What to do…

As you may recall I entered the MyFXBook trading contest at GoMarkets that ran during September. It didn’t go very well, I lost 13%. I blamed the high spreads at GoMarkets partly (for my scalpers), but mostly the extreme turbulence we saw during the second half of the month. When the contest was over I started a new demo with GoMarkets in the same terminal, IE with the same settings. I choose a $5000 account this time thou, it is more realistic for me. Then I forgot about it, it is on a VPS over at SWVPS that I don’t use much anymore, but have payed for a year in advance.

I checked in yesterday. The account has exploded to about $11200, which equates to about 124% gained in 14 days. At first I thought that I had mistakenly started a $10000 demo, but after checking the trading history I can just say that the EAs in the account has made a great job during these weeks. The performance is not possible in a live account thou, because I forgot to adjust the lotsize of one of the EAs. It still used fixed 1.10 lots for trades, this number was based on the $50000 account size of the contest account. IE I have been taking 10 times the risk in this demo. The interesting thing is the gained pips thou, and in that respect this strategy (a midterm intraweek EURUSD strategy) have been doing very well with 6 trades resulting in 542 pips. I have corrected it to take 2% risk now, which is more realistic for a live trading environment.

All the other EAs have been doing great also, including my main scalper. I really can’t wait to get my money from JadeFX now so I can start a live account at Pepperstone (via cashbackforex of course for the kickback) and really get into this again.

Here’s the account (demo at GoMarkets): http://www.myfxbook.com/members/someguy/ea-portfolio-gomarkets/179700

It’s been quite some time since I traded accounts with any sums to talk about (I have a very small account at Alpari UK funded still, but it isn’t doing well with automated strategies, it’s okay for manual mid term strategies thou). I’m still waiting to get my money back from JadeFX to start trading automatically seriously again. The last word is that the NFA is going to get access to JadeFX accounts in November and that they then will start the distribution of funds. It will be interesting to see how much I will receive since I had quite a bit more in the account than I had deposited (I had profits of 143% during 2010H2). I’m guessing I won’t get the profits back, but at this point really anything is better than nothing. I’ve been waiting for 7 months…

In the meantime I have been testing different strategies out in demos at FINFX and Pepperstone. I was quite confident that I had a nice setup with 5 different EAs after the summer, but the last contest at MyFXBook unraveled some disturbing losses. The scalpers really suffered from the relatively high spreads at GoMarkets (they have been optimized for the low spread trading environments at ECN-brokers like Pepperstone and FINFX). More disturbing was that some intra-day strategies didn’t work well when turbulence hit the markets in mid September. All in all I lost ~13 % during the month, and I was up about 10% halfway through. I know that if this would have been a live account there would have been days I would not have traded because of the turbulence in the worlds markets, so I think a live account would have managed a break even month. I would like the EAs to take this “no trade” decision themselves thou, and it is something I am working on.

I think that you will see more activity in this blog once I get my (forex) trading capital back from JadeFX. Until then I will try to take some time and update the Forex Guide. It is long overdue.

I entered into the latest competition at MyFXBook, which started yesterday when the markets opened. I’m only going to trade it with some of my EAs and with acceptable risk (maximum 2% risked on each trade). I won’t stand a chance to win with those settings thou, the leader right now is up 60% in less than 12 hours running! Clearly this is a violation of the rules as it is stated that it is not permitted to take overeager risks. Hopefully the guys running crazy large lotsizes will take a few stoplosses and completely loose their accounts.

I’m up 1.49% right now which makes me #191 in the total standing. I’m aiming for 15% over the whole month so so far so good

Here’s a link to my account: http://www.myfxbook.com/members/someguy/contest-someguy/156600

Here’s a official live account from the Forex Shocker guys trading v3.0 of their EA. Interestingly enough it is at Pepperstone. It haven’t traded long (since early June), but so far it has been quite undramatic, if not a little bit depressing. We’ll see in the long run.

