Right, well I have an EA for this but I don’t believe it’s at 100% yet as some of the results don’t seem to quite match up. It’s against ODL’s data but it specifically stated Tuesday as a losing trade when I think most of us won that one? I was gonna use this for backtesting and also to quickly scan a variety of methods and different pairs but can’t until it’s correct.
[B]
Based on TREVPICK001’s times and 10 trailing stop (30SL) Tuesday was a loss.
Can you check this with what you got on that day?[/B]
2009.06.23 06:31 Tester: stop loss #4 at 1.6288 (1.6285 / 1.6288)
2009.06.23 06:00 GBPUSD,H1: delete #3 buy stop 1.00 GBPUSD at 1.6366 sl: 1.6336 tp: 1.6466 ok
2009.06.23 06:00 Tester: order #4, sell 1.00 GBPUSD is opened at 1.6258
2009.06.23 05:00 GBPUSD,H1: open #4 sell stop 1.00 GBPUSD at 1.6258 sl: 1.6288 tp: 1.6158 ok
2009.06.23 05:00 GBPUSD,H1: open #3 buy stop 1.00 GBPUSD at 1.6366 sl: 1.6336 tp: 1.6466 ok
Here is an image of last week’s results using the EA + the report. Can you cross check this with your results if you get a chance? [B]IF[/B] I’ve done everything correctly, and it’s quite possible I haven’t :), the backtesting results are not matching up with what you guys have looked at/stated. Only in the last month or so has this been very successful. However, as Phil said, the majority of the trades were winners so when we’re losing, we’re undoing all the good work (73:27 in this EA, 80:20 for June, June is profitable by the way).
It did show that the ideal trailing stop size for last week was 14pips but I suspect this is largely due to Friday’s move and a 30:24 TP:SL might be the most advantageous under current market conditions.
…and then of course it has no trade management at the moment including moving stops to break even (however, the trailing stop does that for you).
So, what I’m proposing is to run this again this week and make comparisons to fully check the EA is entering the correct trades.
If I can get this working then you guys can have it if you want but more importantly, we can use it as a way of trying different methods with the technique (trailing stop sizes, ATR based targets, box breakouts, etc.).
[B]Stop Loss 30, Trailing stop 10, when 1 trade is opened the other pending order is deleted, working out high and low between 1900 and 0559 GMT (ie the orders are placed at 0600GMT). Strategy Tester: LowVolumeBreakout[/B]
Logically, it doesn’t seem like it’s going to range within the overnight highs and lows so the stop/trade management must be the major issue for this strategy? If one of the trades fails, the other has high probability of being successful?
Since the start of the year, I have this as 72:27 winning strategy. However, the average profit trade is 113 and average loss -300.
darn, you did a nice job. There is one thing that I see different, Trevpick actually is using 30min charts and not 1H charts, therefore it would be nice to compare with the different time-frames since that could make a difference too.
Yes, if you would post the EA I would greatly appreciate it.
Also, I think the more people are testing it the more it would show if and where the problems could be.
Happy Trading
I’ve read through this thread with great interest, as I have long had an interest in finding a simple system where I could place one single order in the morning, small in pips but highly probable, leave it running during the day and let the market take care of the rest. This system seemed to meet these requirements excellently. I went into doing some backtesting of my own here. I exported historical trading data that is available via MT4/Alpari and processed it with a separate program. My broker does not let you define trailing stops before the trade is open, and as I cannot place them manually at office hours, I selected fixed TPing.
So here is a summary of the results I got for roughly 1 year of 5 min data. There were a number of trades that were ambiguous with 5 min data, so I had to recheck them manually against 1 min data. Unfortunately there were only 2 months of that data available, but I think the overall performance became clear.
SL 30 pips, TP 30 pips: the overall result is pretty close to zero.
SL 30 pips, TP 10 pips: three winning trades for every losing trade, so again about a zero result.
SL 20 pips, TP 10 pips: two winning trades for every losing trade = yet another zero result.
So this was quite a dead-end for me. But while I was checking the details of a number of individual trades, it became very apparent to me that using a trailing stop is very crucial for the success of this system. It locks the profits very early and then lets you run the short-lived trends wherever they go.
