Proprietary Trading
Discussion
R11ysf said:
Swiss Index or S&P?
Again, the reason shops tell you this kind of stuff is because they make money off volume. Find your own way to trade and remember volume and profit are not always linked.
We've had a few guys who've overtraded with different results. One guy came to us from a prop shop and couldn't help but click at Eurex the moment he was bored. I kept showing him that he was wasting money - as a trader you can only control 2 things: how much comes in and how much goes out! I showed him one week that he had traded more Eurex than the top 3 guys in the room combined and that our p&l was 25 times his. He didn't listen and in the end we fired him.
Another guy kept trading the 10yr too much and we pointed out how much he was dong in costs. He changed his style and in 1 quarter cut his 10yr volume by 25% and put his profits up 50%.
DOnkeyApply i sent you a PM.
ASX/S&P. His limits are 1,250 Aus 10yrs and 1,500 ZN I think.Again, the reason shops tell you this kind of stuff is because they make money off volume. Find your own way to trade and remember volume and profit are not always linked.
We've had a few guys who've overtraded with different results. One guy came to us from a prop shop and couldn't help but click at Eurex the moment he was bored. I kept showing him that he was wasting money - as a trader you can only control 2 things: how much comes in and how much goes out! I showed him one week that he had traded more Eurex than the top 3 guys in the room combined and that our p&l was 25 times his. He didn't listen and in the end we fired him.
Another guy kept trading the 10yr too much and we pointed out how much he was dong in costs. He changed his style and in 1 quarter cut his 10yr volume by 25% and put his profits up 50%.
DOnkeyApply i sent you a PM.
I'm definitely learning, less is more as some days I just burn brokerage. I remember the days on the sim when bro wasn't counted lol.
You're thinking retail FX terms.
For me, there is no such thing as risk '0.5% ' of my a/c. For a starter, I have no balance apart from my own personal P/L. I am allocated a maximum number of lots to trade and that is reviewed based on my progress.
I'm pretty sure, R11 doesn't think in terms of % either, happy to be corrected though.
For me, there is no such thing as risk '0.5% ' of my a/c. For a starter, I have no balance apart from my own personal P/L. I am allocated a maximum number of lots to trade and that is reviewed based on my progress.
I'm pretty sure, R11 doesn't think in terms of % either, happy to be corrected though.
Mr fox said:
Please excuse my nievity, and intrigue, so how do you determine how much you are going to trade "risk wise" per trade.
Regards
Mr Fox
I have a set number of lots to trade. For example, 1 lot on Aus 10yrs is currently $47 per tick. US 10yrs are $15.63 a tick. From this I have a daily stop and it is my discretion how many lots I wish to trade per clip. I usually have 3 clips, meaning I'll enter on 1 clip (i.e 5 lots) and then use a 2nd clip and sometimes a 3rd. So I'll be long or short 15 lots on the spread or an outright. I am not allowed over my daily stop so I have to use my ability to avoid that and ideally make a profit!Regards
Mr Fox
Hoofy said:
Out of interest, does your style trading involve DOM ladders? Is that what you're doing, looking at the money sitting on each side?
Trading the DOM alone for me doesn't work. Too many algos and spoofing. I've heard it used to be a lot easier a while back but not so much now.Advantage of DOM for me is seeing weak bid/offers and getting good queue in, especially as I'm such small fry. I can flick the bid/offer back and forth occasionally.
Hoofy said:
Taken out of context this is so Betfair trading. 
So apart from DOM what else do you use?
Apart from watching my ladders I always have my charts up. I'm a spread trader so focus on that chart a lot, the U.S 10yrs, Aus 10 yrs, Bund, Dax and S$P mini. Usually have a 30yr TBond up also along with the Curve book for Aus 3yrs vs Aus 10yrs.So apart from DOM what else do you use?
Mr fox said:
I don't know what "trade over numbers" is, I never check rate announcements, nor check the news, and never hold positions over night.
Are you saying you never check when news announcements are scheduled? You're fine with potentially opening a trade when the BOE announce more/less QE, or the EU cuts rates?Mr fox said:
Yes that is correct. As strange as the notion seems the majority of times you'll find "price procceed's the news", and the rest of the time, well I'm not in the market, because as soon as I have made a satisfactory amount. I'm out, be it 10 mins working, or 1hr. I don't care if I've took a target of 10 pips from the market, and then it shoots 100 pips in my favour. All I care about is that my target is met(control your greed). Even if you take the crudest of news announcements like Bloomberg, there is so much scaremongering going on there that any sane person would'nt even dare to trade. I firmly believe that people who know what they're doing either don't tell anyone, or scare you away. Should I check the news on a daily basis, Ofcourse I should, but during back-testing its proved one thing. Your either in the trade, or not.