Link: http://www.myfxbook.com/members/shockerv3/shockerv3/135399

Update: They’ve closed the account above and replaced it with this one http://www.myfxbook.com/members/shockerv3/shockerv3/148370 . Obviously they weren’t pleased with the performance and started over. Bad move. I think it still is the same live account thou, if it is it started with $900 asfaik. No point in offering live statements if you can’t stand for the losses the system incurs.

Both FAP Turbo and Forex Shocker has new versions out. Forex Shocker 3.0 and FAP Turbo Ichimoku. I haven’t had a chance to test them yet, but actually both seem quite promising. I’ve been hearing good things from a friend of mine about FS3.0 and FAPT Ichimoku has excellent backtests posted on their site. The backtests were performed with tickdata and has 99% accuracy. That is certainly not the same thing as a “proof”, like many of these EA vendors would like you to think, but it is usually a very good indication.

When I get back from my vacation I will run my own tickdata backtests on both EAs and get back with the results. I will also start demos at Pepperstone for forward testing.

Excellent ECN spreads (and STP if that is your taste) at a broker that is regulated by ASIC? Sounds excellent. They show spreads that is lower than what I was used to at JadeFX and lower than the currently popular FinFX, and they offer micro lots and just $200 deposit limit (good for first “live test”). When (if) I ever get my money back from JadeFX I’m tempted to stick at least some of it in at Pepperstone. Still lacking reviews over at ForexPeaceArmy, which is strange, but at least there aren’t any negative ones.

Be sure to sign via Cashbackforex.com so you get the best possible deal.

A while ago I beta tested a product called OrderBook FX that basically gives you a tool to understand the current market order depth (or depth of book) for currency pairs. The company behind the product collects its underlying data from multiple institutions and aggregates it into what it calls a “global depth of book for all major currencies“. During the beta test there where many problem with non-us installations and such, but all where fixed and they are now live accepting customers. I very much like the chance to see market depth in MT4 as this is very poorly implemented in the standard MT4 terminal (better in MT5 if your broker offers the service, but still not a “global” view, just the brokers book or the ECNs book). Using the global book you can take advantage of selling or buying pressure to speculate in coming price movements in a totally different way than with other indicators. I only had very little time to experiment with this during the beta test and following 7 days free trail, but I will definitely work on some filters for my current EAs to use OrderBookFXs API. It is excellent for a Asian session scalper to know when there is a selling / buying bias in the market to wait for channel bounces and even break outs. And of course this API could be used as base of a new strategy also, buying/selling when others do and chances are that prices will move.

I will very likely (90+ %) sign up for the service once my major trading capital is returned from JadeFX by the helping NFA and CTFC. Hopefully that is soon…

OrderBook FX offers a 7 day free trail. Make sure to use it well. After that there are two choices depending on the amount of pairs you would like to follow at the same time for $49 and $79 per month. Money that better entry and exits by just fractions of a pip will get you back over a month of successful scalps I think

Just a quick note that Birt has updated his excellent collection of tools for tickdata backtests in MT4 using Dukascopy tickdata (some time ago, but I’ve missed it until a few days ago). The big news is the new compact FXT format (deletes duplicate ticks) which really saves on file size allowing you to test for longer periods and a extension of the 2 GiB limit to 4 GiB on Vista and Windows 7 systems. I’m still on Windows XP SP3, so I haven’t been able to test the last feature, but with the new scripts I still can test 2+ years on any currency without hitting the 2 GiB barrier. The tests also run faster on the same time period because it contains fewer ticks, which is always very welcome.

If you are new to tickdata backtests or run older versions you have to check it out.

Yes, I’m thinking about becoming a signal provider.

The ones I’ve examined is Tradency, Collective2 and Zulutrade. I’ve only yet tested giving signals to Tradency, and I must say that I’ve already concluded that my EURGBP scalping strategy won’t work with it because of the 1.5 pip spreadpadding by Tradency (the cost of using the signal). The usual TP for the strategy is 4-9 pips and it uses timeouts to get out of the trade after some time at breakeven or small loss. The actual account that I’ve generated the signals from is in profit, but anyone subscribing would be in loss. Two other strategies with larger TP have been working out thou, so I could start to offer them.

