dalby

btw, that was a typo in my above post. should read "that means i would buy it at 20" (not 22) btw, if you want to see how a trader can lose money with naked options, google "niederhoffer"

bear, first of all, unless you are talking about futures options, the options only trade during limited hours so, there is tremendous overnight risk in naked calls also, for many options, there is a lack of liquidity, especially when prices get volatile there is more risk in naked options vs. shorting the stock in reference to the above example you gave (gap up overnight), because 1) the options trading time is shorter, so if the stock opens premarket with a gap and the gap turns into a runaway gap, you still have to wait for the optiosn to open to close your position (although you could hedge with some stock IF you have sufficient capital 2) calls increase in price based on both volatility AND price, whereas shorts only are affected by price. theoretically, if u use similar size to what you would be shorting in stock (iow, if you would only short 100 shares of X, then only write one naked call), the risk is similar. but it's still greater in naked calls.

d00d, i have written naked PUTS. i would NEVER write naked calls and as i said, the difference is that the risk is NOT unlimited in naked puts. basically, i write naked puts in my INVESTMENT account (not trading account) at a strike price where i would want to start accumulating the stock. if i write naked puts with a 20 strike, and the stock is currently at 22, that means i would buy if i could get it at 22 a stock can only go to zero but it can go up (theoretically) infinitely. so, naked calls DO have unlimited risk. naked puts do not. it is incorrect to say that naked options in general have unlimited risk. that is only true of naked calls

actually, the risk is only technically unlimited when you write naked calls the risk in writing naked puts is limited

Is there a way to backfill/download multiple days of tick data with tradestation? I have no problem loading a chart (YM) with multiple days of MINUTE data, but no luck downloading multiple days of TICK data.

by eminis, do you mean CME eminis (CME has trademarked the term) or mini futures contracts IN general? i believe it's $25 for CME products, and CBOT (which has dow mini, etc.) is free

i think the comment about the futures market vs. equities market and zero sum game etc. by Bear is spot on the futures market is not a market of "stuff" like the stock market is. it's a market of "contracts" which are simply agreements. a very big part of the futures market is commercials doing hedging (producers and consumers of goods), and in order to serve its purpose, it has to give "equal access" to both sides of the commercial game, not to mention speculators. if coke wants to lock in (what they see as a low) sugar price, they go long sugar contracts, and that means that any gain in sugar price will not hurt them, since their long contract will offset the additional costs of buying sugar for their product. and a sugar producer goes short of course, to hedge the price of his sugar that is in storage, or waiting to get processed, etc. purposes like this are why the futures market was INVENTED in this country, and others (we weren't the first.) the stock market has a limited # of shares for each company, however the futures market can have unlimited # of contracts outstanding (called open interest). heck, you could have only ONE person long and one short the dow futures, or 10,000,000 long and 10,000,000 short because the contracts are merely agreements created out of thin air. the stock market otoh, is not a zero sum game, and is not structured to be a free flowing shorts vs. long market. so, personally, i have no problem with the stock market uptick rule. it would be insane (and nobody believes it would be instituted) in futures

my experience is yesterday. my only two big problems with IB is the chunked tick data, and the lack of access to the put/call ratio i gotta say that watching the tape in TS is MUCH more instructive than doing so in IB. i can't believe i waited so long.

its nowhere near a 15 to 233 ration disparity ive run 300 tick charts side by side, and where IB might have 250 ticks or so, TS would have 300 its inaccurate, but it's not THAT bad

I have recently acquired a TS account, and also have IB and AMTD i had heard previously, and now have it confirmed by my own experience, that IB "chunks" (aggregates) their ticks in a fast moving market. TS does not. This is clear when watching TS time/sales vs. IB's In IB's you will often see orders for (for example) 35 contracts, whereas in TS you will see 5 5 3 10 6 6 in other words the exact fills that went through i have personally seen my orders go through on IB's tape (buy 6 lots on the bid, it shows up on tape, etc.), but it appears that IB aggregates ticks when the market starts moving quickly. this means that tick data as well as delta data (trades on ask - trades on bid) is inaccurate with IB feed. i was using marketdelta with IB and was getting the impression that the data was bogus, and have now confirmed it by comparing to TS. don't get me wrong. i love IB for what it is - cheap commissions, lots of datafeeds w/o additional fees, etc. but for realtime tape watching and delta comparisons, it is not suitable

nosast, my account just got approved today, so i start tomorrow. my data is cheaper than soul's cause i am not getting CME, just CBOT, NYSE, OPRA and i think one other. so, like $5 i do most of my charting with the IB feed, using Quotetracker. i also like having a backup futures broker (AMTD does not have futures) and i think TS' charts are pretty kewl. im gonna use TS for my 10 + trades a month, to get the free datafeed, etc. and use investor RT ($60 a month) for market profile. QT costs me like $6

hmmm i JUST signed up for TS (I already have AMTD and IB accounts) and I was told (and their website confirms) that the software is free, not $50, if you make 10 roundtrip futures trades. personally, i prefer IB as a broker, but i want access to TS' datafeed, and to be able to use the tickdelta indicators.\ their commissions are ok, but not as cheap as IB's if u do volume and get the unbundled rate

lol boba, you sound conflicted. first you retract the statement, then you reassert it. "I voted for it before I voted against it" or something ...

