DionysusToast
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I've read that there are only really 7 basic story plotlines. So perhaps every story you've read isn't as different as you think. But perhaps that was kinda your point
Read Chuck Phalaniuk & get back to me on that one. Start with Pygmy.
A lot seems to have been said about mechanical not working. There are algorithms in the market that work. Does anyone dispute this? So mechanical can work.
I met a guy at a **** up not long back - day before the Singapore GP I think it was. He was 41 & retired. He'd been a trader at a Canadian Bank. After retiring he became an advisor to a firm that developed trading algo's. When he told me this, I said "arbitrage?" he said "yes".
The way that retailers trade is generally "guess the direction". A lot of us retailers make a presumption that this is what trading is all about.
If you get your commissions down to zero, have a co-located server and some clever math, you can, for a while do very well out of arbitrage. Still, it's a competitive market and by it's very nature (just like HFT) you end up going for smaller & smaller chunks of change.
So - whilst there is lots of evidence that trading algos work, I have never seen any that they are trying to pin the tail on the donkey like a retail trader.
I don't trade purely mechanically. But I noticed you said there's not a cat's chance in hell you could program your method. I have often wondered this. And I suppose in theory it should be doable, it would just be a nightmare to do, and probably not worth the time. By the time I'd finish, my methods (or the market) may have changed slightly and I'd have to redo it. What is there about any method that isn't relying on some information that a computer could obtain and interpret as you do?
For many years the best chess players in the world said that a computer would never be able to beat the best human player. That computers were too predictable, and would fall into traps a human could set. Eventually a program came along that beat the best. I'd guess that there are already many mechanical systems trading the market daily that do better than what you or I can achieve.
Chess is a problem with a finite solution. There are 64 squares and each piece can only move in a pre-defined way. The markets are not finite and this is what causes some issues in programming certain techniques.
The thing is, many people believe that there is a mechanical solution but one has never been demonstrated. Not on this board, nor other boards. Not in any trading books or skype rooms - not that I have seen.
I think the halfway house mechanical system is something that is eminently doable. The halfway house being a mechanical system that will work in certain conditions. This still leaves you to decide when to turn the thing on or off. I think the robot you leave on day in day out unattended to make $$$ for you is a myth.
Anyway - what does that have to do with tying one hand behind your back, sir?