Adamned

I have pretty much a carbon copy experience as TraderJean. Infinity uses the Transact platform and data. You get cheap rates. The platform is geared toward speed. It is more streamlined than something like Ninja Trader. So, it doesn't have as many bells and whistles or strategy possibilities. But, I actually like it better in many ways. i use the Transact data to power Market Delta which is a definite bonus. The service is really great. My broker is Russ Carlson. Great guy and broker. No anonymous trade desk. When/if you have any problems you directly call your personal broker. I've had no problems since i have been with them. Hope it helps,

I have been using etrade for about 8 years and pro for about 5 years. The new etrade pro is ok if you setup cheaper commision rate. Their per contract rate is .75 but I heard .50/contract is not out of the question if you make many trades per month. For 20 contracts it's $10 bucks plus 5.99 per leg for a total of $15.99. No bad considering the competition, TS charges $1 per contract and no trade fee, $20 for same trade. The Pro platform is usable but the data feeds are questionable, charts are micky mouse (I use another chart service), no trade cancelation fee (TS charges $1 per option cancel) but if you trade 5 contracts, you are allowed 5 cancels. Once exceeded the charge is $1 per cancel.

Hands down this is the best thread on the net. I would like to thank all the regular contributors for their inputs. I strongly believe in the concept of VSA and I think its one of the best approaches to the market. Lately I have been doing much more testing than normal on the data generated by stock index futures. I have come up with an interesting finding that has deep implications for my VSA analysis. I have come to this conclusion a 34 minute bar can be decisively different than a 30 minute bar. If this can happen on a 30m to 34m comparison it can happen on any time frame. Then I took it a step further and tested starting at 10m all the way up 60m bars. Meaning more specifically I tested a 11m bar, 12m,13m, 14m, 15m, all the way up to 60m bar. This has opened a can of worms for me. Certain bar patterns can occur in odd numbers for example a 53m chart. For practical reasons its not possible the keep tabs on 50 different charts. My question is this. Since a big part of VSA judges the close of the bar in relation to the high for an up bar or low for a down bar. For example say a up 30m bar that closes well off its high must of had selling inside it. But what if the 34m bar some how closes right near its high. This causes me great confusion. One idea is to not use time based charts but transaction volume based charts (tick charts). But the same problem can take place there as well 500 tick compared to 550 tick could be quite different. My question to all you VSA experts is what did the creator of VSA have to say about this phenomenon? Thanks for the help.

Recently a light bulb has turned on in my head. The second most important thing in intra-day trading the stock indexes is knowing what type of strategy to employ. Either a range strategy or a trend strategy. The first most important thing is of course risk management which addresses the crucial aspect of stops and position sizing. I would greatly appreciate some creative ideas which would help all the great people on this forum trade a little better. The objective is to help determine which strategy is the correct strategy to employ on any given day. In hindsight its very easy to determine which was the correct strategy but in live trading its a totally different story. After deep thought and long back testing I have found it makes an enormous difference if I use only a trend strategy on trend days and a range strategy on range days. Now the problem is actually achieving such a great feat. I like some of the ideas from tony crabel for assisting in this area such as NR4 and NR7. If you are not familiar with his book its basically just when you have an inside day expect a persistent trend when the high or low of the inside day is breached by a predetermined spread. This is a good tool to have in ones arsenal but its not enough. Many trend days occur with out a previous narrow range. I have read the indicators such as ADX and volatility indicator (not implied or historic) can help in this area. I don't particularly like indicators but if some one has had good experiences with indicators for this purpose i would love to hear about it. Thanks for the help and good trading to all.