The Collective2 is probably better suited to offer scalping signals as there is a choice to take a fixed sum of money per month (the recommended fee is between $50 - $200). There is also a possibility to charge per trade and even only to charge if the system is profitable. The MT4 integration is much worse than Tradency thou, at least that is how I experience it. One irritating thing with C2 is that they charge you ($98) up front for offering your system, before you even know if it will perform well through their trade bridge. You can test it for free for up to 5 trades, but I don’t consider that as a real test.

The last option is the very popular ZuluTrade. The pricing model is the same as for Tradency, IE they pad the spread and the signal provider gets a part of it. What I don’t like is the way signals is sent to ZuluTrade as it doesn’t use a bridge software like the two other alternatives, but rather requires you to give up the investor password of your MT4 account so they them self can pull the triggers from your account. Sure, it is probably easier to setup, but it feels a little off to me. Shouldn’t be a problem thou since you are allowed to use a demo account for generating signals.

I’ve started accounts at all of them, but like I said I’ve only yet traded with Tradency. A few things is a bit annoying with the whole concept like the fixation on lot sizes. I very much prefer variable lotsizes for each and every trade considering the risk willingness and the SL picked. I almost always risk 2% and adapt the lot size accordingly. Unfortunately there is no way as a mirror trader to specify the same, all lotsizes is fixed per strategy (say 0.1 lots). Even if I find a trade that needs a little larger SL level I can’t tell the client to use a slightly smaller lot size in order not to risk too much. The reverse is also true of course, I can’t increase the lot size if there is a tight SL. So really only the actual signal is sent  to the subscribers who in turn can specify which lot size to trade.

If anyone have tips about the services above, or others, I’m very interested. I’ll keep you posted on the progress.

I guess you’ve already been spammed by all your favorite spammers about this a few days ago. The FAP Turbo guys have built and just began to sell a software that finds arbitrage’s in sport betting (called arbs in the online community). Contrary to what these guys are stating on their website this isn’t anything new. There’s been quite a few fully automated solutions for years online, some good, some not so good. There’s even been free arbs posted on several forums. I know because I ventured into this field for a small foray about five years ago.

I’m doing this post part as a way to verify that the arb scene is real. The bookies really do give setups, very briefly, that guarantee profits if all possible outcomes are covered with just the right bet. Every bookie sets his own odds of course, and bases this on his information about the game/event. Sometimes this is evidently very hard. What a arbitrage better really is doing is taking advantage of a imperfect market.

But the other reason for the post is really to warn you that this isn’t free easy money, certainly not forever. You see the bookies really don’t like arbitrage betters, they even see them as the enemy. If you start betting the arbs found by the software (or by some other service, or by yourself) you will very likely in just a couple of weeks be hindered from making large bets (it was a long time ago, but lets say $100 or so as maximum).  Especially if you bet $318.23 or $422.98. No-one but arbitrage betters do that.

The arbs don’t stay out there for long either, so you will want to sit at the computer waiting for possibilities to come, which is fine if there is plenty, but the ones found by the software will potentially be played by thousands of people(they state that only 1000 copies will be sold, but who knows). Every one of those bets will possibly change the odds, against you. So you better be quick in and seal the odds needed, on all outcomes. The worst you can do is to get in on one of them and not the other, then you’ve just guaranteed a loss instead of a win

Also, if you start signing up to all the bookies needed, do check if there are promotions to take advantage of. They can have some deposit bonuses or perhaps there is some friendly affiliate to give you a kick-back (like boogster.com and others).

Personally this actually got me a little interested in getting started with some arbitrage betting again. After the debacle with JadeFX I’m a bit turned off by Forex trading, perhaps this could work like a time out. If I go for it, I’ll let you know of course. It’s $149 to start and then $20 monthly. Since it’s a ClickBank product I think there should be no problem to get a refund within 60 days if it doesn’t work.

Check out the incredibly lousy website.