HTH.
Regards
Mr. Fox.
I'm sorry but opening a trade pre a big release is nothing other than a gamble. Good luck.HTH.
Regards
Mr. Fox.
Mr fox said:
I assure you it's not a gamble if you know what your doing. Think about it. If no-one ever traded before a news announcement there would be no trades placed at all, thus the market would not move at all. If you need someone to teach you this let me know, and I'll reconmend you a few good books to help you become a better trader.
Regards
Mr. Fox.
I'm trying to work if you're being a condescending git or not?Regards
Mr. Fox.
You're an intraday trader, news announcements WILL affect you. Think about it. If you'd like me to explain it to you, do let me know.
Let me know how you go when your stop gets gapped 50 pips on a news announcement you knew nothing about.
Ok, I'll bite.
Everyday there are at least 1 high impact news announcement from UK/Europe or the U.S. These can cause movements from 15 pips upto 200+ pips in the space of minutes. If you're in a trade pre announcement and happen to be on the wrong side, quite simply you'll get your stop slipped considerably if it's a big move due to liquidity issues in the market.
Below is EURJPY from the March NFP. A 50 pip spike higher then an immediate reversal to fresh lows. That is solely caused by a fundamental shift, no indicator or pattern will tell you that would happen.
Everyday there are at least 1 high impact news announcement from UK/Europe or the U.S. These can cause movements from 15 pips upto 200+ pips in the space of minutes. If you're in a trade pre announcement and happen to be on the wrong side, quite simply you'll get your stop slipped considerably if it's a big move due to liquidity issues in the market.
Below is EURJPY from the March NFP. A 50 pip spike higher then an immediate reversal to fresh lows. That is solely caused by a fundamental shift, no indicator or pattern will tell you that would happen.
I've been going a lot better the last couple of weeks, mainly due to me changing my hedge ratio. I've always felt my ability to read ZN is far stronger than XT and always do my most work in ZN. I've decided to be a little more aggressive with ZN and whilst the spread has been a little more compliant I also feel the slight change in ratios is helping me with my confidence also.
Nice to be on a little heater but as always, can turn on a dime so I'm sure I'll be back with a tale of woe soon enough!
Nice to be on a little heater but as always, can turn on a dime so I'm sure I'll be back with a tale of woe soon enough!
Well May turned out to be a great month, some 3.5x better than my previous best month. Hopefully the good streak can continue into June.
Bonds have certainly been pretty volatile and tricky to scalp on occasions, my best trades have definitely been spread trades.
I did have an absolute nightmare on the night Bernanke was speaking when the US 10 yr (Tnote) zipped up 6-7 ticks pretty quickly and then got absolutely murdered. I'd left an order in the book and it got filled and then spent a very nervous 30-40 seconds trying to hedge it or even just exit it. Prices were just vanishing and couldn't get an exit. Ended up costing me 2-3 days work but did lead to a very strong end to the month.
Bonds have certainly been pretty volatile and tricky to scalp on occasions, my best trades have definitely been spread trades.
I did have an absolute nightmare on the night Bernanke was speaking when the US 10 yr (Tnote) zipped up 6-7 ticks pretty quickly and then got absolutely murdered. I'd left an order in the book and it got filled and then spent a very nervous 30-40 seconds trying to hedge it or even just exit it. Prices were just vanishing and couldn't get an exit. Ended up costing me 2-3 days work but did lead to a very strong end to the month.
A little update for June now it's pretty much all done and dusted.
I thought May was volatile! June has been extreme from my brief period in Bond markets. I got off to an absolutely awful start in the first week and have pretty much been playing catch up since then. Managed to eek out a small profit but disappointing given the movements. I seem to gone into a sequence of either smashing it and having fantastic nights or being smashed and hitting my stop. I have lost of bit of consistency and it's a little tricky to pinpoint why. I think on my poor nights my bad decisions have been amplified by the movements and to be fair I have made some poor calls in the heat of the moment.
Looking forward to July to try and hone in on my good nights and make them a more popular occurrence
Be interested to hear how any other Bond/Fixed income traders fared in June.
