BlowFish

Pyramiding is the turtle system. The money management is the very essence of the system. The trigger (simple BO) is pretty irrelevant, anyting that will ensure you are positioned when a trend starts. When I looked at it (which was many years ago admittedly) you absolutely needed the aggressive adding of units to wining positions to cover the many small losers you get before a market really trends. It was this that actually turned the system profitable. Maybe markets have changed since then (though I would have thought for the worse). In any case it taught me what old fashion trend following was all about.

Congratulations! Don't forget a careful review of this thread there are some good words of wisdom amongst the charts.

Probably missed your reply, apologies.

Worth thinking about BE and a partial round here though there could be a big move as this set up on the 4hour.

Pullback to previous R and breakout level - trigger from the 15min minor S/R in the style of Don4 or JR. Edit this is USDCAD btw

Had been stalking that for a couple of days but missed the break....there is always a pullback (if one presents itself). Would you have considered a short on the prod down a couple of days ago?

The very best way to hide your order is to use a market order! I'll certainly acquiesce to that:D Rather than repeating ourselves here I wonder if you saw my post here http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/6/order-flow-analytics-7173-4.html#post82577 I really would welcome your comments as I do find your work most interesting. In a nutshell have difficulty with the core assumption that 'commercials' trade aggressively and 'non commercials' (retail?)passively.My experience of a variety of 'commercial' participants in a variety of markets is difference to yours. Another angle is to have a 'commercial' trading aggressively on one side and a 'non-commercial' trading passively on the other you need roughly equal volume on both sides. A quick look at the Co shows this not to be the case. Another thing, a cursory investigation into market micostructure would show that there are numerous types of informed traders using quite different methods to conduct there business. As I have said I do have respect for your work (otherwise I would not bother pursuing this,) not only does it seem to fit together coherently but it seems to provide you with a decent framework to make your trading decisions. (This is of course what's important.) The trouble that I have is with the core premise that participants accumulating or distributing inventory predominantly do so aggressively.

What makes you think the 'commercials' use market orders to accumulate a position? I wonder if you saw my post about accumulation in the other thread? I wonder if you might have a crack at answering that as I do have respect for the stuff you have written despite being somewhat doubtful about your core assumptions.

I can't help feeling that there is something there (market delta) and I am just not seeing it. Of course being 'intellectually prejudiced' (to make up a term) against some of the core assumptions can't help with me 'seeing it'. I did have another look at Order Flow Analytics site. They seem to be a pretty new vendor, there is an incomplete feel to their site. They have got a couple of vids now (that where dead links when I first came across this thread). It looks pretty similar to market delta's stuff to be honest.The key thing they seem to have is they seem to 'shift' to a new column (bar if you like) on a certain event....some sort of shift in delta/order flow. It looks like quite a 'scalp' type tool. Kind of hard to really see what they are up to.

There have been several threads here in the past on 'delta' (Vol@bid and Vol@Ask) you should be able to find them if you look round. http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/f6/order-flow-analytics-7173.html is the most recent. My hunch is that a lot of what you read was based on false assumptions. If you take a look at that thread I made a post recently listing why I have reservations about 'delta' as a proxy for order flow. I haven't traded stocks for ages but when I did at times you would see Goldies sitting best bid (or a level or two outside) absorbing 100's of thousands (or even millions) of shares. Needless to say price would eventually rise.

You might enjoy the trading with market statistics threads. Whilst they don't deal with pairs specifically they give a fairly comprehensive coverage of VWAPs and standard deviations of it.

If you have a proven profitable system (and can apply it consistently) you don't need any clever business idea, investors or much of anything else. Compound growth can be a fearsome thing. The way to make more money is not to trade OPM (other peoples money) it is to increase your own size until you are making as much as you desire. (Unless the 'investors' take the risk and you take the money....then you don't really need a profitable strategy).

Mind you......it had turned fairly lacklustre when I posted that before I went to bed and still is this morning. Looking kind of bearish again to me but there are now a couple of good boundaries to trade. Edit short side I would perhaps enter ahead of the lowest recent low if a good setup develops on the 15 minute (one that would allow a profit if there was another test).

Did you have a short with that first poke down? I did. As Brown said it seemed one f the most promising areas today. Managed to get flipped long....there where plenty of opportunities to do that too.

