Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

high street retail of all sectors is almost certainly rubbish, as it has been for a number of years

however, restaurants and pubs and hotels all look to be reporting some strong numbers
and if the hotels are doing well, and i have individual info from a little group with hotels from cornwall to malvern, then surrounding businesses will also benefit as a by-product

Same here in the North Fred.

In fact the fall in unemployment tuesday was a transfer of people over to sicknes benefit, from the dole que.

What we are getting is a massive explosion in self employed PART TIME WORKERS all claiming working Tax Credits rather than signing on the dole.

Problem is in time the Tax Man will catch up with them and ask why they havent submitted a self declaration on line.

i accept that h'gate is something of an oasis, but hotels and restaurants there are consistently jam-packed

i wonder how many of these unemployed or self-employed brits are prepared to take catering industry jobs

my guess is that, rightly or wrongly, it is more comfortable for them to draw benefits than work in what is unquestionably a tough environment

Alders,

I've no wish to tread on Fishfinger's toes if he's been helping you with a trading system, but, for you to have lost 22% of your pot in a single trade, it means that you're over-trading.

You should aim to be risking no more than between 1% (for large pots) and 3% (for small pots) on any one trade. That way, if you have a run of successive losing trades (which happens), your pot won't be dented to the extent that you won't be able to return to the table.

Whenever I analyse a particular system, I always run a Monte Carlo Simulation on at least 10,000 passes over a sustained period (normally 10 years), and the objective is for there to be a less than 0.1% probability of a 30% drawdown. Statistically, whenever a trader goes down by 30% of his pot, there is a strong probability that he'll pack up and walk away from trading, so the objective is always to ensure that the drawdown from peak balance never goes that high.

At 22%, you nearly broke the bank first time out. :o)

Seriously. You need to either tighten your stops or scale your position sizes down to limit your risk in future. Otherwise you'll be out of the game. And as Fishfinger said, you got lucky this time!

Hope that helps.

Hilary the system I have introduced Alders to is the 2 x2 system, you must have heard of it all the big houses use it, ie, no more than 2% of your entire portfolio risked and a return on your position of twice your risked downside on any one trade, plus a lot more with a trailing stop loss.

I use a hybrid of this which is far more stingy and althought I get stop lossed out far quicker and have more positions closed down, the winners which I let run, far exceed the original 2 x2 system.

Some wouldnt like it and say let your position breathe a little more, but it suits my style and Ive increased my profits 24% after back testing it after 9 months.

Perhaphs differing market conditions will take the edge away, I will have to monitor it.

ahhhhhhhh knew Id posted more than that last post for alders.....

goldfinger View goldfinger's profile - 18 Sep 2014 11:34 - 45897 of 45916 edit this post

Alders, not sure re-to 2-2 system and forex.

Best to stick to being a master of one trade rather than a jack of all trades.......well that is if you havent done forex before.

Briefly took it up about 8 years ago for 9 months and was pretty good at it but in the end found it boring and more akin to just gambling awaiting news all day.

I suppose it could be used but thier may be better suited risk/reward systems..........ends

Hilary your thoghts on risk/reward systems for Forex for alders, I believe just you and shortie practice it full time on the board.

There's nothing wrong with that, Fishfinger, although what I would say is that EVERY trading system is simply exploiting short-term inefficiencies in the market.

Trading is a three-player zero sum game where one player always wins, and extrapolation of a 9 month backtest may show that the system doesn't prove profitable in the longer term, unless your system uses a discretionary edge (eg. staying out of the market ahead of NFPs, which generally only comes with experience).

You may find that you need to run some walk-forward tests to regularly optimise the system.

Hilary your thoghts on risk/reward systems for Forex for alders, I believe just you and shortie pratice it full time on the board.

No different to any other market. Identify a trend on whatever timeframe you wish to use, trade only with the trend, set your stop just outside the bounding trendline, and size your position according the distance away that the stop is. And if you can't identify a clear trend, stay in cash.

Yep thats why on Trade Station you find so many systems have limited lifes. ie, because the market is forever changing.

Ive said before (and I know you disagreed) that the market is more often wrong that is right and I certainly dont believe in the principle of 'modern market efficiency'.

I think alders should stick to stocks and forget Forex and indicies for at least 24 months while he gets experienced in the ways of the IG trading platform and also the risk /reward system he is going to use.

I'd probably concur with that - FX does have a habit of frightening a lot of people away for a variety of reasons, not least because most rookie traders unknowingly over-trade as Alders did today. But that doesn't mean that it should be discounted completely.

Alders where are you????

http://undergroundmgzn.com/2014/09/17/queen-accidentally-shoots-alex-salmond-crossbow/

http://undergroundmgzn.com/2014/09/12/wales-reveal-theyve-already-left-uk/

http://undergroundmgzn.com/2014/09/15/exclusive-alex-salmond-birth-certificate-reveals-born-essex/

goldfinger

Just read yours and Hil's comment's and will take them on-board, cheer's.

No probs alders you know you have freinds to call up on.

just got tv on and breaking news says "Scotland votes no...prime minister talking to salmon.." ..what is he says to him...literally -"mega lol"?

more like "how much cash do you want?"

Big gap in favour of no. There is now a strong demand for an England only parliament in exchange for Scotland getting new powers. That will be with no Scottish MPs in our parliament. That, of course, means 41 less Labour MPs, 11 Liberal MPs and 6 SNP MPs. That's pretty much a regular Conservative majority.