That was not a valid Cowabunga signal, since there was no EMA crossover. It may have crossed over temporarily, but you should always wait till the end of the candle to make sure the EMA’s really are crossing.
Also, you’re trading on EUR/USD. Cowabunga was designed for GBP/USD, which is a much more volatile pair and will give you better result with the system.
I did wait for the crossover, which I did verify on the next candle, and got the cowabunga buy indicator. On the second candle from the cross up, it quickly cross back down again, which makes the chart now look like a flat or non-crossover. But live i’m pretty sure it was a valid crossover. Oh well. Next time.
It’s a common newbie misktake, so don’t feel bad, but that was not a valid crossover. Once a candle closes and generates a crossover it’s set in stone, the next candle cannot erase it from your charts and make it appear flat. 
Remember the indicator isn’t a buy signal, it’s a warning of a [I]possible [/I]buy signal.
If you’re trading this system on EUR/USD you’re going to get fakeouts like that a lot. I highly suggest you follow the rules and move to a more volatile pair such as GBP/USD.
Hello can any of the system experts tell me if we have to wait until the moving avergaes have made a clean cross over and then cross back again before we trade or can a touch and then break apart again be a vlaid trigger?
For example yesterday 24th June the trend was up all day so I was looking long. At 6:30 BST (1:30 EST) the 5EMA dropped down and touched the 10EMA (on my chart the values at close of candle were identical at 16465). The 5EMA then moved back above the 10 EMA on the next candle. Was this a trigger? Or would I have to wait for the 5EMA to clear below the 10EMA and then cross over up again to get a valid trigger (as it did between 12:15 and 13:45 BST (7:15 and 8:45 EST)) ?
I didnt trade the first one as I wasnt sure what the rule was on touches and obviously missed out on a great trade. The second one I did as the rules were met but it was a loser.
Thanks in advance.
As far as MA crosses go, that one was a tough one to call. On my chart the 5 EMA dipped 1 pip below the 10 EMA before crossing back up, so technically the MA’s did cross over.
It still was not a proper Cowabunga trade though, because the indicators did not have the proper setup. The MACD was going sideways, not up, and the slow Stoch line was also going sideways, if not slightly down.
Thanks Phil agree the indicators didnt signal a trade. Ive had a few of these touches and then pull aways where the indicators are good and never know what to do. Some I was glad to ignore and some I wished Id taken. Maybe I’ll use MT4 as well as my brokers charts to confirm.
Hi tony, in your large R wins, could you tell me whether these are based on backward review or actual live trades?
To determine if the clear break is going to happen, because sometimes, it could hit the 50/00, then reverse 15 pips, then go straight through. But you’d definitely be out by then, though backward review could show that you held on.
Thanks! (and thanks for your work!)
can someone please clarify for me that on the 4hr chart are we looking for the the stoch and the rsi to be heading up or just looking for the main trend.lately a lot of trades have been going against. not sure why:mad:have had sucess until just recently
Where possible I put the trade on live on a demo account. If I am not around then it is based on chart review. For that I dial down to a 5 min chart to ascertain my likely exit. Its a good point you make overall though. I would expect live trading to show poorer results than those I post and there are a number of reasons for this including what you have identified. Its nice to see COwabunga move back to profitability and just made a new high for the year
PS has gone missing in action again so here are the updates for the last 6 weeks according to my results
hi tony, did you consider the news for this also, must be really hard work
i think ps usually gets out a few pips below the 00/50 target if a clean break is not made. while this system is supposed to be mechanical, it is for the entry, but certainly not for the close… closing will mean a difference btw 0.5R and 2-3R…
Mostly I will ignore the news these days unless it is something that clearly causes major volatility such as NFP. I agree entirely that the close is discretionary and if you become good at reassessing potential as the trade unfolds you might well do very much better. My point in keeping this data and for that matter using my own mechanical system is a comparative against my returns from trading SR levels and to amass long term data sets so that I have something to fall back on if PA alone ever fails me
i’ve spent a couple of hours eyeballing 2009 results a 2 times over, and both times give about 2-3% difference for each month.
i used a mechanical close at round numbers (i do not trust myself to be able to wait for a clean break), and my results are half that of yours (the feb outstanding result relied quite a bit on clean breaks).
overall, still a compelling system for 2009. I think the biggest hurdle is not that this is not a good system, but that we must be close to a PC when the trigger comes vs other limit order systems.
hi guys…i hv been using cowabunga for quite a long time and manage to collect some pips out ov it…bt i hv experienced that on 15 minutes graph the system is not quite efficient…during last two months i hv used this system on 30 minutes time frame and results were just amazing.my win ratio amazingly increased.m not pointing out drawback in the system .infect im just adding ma personal experience for u guys.just back test urself for varrification of ma statement.
remember me in ur prayers
m.adil shabbir
pakistan
today it was a bad day for cowabunga systems,
for all currencies there where fakes with EMA5/10, even with GBP/USD
I’m rethinking about using a EMA 13 instead EMA10
I’m using the cowabunga system in an 1H chart. 
it’s great
a big THANK YOU for providing this system for free
There have been no entries today on this system
post your results
there was one at 16.7.09, 0600hrs GMT. A candle peaking at 1.6414. At that the end of the 15 min, on MT4, all were valid signals - rsi, macd, a crossover. am i missing something.
but it then switched back crossover the next candle, and went down for a loss.
[B]yes…me to…many idea make more pip…:D:D[/B]