Hi BG, don't have the time to give your post that it deserves right now (dinner soon)....but there where a couple of things I picked up on a quick read through that I thought I'd comment quickly on. Some while back someone introduced me to the idea that an absolute cumulative delta was usually needed to sustain a 'decent' move. I can't remember who it was right now but I remember it was someone I respected. I didn't prove or disprove it for myself but on the times I have watched delta I have often noticed 'strange' effects. (Like a market rising all day while delta declines). As for the different market participants (your jackals and hyenas) I certainly buy into that idea. Harris (or O'Hara I would guess) details all sort of participants and methods they might use to get there positions. It also details which participants are likely to be the other side of their trades. Many large participants are not even profit motivated in the traditional sense of buy low sell high (or buy high sell higher). I found Harris pretty interesting others have found it 'difficult'. One thing that you do get from it is that there are a wide range of types of participant that act in quite different ways. One of the things that cuts short my forays in to market delta as a proxy for order flow is the difficulty of getting and maintaining accurate data. You have pretty much to run 24/7 in real time it seems to me or use marketdelta or investor rt. Not sure of the accuracy of there historical bid ask changes. I understand (though might have mis remembered) that Rithmic (that zenfire is based on) has historical bid and ask info available....I think it only provides 1 day historical tick so probably the same bid ask history. This kind of leads me back to the subject of this thread. I wonder on the accuracy of the OFA software (particularly the ninja stuff) I am a wee bit sceptical to be honest.

Thanks. I notice Amp are doing futures and spot, I have a ticket with them asking if I can use one (ninja) platform for both. My hunch is that they are under separate umberellas.

Slightly off topic do you trade through Gain as well as FXCM? Do you need a funded account to try Ninja with them? (guess a visit to there website would reveal the answer to that )

One of the better things about old JR's work is that he provides some simple 'rules' for spotting range bound markets. One of the ideas he introduces is a 'measuring bar' the first bar of that range was such a bar. Until price can make it out of the confines of that bar it is clearly not making any directional headway. Matching H L or Closes. Alternating closes... all objective ways to say the market is currently sideways and maybe helpful to those that can not just see it.

Hi Don, would you have still been in with your management? I guess you would have been short ahead of the break too if you even took the trade? Cheers.

Im not a great one at drawing but here is an interesting variation where the LL occurs before the LH. This sort of pattern would probably have me looking at a faster chart for entry close to where the LH might be anticipated.

This might well have been answered (Im playing thread catch up) and I might be on the wrong track completely.....but with that caveat take a look at the posts Thales made after the elliot wave document. Many people have described this behaviour in a variety of ways..... whilst price was making hh's it was having a lot more difficulty doing so, the bulls are running out of puff (for the moment).

Thanks for the kind words. There are, I guess, some things that just 'work' regardless of whether there is a natural phenomena behind them or not. Maybe there is some fundamental 'law' or maybe some things are 'self fulfilling prophecies'. I must say I think what Fulcrum is doing makes interesting reading and he has put together what seems to be a consistent framework to make trading decisions. I am one of those people that want to know the reason for things ....why something is as it is? A good example is market profile, it's clearly a powerful tool that some successful traders lean on to make trading decisions. Personally though I have a much easier time 'accepting' Jperls excellent "trading with market statistics" concepts because to me they make more sense. Anyway....perhaps it is not really necessary to know why something 'works' (take a look at the "why does support turn to resistance" thread for example). A better question is perhaps 'how can this help me make better trading decisions'?

I think it is worth re-iterating some basic points. For every buyer there is a seller (in the futures markets at least). Each trade may have - both long (buyer) and short (seller) opening - both buyer and seller closing - or finally one or other opening and the other closing. To assume that just because a trade took place at the ask that it represents a 'buyer' or 'more buying' is rather naive at best imho. Sadly some of the arguments that are being advanced are based on this questionable assumption. I have some problems conceptually with using delta as a proxy for order flow (as you might guess), it's about all we have to work with I suppose. I am interested in Fulcrums work it seems that he too must be making certain assumptions (though perhaps not naively ) On a more practical level I have a hard time seeing that someone accumulating inventory will necessarily do so through aggressive buys quite the reverse I would think they are going to buy every last bit they can on the bid as close to the bottom of the zone as they can and even may become aggressive sellers at the top of the range to 'cap' price if they haven't accumulated their line. Likewise they may well sell (on the ask) into the tail end of a rising market.

There is a "best of TL post" at the top of this section. That should get you started. This thread http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/f208/reading-charts-real-time-6151.html may not be in there as it is fairly new.... probably deserves to be.

I'm sorry to hear that, I am not quite sure why you would feel that. I got something from your posts if that is any consolation.