I thought May was volatile! June has been extreme from my brief period in Bond markets. I got off to an absolutely awful start in the first week and have pretty much been playing catch up since then. Managed to eek out a small profit but disappointing given the movements. I seem to gone into a sequence of either smashing it and having fantastic nights or being smashed and hitting my stop. I have lost of bit of consistency and it's a little tricky to pinpoint why. I think on my poor nights my bad decisions have been amplified by the movements and to be fair I have made some poor calls in the heat of the moment.
Looking forward to July to try and hone in on my good nights and make them a more popular occurrence
Be interested to hear how any other Bond/Fixed income traders fared in June.
R11ysf said:
June was super volatile in stages and dead in others. Overall we were on par for a normal month but some people got hit bu the volatility and others thrived on it.
The signs of tapering are good though and will provide some increased flows going forward. So even if you struggled a bit this month the overall signs are good as it will bring paper back to the market which is what you want.
NFP should be very interesting tonight. A good number on the unemployment rate could see US bonds smashed I think. Conversely a weak figure could see a nice rally as tapering may be pushed back longer than initially expected. Hopefully some good trades out there tonight.The signs of tapering are good though and will provide some increased flows going forward. So even if you struggled a bit this month the overall signs are good as it will bring paper back to the market which is what you want.
Another month has whizzed by! Struggled the first 2 weeks with consistency issues with huge gains or huge losses. Too many outrights and not enough spread trades.
Calmed it down somewhat and stuck with the spread a little more whilst still being aggressive on an outright when I feel I can capitalise on legging in/out at a good level.
On for my best month which is a nice sign of progression and hopefully will get more size next week.
Calmed it down somewhat and stuck with the spread a little more whilst still being aggressive on an outright when I feel I can capitalise on legging in/out at a good level.
On for my best month which is a nice sign of progression and hopefully will get more size next week.
I've just spent the last 15 minutes reading this thread and thought I'd give it a revival.
So much has happened in the intervening 3 years that I genuinely don't know where to start. We found out in 2014 my son has a very rare brain disease and this mentally broke me whilst I was trading for the prop firm. I began making poor trading decisions and the small equity I'd built up quickly became a negative account and with mounting desk fees I was in the hole for around $40k. I did manage to make one last run and eventually finished in the green by $10k and walked away. I was working 70-80 hour weeks and with our time zone I wouldn't be getting home until 3-4am and then waking up at 6am to start the normal day with the children. My wife was also selflessly working two jobs to allow me the freedom to chase my trading dream and a strain was showing on our relationship.
I'd be irritable from being dog tired constantly and I'd spend hours contemplating the future for Charlie and the rest of the family. I made the decision that I needed some stability in my life and made the extremely tough decision to walk away from trading to find balance. My son's health and marriage were too important to me to be so invested in trading without giving anything back. So at 30 years old I was unemployed with no real world qualifications other than life experience working in the Engineering sector in Dubai.
I decided that I'd use my passion for cars and try selling them! I've been at it for nearly 2 years and currently work for Mercedes and whilst it isn't what I ultimately want to be doing, the income isn't to be sneezed at.
I took 8 months off from trading altogether and last September I opened an account to begin trading again. I learnt so much in my 18 months at the prop firm and valuable lessons that I wanted to spend some time with trading again. One of the biggest lessons I learnt was capital management and expectations. When I very first started out trading,I very naively bought into the retail hype in forex when I began that it was perfectly possible to make 50% a month month in, month out.My sights are now somewhat lower and if I can make anywhere from 5-10% a month with drawdown under 20% then I'm a very happy trader. My son's diagnosis is very much at the forefront of my mind but now we've dug deeper we have a few things clarified and whilst his future is very much uncertain, for now, he appears a very happy 4 year old.
I have believed for a long time that trading is my passion and future and I will never stop trying to improve myself and my skills and whilst I'm not doing it to the same scale I am slowly building my equity again and finding a nice balance of home life and work. I probably spend 2-3 hours a day watching the charts and trades but not to the same extent as a few years ago.
For anyone interested, I post a few setups on my instagram account @flipfloptradergc.
Also, I've attached a picture of Charlie from an evening down at the beach. He absolutely loves the beach.
