I use a slow stochastic 8,3,3 indicator. When the stochastic is above 80, turns downwards and I have a confirmed crossing where the lagging curve crosses the faster I have a buy signal. Works every time I sell. When I sit aside the opposite happen.
When the stochastic is below 20, turn upwards and crosses I must sell. This is of course only true when I just bought.
There is a thread concerning what expectations a newbie should have and I do not expect this to happen as consistently as it does. When I track the charts backwards I can hardly find these rare situations. I seem to have a very sensitive nose to never ever miss these things.
I have the exact same stochastics settings from the IB system by james. So, far I’ve found the stoch only good as a multiple indicator system, as confirmation of a better signal. There is many times the stoch will go in the upper or lower range, cross back and make it look like a possible reversal only to go right back up or down and hover around the upper or lower range for many bars/candles.
The problem is, when looking at past charts it seems as if that it is a clear signal, because the stochastic crossed when price went up or down. When you use it in a live demo it becomes apparant that it is a lagging indicator that can get you in trouble if you depend only on it, because price was well ahead of the indicator. So, you would get in lat and out late even if the indicator had you going the right way in the trade.
If you like the stock check out James’s, “IB,” system. The basics of it in the trading systems section. He uses that stochastic setting as confirmation.
Stochs are still a lagging indictor, IMO, learn candles first. If it were as simple and repeatable as watching for stochastic lines to cross everyone trading forex would be rich.
agreement with most of the statement phoenix, although using just the stoch alone coupled with s+r on your chart, you can easily estimate where the price is going — lets say a resistance level is 20% or so above the present price, and the stoch has crossed the 50 point and looks to have 20% left for a successful run before topping.
Welllllllllllllll — i sure would put a few lots on it reaching that resistance point with no hesitation.
but to admit, my stoch panel also contains a/d, rsi and cci, so you see i agree with you completely (just that it CAN be used alone once one has some experience with how the price retraces a bit even when on an extended run up !
granted, i also have a few neato ma’s on the chart that i use for crosses and combining what they say with the stoch has never let me down — now, I CAN let me down, but the ma + s+r + stoch doesnt !
Yes, the stochastic do have the flaws you describe. My ide� isn’t that simple but I have give the IB system by James twice as much thought as anything else but I don’t see it. The bare idea that an inner bar mean that there is a consolidation and that the price will break out just isn’t true. I have back tracked my charts really hard trying to see this, even wanting to see something but to me, the so called IB doesn’t mean anything by itself.