Here is one additional idea for use for those than can trade this system live: how about increasing the TS a bit after you have locked a certain level of profits, say that 30 pips? That way you might be able to let the trends run a bit longer.
Excellent work, Trevpick!
And all you other guys as well - keep on doing the good work! I might be able to use an MT4 EA over a bridge that my broker has recently implemented, so I am for sure interested about that part of your work as well.
i tottaly agree this stratergy is best with trailing stops as profits are locked as you quite rightfully said and i also are looking to slightly amend this for my self over comming week to lock profit in at 10 pips and see what i can get therafter without TS.
there have been lots of oppotunities over the last few weeks to gain more pips then using a straight TS
also quick question are you using alpari as your broker because you can add trailing stops as i do every morning after setting up the pending order by right clicking on the trade in your trade screen (i will attacth a screen shot) and either choosing a predeterming stop or setting your own by clicking custom
alpari use 5 digits so when you see 45 as a trailing stop thats 4.5 pip trailing stop
You’ll find that a trailing stop will probably have the same or worse results. If you have a 15 pip TS, price can go to 16 and then back up and you’ve only locke in 1 pip. To actually lock in 15 it has to go to like 30. A small TS is really only good to lock in larger amounts. It might work once in while.
IME testing TS they almost always reverse back. You’d be better off watching the trade manually and moving the SL to postive or break even if you are looking to make a small again and have a chance of riding a larger move.
I’ve found for most of the pair i’ve traded. 10-30 pips is a rather tight stop loss. 30 pips would be acceptable for some of the pairs, but lower than that you are asking to get stopped out on a retrace before the trade goes your way. Keep in mind the spread automatically make you negative when you enter. So, if a pair has a 4 pip spread and you have 10 pip sl, it only takes -6 pips from entry to stop you out. Even when you get a good entry with the direction of the trend -6 pips isn’t a lot.
If you want to make system where you place a trade with the trend and then let it ride, and walk away, you are better off finding what is a larger SL that doesn’t get stopped when you are correct with the direction of the trend. Then take that SL and divide your risk among that. Trying to make a lot on small trades with small stops is a recipe for slowly cleaning out your account.
also quick question are you using alpari as your broker because you can add trailing stops as i do every morning after setting up the pending order by right clicking on the trade in your trade screen (i will attacth a screen shot) and either choosing a predeterming stop or setting your own by clicking custom
alpari use 5 digits so when you see 45 as a trailing stop thats 4.5 pip trailing stop
No, I’m not, but this piece of information may turn valuable for me! There is that MT4 bridge, which I’m not familiar with yet, but they advertise that you can takeuse of EAs with the help of that. I suppose that manually placed orders should work equally well, and what you say here is something that I would prefer.
ThePhoenix,
thanks for your wise words of warning! I took the spread into account in my backtests. I also checked a number of losing trades how they would look like with a TS. The result was practically always (I don’t any more remember if I found any counterexample for this but for sure there must be some) that if you used Trevpick’s very tight TS of 5 pips once you are above BE (spread and TS included), you would have landed in at least a couple of pips profit instead of losing 30. I did not check the winning trades, but well - probably many, if not most of them would not have reached the TP, at least that 30 pips. But still, if the TS-less losing trades turned into winning ones with a TS with very high probablility, the TS-less winning trades would have been for sure winning trades also with a TS, maybe just with a smaller profit. I don’t have any backtesting figures for pip gains when TS is in use, but based on the above, I’m not the first one to question Trevpick’s live trading results.
I see this system also very critical to the proper operation of the broker. If there are lots of slippages, big spreads and alike, you’ll be in trouble.
SanMiguel:
Do you have the percentage winning/losing trades because what you are suggesting here is that it’s a 50:50 system.
Yes, that’s pretty much what my results were telling me. One losing trade for every winning trade with SL=30, TP=30.