I believe the article in time magazine on Nicolas Darvas reveals the essence or key secret to successful trading. I thought we could play a little game since reading this short article could benefit all traders who read it. Please give your opinion as to what you think this key secret is. The point of all of this is that there are several core virtues that pertain to trading that are listed in the article. It would be interesting to see what people on this board think are the most important. Thank you in advance for your contribution to every ones education if you take the time to interact with this thread. the official article can be found at: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,865930,00.html Here a cut and paste copy: The lights go low at Manhattan's garish Latin Quarter nightclub. Onto the stage glides a slim-hipped, broad-shouldered man in white tie and tails. He grasps his partner, a stunning redhead in black tights, whirls her over his head on one arm, hurls her dramatically in a split-legged fall to the floor. The dance team is Nicholas Darvas and his half-sister, Julia, one of the top acts in the U.S. What the tired businessmen watching the show do not realize is that Hungarian-born Nicholas Darvas, 39, is a better money man than most of them; he is a top stock-market speculator who has parlayed his considerable weekly income ($3,500 currently) into a fortune of more than $2,000,000. Moneyman Darvas' methods would raise the eyebrows of most Wall Streeters. Instead of studying what Wall Street calls the fundamentalsâ€â€price-earning ratios and dividendsâ€â€he judges public enthusiasm, a method that works best in volatile markets. "In my dancing I know how to judge an audience," he says. "It is instinctive. The same way with the stock market. You have to find out what the public wants and go along with it. You can't fight the tape, or the public." Darvas' system is tailored to his job. Since he has to do trading from wherever he is dancing (he recently completed an Asian tour) he ignores tips, financial stories and brokers' letters, has never been in a broker's office. Basically, his approach is that of a chartist: he watches price and volume. But the only charts he keeps are in his head. He studies the weekly stock tables in Barron's, receives a nightly wire from his broker giving the high, low and closing of stocks he is following, as well as the Dow-Jones averages. When a stock makes a good advance on strong volume, he begins watching it, buys when he feels that informed buyers are getting in. For example, when he was playing in Calcutta, he noticed E. L. Bruce moving up in the stock tables. Suddenly, on 35,000 shares it moved from 16 to 50. He bought in at 51, though he knew nothing about the company, and "I didn't care what they made." (They make hardwood flooring.) He sold out at 171 six weeks later. Darvas places his buy orders for levels that he considers breakout points on the upside. At the same time, he places a stop-loss sell order just below his buy order, so that if the stock does not move straight up after he buys, he will be sold out and his loss cut. "I have no ego in the stock market," he says. "If I make a mistake I admit it immediately and get out fast." Darvas thinks his system is the height of conservatism. Says he: "If you could play roulette with the assurance that whenever you bet $100 you could get out for $98 if you lost your bet, wouldn't you call that good odds?" If he has a big profit in a stock, he puts the stop-loss order just below the level at which a sliding stock should meet support. He bought Universal Controls at 18, sold it at 83 on the way down after it had hit 102. "I never bought a stock at the low or sold one at the high in my life," says Darvas. "I am satisfied to be along for most of the ride." Limiting his selections to five or six stocks at a time, Darvas often studies one for weeks or months before buying. He steers away from blue chips, buys only growing companies. "I am only in infant industries where earnings could double or treble," he says. "The biggest factor in stock prices is the lure of future earnings. The dream of the future is what excites people, not the reality." Darvas studied economics at the University of Budapest, fled Hungary for Turkey in World War II (he still holds Turkish citizenship), methodically trained eight hours a day to become a dancer. He came to the U.S. in 1951, got interested in the market in 1952 when a Toronto nightclub owner paid him off in a mining stock that promptly trebled. (He sold it at that point; it later collapsed.) Darvas trained for the market just as methodically as he had studied his dancing, read some 200 books on the market and the great speculators, spent eight hours a day until saturated. Two of the books he rereads almost every week: Humphrey Neill's Tape Reading and Market Tactics and G. M. Loeb's The Battle for Investment Survival. He still spends about two hours a day on his stock tables. Even though he has made a fortune he plans to keep on dancing. Dancing is his business; the stock market is just that second income.

I have a general distaste for most trading books. I only like books that are basically memoirs. I have read and reread Reminisces of a Stock Operator, How I made 2,000,000 in the stock market, the market wizards series, Mark Douglas' two books, and Martin Schwartz's pit bull book. The problem is that it appears I have exhausted the source of quality trading books. I would greatly appreciated any and all suggestions. Please give suggestions even if the books are not directly related to trading. For example I have found some biographies on generals such as Gen. Patton and Field Marshal Rommel to be appropriate to trading in some aspects. Thanks for the help and good trading to all you great people on this forum.

