extra filters & alterations to suit your style which is what it is all about.

www.lbrcapital.com for book info etc

 

[Helenqu]

If you want another book that contains some good ideas for systems (Modify according to needs) then check out Welles Wilders New Concepts in Technical Trading Systems. I'm trying out one of them at the moment and it's helpful for me as I tend to be far too short term in my SB trading, the system gives me some rules and that seems to help

http://books.global-investor.com/books/0871.htm?ginPtrCode=21470

 

[fastnet]

Hi DaxTrader - comments not too late at all and very much appreciated.

I have to admit that remaining flexible (i/o trying to find the holy-grail mechanical set-up) does feel intuitively to be the best approach. Otherwise I just don't understand why the investment funds and trusts are not simply replaced by computers programmed to make money.

I also agree in horses for course and applying the correct technique to the prevailing market conditions. This introduces the subjective categorisation of a certain market ie EMA gradient and ADX for trends, touches on support/resistance for consolidations.

Could you let me know what your findings were after testing the TS+1 set-ups? Did you look into daily markets or mainly intra-day?

3 pushes down features on LHR site on the 18th June free sample of set-ups you would receive if you were a subscriber. The set up in question was on the S&P. It doesn't explain what this set up involves though - for that I suppose you have to buy the book - har hummm. .. .

Cheers

 

[mmillar]

Amazon is doing Street Smarts and Connors on Advanced Trading for a great price of only $325 Also, www.insideedge.net sells the TradeStation code to most of the systems in both these books for $400. Whilst my wife is happy for me to buy my expensive trading books 'for work' I doubt she will stretch that far

 

[DaxTrader]

£120 for Street Smarts on T2W

 

[mmillar]

exactly - would anyone like to sell me a 2nd hand, cheap copy?

 

[fastnet]

Thanks Dax Trader - I can see this price but no clickable ''BUY'' button to link to on-line shop as there is on all other books. . . . (100% discount is a bit misleading!! - I think they mean half price - but it's not ;-)

Do you know which shop this price is available from?

Thanks for any help - I might pop down the City Biz library this lunch to see if I can find a copy before shelling out that wad. . .

 

[DaxTrader]

bought mine direct from www.lbrcapital.com, but try http://www.global-investor.com/

 

[DaxTrader]

Fastnet - disagree - if there is a mechanical approach usually it is expolited by funds pretty quickly, and the pattern becomes marginally profitable in a period of time.

The edge for an individual is in diciplined but non mechanical trading - exploiting patterns that can't be written into a program.

Try to work out WHEN patterns work in terms of ranges/breakout/times of day even. I've found lots of patterns to be profitable, but you have to concerntrate on when they work. Most people do a blanket back test and leave it there. Intraday I filter my testing by only looking at 8.15am till 11am then 3pm till 5pm

Re: 3 pushes etc, see my post at http://www.trade2win.co.uk/boards/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5426

 

[fastnet]

Thanks Dax Trader - I'll have a look at these links -

BTW - I might not have made myself very clear (wouldn't be the first time) but I was agreeing with you about the shortcomings of mechanical systems -


Cheers

 

[DaxTrader]

Doh ! my fault Fastnet, now I read your reply a bit more carefully

 

[robq]

Helen,
Have you - or anyone else - read read Welles Wilder's other, strange book - The Adam Theory of Markets, or about the Delta Society - and what did you think?

Rob

 

[Skimbleshanks]

Nowt strange about either of those books

Actually, Adam Theory has worked perfectly on the S&P over the last three days (looking at the 30 min chart).

 

[okwon]

Of course according to Mr Charts and others we should all be trading the US markets but in reality few of us are.

Turtle soup does really interest me and I have debated the original turtle vs turtle soup elsewhere on this site without a conclusion.

Would you have any more to add to this discussion about TS+1 set up? Does it work for you? (as it were . . . )

Cheers

That's ironic that Mr Charts would say that because I'm based in the US and am interested in trading the some of the Eurex instruments, like the DAX and Bund. I trading job during US market hours so I only have time to trade for myself during non-US market hours. I was just looking through this site for some help/info on Eurex set-ups.

Although I haven't tested set-ups in the LBR book myself, primarily because I was an equities trader until recently, I have some friends that are S&P traders that tested most of the set-ups in her book and also had memberships to her chatroom. Their conclusion was that in order make the set-ups successful you needed to have Linda's market feel to filter the trades.

The original turtles set-up is available on the web. None of the original turtles use it anymore. Even when it was working, I think the length and amount of the drawdown experienced by the system is too hard for an individual that is trading their own money to handle.

However, the LBR book can help give you ideas in developing your own set-ups to trade. Unless someone is offering you a completely mechanical system which will probably never happen, you're better off developing your own set-ups and styles, and just looking to sources like LBR's book for ideas to play around with.

PS - does anybody know if there are any European futures pairs or spreads that are worth investigating?

 

[Trader333]

Okwon,

You posted:

Their conclusion was that in order make the set-ups successful you needed to have Linda's market feel to filter the trades.

This would be of no use to me at all as I just dont see how it is possible to learn what is effectively "Intuitive Trading" from someone else. In my view you are either "gifted" with an ability to trade intuitively or you're not. Those that are gifted are often referred to as being very lucky in their trades when in reality they just know when a trade will work and when it wont.


Paul