Most pair’s is not GBP/USD, i have only ever used this pair no more no less findings on anything other than GBP/USD is not apart of the stratagy althought if anybody would like to test other pairs please go ahead, keep us informed with the finding.
the small trade stratergy as certainly not cleaned out my acccount and i only trade once per day which isnt what i would call alot, i am looking for sugestions on ways of optomizing the results, too many days i end up with 9 or 10 pips but i could have had 10 times that so im intrested in othere peoples finding’s , maybe even strengthen the R/R so when the markets to take on a diffrent turn most likly will happen, i want to maximize the profits
also straight TP/SL setups dont work i already know this
I’ll do some more work on it this week but here’s what I have so far.
With data from 1st Jan.
[B]1/
1900 to 0600 5pip trailing stop, 30 SL[/B]
I have been unable to test this due to my broker only allowing 10pip TS. Know any demo brokers that allow less?
[B]3/
2200 to 0800.
Edit: now adjusted for BST beginning on 29 March 2009.
30TP:24SL 52% win : 48% loss - marginal. Profit is due to the RR. Roughly break even until April this year.[/B] Strategy Tester: LowVolumeBreakout
[B]4/
I tried a box breakout method as well when the difference between the high and low was less than 80 pips, which seemed to work well but entered less trades over the last 6 months obviously.[/B]
Note how as of roughly 10th June, both methods are showing good profit. Coincidentally around the time cable started ranging. I have no idea if that has anything to do with it.
I backtested a 30 pip SL and TP from the beginning of the year and I got a 59% win rate. While that doesn’t seem like much you have to think in the long-term. At one trade per day, and 250 business days per year, 59% would yield 45 more winners than losers.
If you risked 2% of your account per trade that would be a 90% account increase in a year! Not bad for a 59% win rate.
Heck, even if it only had a 51% win rate that would still be a 10% per year return with only 5 minutes of work per day!!
Don’t underestimate what a bit over 50/50 will get you.
TREV
I have tried this on Alpari this morning and it yielded 8pips with the 5TS.
Can you check the orders and times please? I believe Alpari uses Central European Time so I’m not 100% I have it correct but I worked out highs and lows between 2100 and 0800, which is 1900 and 0600GMT, ie orders are placed at 0600 exactly.
It seems whatever I try to compare, in the end I get back to Trev very first post on page 2. If you look right now, you can see it does a nice correct move according to the original post. (I am in since the doji M30) and watching. So far it looks like the manual trading and GBP USD works best.
Phil, Last night I did the Sunday breakout and got 27 pips. Thanks.
I realized if the Sunday would go to TP240 then Trevs would be working on the “Sell” too but decided to “Jump Ship” since 27 pips was nice. For today it looks like the right move.
Happy Trading
All these strategies are working very well as of June:
30/24, 10TS, 5TS, etc.
Before that it is questionable I think. I still need to test my EA this week with some LONGS. Will it win you money on the long run…yes, it looks like it. I’m not sure it’s a 99% winning strategy though
if you was to run this test for 6 months every day you would not get a 98% win, however if you take into conseration price action and news releases which can mess up any stratergy the results are quite diffrent,also support and resistance areas are a big factor too,
this System alone will not give a 99% winning stratergy.
in other words i have not traded every single day over the last six months
because of variouse diffrent factor but from what i have traded i have lost 2 trades out of 116
im not nieve, this will not last forever. i want as many people testing it to see if there is a better R/R and hopefully make us all some money
i will detail the factors and publish it so every one is aware of how i trade and when i decided to miss a day.
no programme run every single day using the same criteria will produce the same result all the time, sometime’s it the human elimant that makes it work,
that why banks have traders and not ea’s
i think a ea would be good as a platform but i always get the feeling you will never be able to take out 100% of the human elimant,simply because there are so many factor
also i want to change it so i get maybe more per single trade and less wins because i know how im trading at the moment 2 bad weeks of losses could knock me off my perch,
that why im looking to amend the R/R and i know people are keen on here,so we can all help each other out.
anyway im glad the backtesting looked good on the results you had
i think what we can all agree on is that the stratergy has a good entry point, as all traders know the exit is even more important, and i want to nail it so its a profitable system what ever the weather.