no offense taken. the issue with arbitrary is that it is a loaded word, and one that "sets me off" cause i see it so much from MP adherents. floor trader pivots are established using a formula the value area is established using a formula. whether or not either formula is "arbitrary" is frankly, a matter of opinion. also, the 1 standard deviation thing is solidly dependanty on the assumption that equity markets distribute price in a normal curve. there is a fair bit of evidence that this is not the case in many respects. this is similar to how some people say the bollinger bands correctly establish a X standard deviation, when i think it is relatively clear that markets do not distribute prices normally. if they did, market events like 1987 would have less than a one in a million chance of occurring (approximately) as is the case with several other market events that occur much more frequently the markets are a chaotic feedback system, and there ARE many ways to succeed - i agree. MP does not have the stranglehold on market understanding or methodology, and that was my point.

thegull i am aware of that - but it makes all kinds of assumptions about price variation in a "normal" curve vs. gaussian distributions like i said. i USE market profile i LIKE market profile i also use floor trader pivots, and they both work MP adherents ime are among the most dogmatic (just go to cisco-futures for examples) of traders, because I just see this constant "market profile is scientific and stuff and other methodologies are arbitrary" repeated time and time again. there is no holy grail, there is no one best way.

this is one of the things i dislike about MP - is that people get so dogmatic about it. i use MP. i also use floor traders pivots. they BOTH work. but so many times, I see adherents of MP theory saying that various NON MP levels are "arbitrary" or some such floor trader pivots were invented, and have been used by floor traders for decades. i could sit and cherry pick charts that would (falsely) "prove" that MP levels don't work either. fwiw, despite many claims, MP also has "arbitrary" aspects to it. why should 70% be the value area? why not 75% 65% 50% etc.? it's just as arbitrary. it works, that's the point

my story... i came to daytrading from a contrarian investor perspective. for example, I loaded gold in 98 and 99 when everybody hated it and as a big fan of the graham/buffet approach. but with futures you can't rely on fundies etc. you gotta use TA (or quant analysis etc.) i did terribly the first year, then started to get profitable and am now consistently profitable, after learning "with blood". i've been managing some OPM (other people's money) recently, and also started a trade mentoring business, so I have my hand in this market in several ways.

imo, if u want to daytrade (and i do this) u must 1) master yourself 2) master your emotions 3) have a business plan 4) understand risk. i suggest any book on game theory, to start 5) be able to multitask and synthesize various pieces of info quickly 6) be able to admit you are wrong 7) have a methodology with an edge

20 inch standard is 1600*1200 with decent pixel size 20 inch widescreen actually has less resolution (1600*1200>1680*1050) and has greater chance of driver conflicts (some programs have issues with widescreen format, but not any trading progs i am aware of) I have two 20's as well as a laptop and one external 15. I am looking to purchase two more 20's in the next month or two 20's are great

i use the VOLUME poc almost exclusively. i also use 24 hrs of data. obviously, with the onight session, the VPOC is more "realistic" location of maximum price acceptance i do like to notice sometimes where the time based POC is, but i find the Volume based POC works better... for me

i would disagree that technicals take less importance at climactic times/emotional etc. imo, TA is, to a large extent, the study of aggregate trader psychology. psychology is always an element of TA, and price is ultimately an opinion reached by two sides of every trade. i think like TA in general (where one looks at various timeframes), volume and volatility needs to be considered in that context. iow, for shorter term trades, the volume needs to be compared on a shorter time frame. and for longer term trades, not so much. this reminds me of the old trader joke, your broker calls and says "the bad news is your account is on margin call and down 50% of its equity. the good news that it was on low volume" i don't think anybody should use volume and of itself to predict ANYTHING. that's true of market profile, of indicators in general, etc. it's a matter of synthesizing information. volume does matter (clearly) imo.

i stand corrected. i thought you were supposed to state it written. i was wrong.

also, grandma from idaho incorporates DCA not just BAH there has never been a 20 yr period in history where DCA'ing has not been a good strategy , and in most periods it is in the top quintile of asset class performance as compared to real estate, bonds, metals, etc.

a good example of the product that's hot category is CROX my wife works at a hospital and ALL the nurses started wearing these things that gave a good heads up to do some DD this was many many months ago before the stock took off nurses are a "leading indicator"

yea, my stock investing strategy is basically the grandma from idaho/warren buffet strategy buying stocks of good companies with recognizable products, etc.,at good valuation. I also like to do the peter lynch thing and go to the mall and see what's hot. i am also a firm believer in good management. i bought AAPL and PIXR both when steve jobs took over. management is essential for longterm health of a company.