I had forgotten to mention my one affirmation. I only use one because I don't want to bog down my brain. I say many times during the day it really helps me. With my stop I'm invincible.

It all comes down to this in my humble opinion. You must be 100% sure that you can make money every day in the market. Ofcourse, this can never happen because as we all know each trade is unique and anything can happen. But, you still must beleive in yourself. I think I have a good analogy. Your trust in your trading plan must be water tight. If one takes a boat out thats not water tight it will eventually sink. The same is with ones trading operations if your beleif in your trading plan is not water tight. Everything will sink eventually. The real truth is one has no business trading large sums of money unless they have a demonstrated winning edge. Getting a edge that fits you is very difficult, it most definitly will not come from any book or internet site. It took me three years of trading at $1 per point in the Dow Jones at a spread betting company to finally develop an edge. Three full years of trading five days a week. It sounds to most like a waste of time for such small sums of money but now I have an edge that is demonstarted and fully belived in by myself. And to share with you where the most progress for me personally took place was when I had an enormous winning streak. Once you have a winning streak of twenty plus trades with no losers and only wins and scratches you will have the feeling every mourning that you are capable of winning in the market every day.

Does anyone on this forum know much about the legendary trader Arthur Cutten? For some reason there is almost nothing about him on the internet. There is a very short report on him on wikipedia but thats about it. My question is to all you great people on T.L. have you had any contact with old timers who have been able to share some knowledge about this great man with you. I was reading a biography the other day on Jesse Livermore "Speculator King". The book is basically a very negative assesment of Livermore's life and trading acumen. It can be found for free at 4shared.com. Any how he goes on to present his opinion that Arthur Cutten is probably one of the best traders of all time. Prior to reading this book I have never even heard of Mr. Cutten. Mr Cutten built a fortune of more than 90 million dollars from a mere 1,000 dollars in the 1920's. Its my opinion this better than any Soro's or Pickens or any other of those hedge fund types. They have at their disposal ungodly sums of money to trade with. Mr. Cutten did it all with his own money and was an extremely frugal man. Thanks for the help and I wish good trading to all.

I have been trading nearly three years. I am making a living at this business but defintily not a super living by monetary standards. I do extract great fun from trading but I definitly can't call it a great success. I have been preparing a year end evaluation this past month to propel me forward into the coming new year. My mind seems to be gravitating to a new direction in my trading. I would really apreciate it someone could share with me their thoughts about this. I basically can call my self a scalper. Thats pretty much all I do, scalp the ES or Nq. To get to the point I'm thinking about changing my approach to the market. My current approach to the markets its best summed up by the quote in the market wizards book about how the cheetha hunts. Waiting and waiting for the perfect kill and striking in and out fast. But after doing this for years this type of game isn't cutting it for me. My mind is moving to more of an approach that Mark Dougals calls Trading like a Casino. This means having a much larger sample size and letting the edge play out. Another good metaphor is I currently trade like swiss watch maker, a man that takes his craft very seriously and aims for pure perfection. But the question is? Is this best path? Maybe it would be much better for me to become a quartz watch maker. Finally this is what I think I want to do to move forward. I want to put an end for the most part to my scalping. Implement a mean reversion strategy that aims to extract more points with ofcourse much more money behind each trade, to make it worthwhile doing this type of method. The serious cons of this method is waiting for the edge to come to succesful completion and the requirement of a much larger stop. In my mind this seems much more like a real business rather than a tactical game which scalping is. I've been around the markets long enough to realize that large sums of money is there for the taking in the market but not possible in scalping at least not for me. If anyone can assist me with this serious decison I would really appreciate any advice. Thank you very much and good trading to all.

I'm just entering the world of IRC chat rooms. Could someone please assist me with a few chatrooms that are of good quality and free. I only trade emini stock indexes so it would really be best if the room specialises in index trading. However, any suggestion would be much appreciated. By the way is the chat room any good right here at T.L. ? Thanks for the help and good trading to all.