So much has happened in the intervening 3 years that I genuinely don't know where to start. We found out in 2014 my son has a very rare brain disease and this mentally broke me whilst I was trading for the prop firm. I began making poor trading decisions and the small equity I'd built up quickly became a negative account and with mounting desk fees I was in the hole for around $40k. I did manage to make one last run and eventually finished in the green by $10k and walked away. I was working 70-80 hour weeks and with our time zone I wouldn't be getting home until 3-4am and then waking up at 6am to start the normal day with the children. My wife was also selflessly working two jobs to allow me the freedom to chase my trading dream and a strain was showing on our relationship.
I'd be irritable from being dog tired constantly and I'd spend hours contemplating the future for Charlie and the rest of the family. I made the decision that I needed some stability in my life and made the extremely tough decision to walk away from trading to find balance. My son's health and marriage were too important to me to be so invested in trading without giving anything back. So at 30 years old I was unemployed with no real world qualifications other than life experience working in the Engineering sector in Dubai.
I decided that I'd use my passion for cars and try selling them! I've been at it for nearly 2 years and currently work for Mercedes and whilst it isn't what I ultimately want to be doing, the income isn't to be sneezed at.
I took 8 months off from trading altogether and last September I opened an account to begin trading again. I learnt so much in my 18 months at the prop firm and valuable lessons that I wanted to spend some time with trading again. One of the biggest lessons I learnt was capital management and expectations. When I very first started out trading,I very naively bought into the retail hype in forex when I began that it was perfectly possible to make 50% a month month in, month out.My sights are now somewhat lower and if I can make anywhere from 5-10% a month with drawdown under 20% then I'm a very happy trader. My son's diagnosis is very much at the forefront of my mind but now we've dug deeper we have a few things clarified and whilst his future is very much uncertain, for now, he appears a very happy 4 year old.
I have believed for a long time that trading is my passion and future and I will never stop trying to improve myself and my skills and whilst I'm not doing it to the same scale I am slowly building my equity again and finding a nice balance of home life and work. I probably spend 2-3 hours a day watching the charts and trades but not to the same extent as a few years ago.
For anyone interested, I post a few setups on my instagram account @flipfloptradergc.
Also, I've attached a picture of Charlie from an evening down at the beach. He absolutely loves the beach.
Thought I'd give another update with the end of year in sight.
Trading has been going very well and all things being well should be finishing at equity highs and very much looking forward to 2017. Have managed to keep drawdown under 16% and maintain a good growth rate which has been aided by the boost in volatility since Brexit and other market factors.
Persistence beats resistance!
Trading has been going very well and all things being well should be finishing at equity highs and very much looking forward to 2017. Have managed to keep drawdown under 16% and maintain a good growth rate which has been aided by the boost in volatility since Brexit and other market factors.
Persistence beats resistance!
Well, we're well into 2017 and it has already been an interesting year.
I have been supplementing my trading with a full time job but on February 1 I left that role and have been trading full time. It is a good 6 months earlier than anticipated but my heart and mind simply were not on the job and it was weighing me down massively.
So far it's been a great 6 weeks or so, adapting to a new routine and finding areas to keep improving. My wife has probably found it harder to adjust as she has been so used to me being out of the house for 10-12 hours a day. I now get to enjoy school drop offs and pick up! Haha.
Hoping 2017 can keep moving up.
I have been supplementing my trading with a full time job but on February 1 I left that role and have been trading full time. It is a good 6 months earlier than anticipated but my heart and mind simply were not on the job and it was weighing me down massively.
So far it's been a great 6 weeks or so, adapting to a new routine and finding areas to keep improving. My wife has probably found it harder to adjust as she has been so used to me being out of the house for 10-12 hours a day. I now get to enjoy school drop offs and pick up! Haha.
Hoping 2017 can keep moving up.
layercake said:
@ flipflop.. sorry to hear about your son, i do hope its nothing serious. I envy you being able to spend time with your kids, that's one thing money can't buy.
Always been interested in abit of trading myself, currently my day job is sat in front of a computer which could be used to do abit of trading.
Could any of you kind gent's point me in the right direction .. ie what site to use for trading etc?
Sorry, never saw your reply Layercake (awesome movie btw). Always been interested in abit of trading myself, currently my day job is sat in front of a computer which could be used to do abit of trading.
Could any of you kind gent's point me in the right direction .. ie what site to use for trading etc?
There are a myriad of places to trade but for me a great place to start is deciding what you want to trade and how. Currencies? Futures? Indexes? Commodities etc.
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