Pyramid Trades, Software Auto price Adjustments

[slipperx]

Hi
This post goes over some issues and ideas already discussed with David.

Pyramid Real Market Price Adjustments

At present TradeSim will look at a Pyramid re-entry based on the Trigger being met and will enter the next day at the EntryPrice criteria. IF the market does not trade at the price stipulated by the EntryPrice criteria then TradeSim will forcibly adjust the price to fall within the market price range of the entry day.

This seems to me a very dangerous approach since the software is adjusting the rules of the trade to generate the trade results. If you are not using market orders at a know price (such as the open or the Close) then you will presumably have coded a level where you want to enter the following day. It would seem to me that most users would want to either enter at the price determined by the system or not enter at all. Therefore including trades adjusted by TradeSim in the Trade Database (and there may be very many TradeSim adjusted trades that do not meet entry criteria if those criteria are very strict) completely invalidates the test in my opinion.

It would be useful if other users would post to agree or disagree with me on this.

Pyramid Entries & Re-Entries

This is a suggestion. At present the re-entry of a Pyramid trade is based on thr original Entry Trigger, ExitTrigger, EntryPrice and ExitPrice. It would be useful, much more flexible and user friendly if the Entries, triggers and exits for the Pyramid re-entries could be coded seperately.

I have in mind adding four new parameters to TradeSim - PyramidReEntryTrigger, PyramidReEntryPrice, PyramidReEntryExitTrigger, PyramidReEntryExitPrice into which you could code your entries exits and Triggers for pyramid entries above level zero in order to allow for systems that enter on one set of parameters, take additional positions on a second set of parameters and exit not necessarily at the same time as the original trade. I am not a programmer so I am basically trying to get the idea across.

Again user comments would be helpful in case I am misunderstanding functionality.

slipperx

[davidjc01]

I suggest a better way to do this is:

1. When the trade database is generated ALL possible trade entries are written into the database irrespective of their %InProfit etc. (Tradesim can do this already)

THEN

2. When the Trade Simulator is run a set of conditions be applied under Trade Parameters - Preferences so that Pyramids are only entered if certain conditions are met such as %InProfit of original or previous trade etc.

The problem with what you are suggesting Slipperx is that when the Trade Database is generated you will be eliminating trades based on your re-entry criteria... for example if you want to re-enter every time the position moves (say) 10% and the actual sequence of valid trades is: 0%, 5%, 10%, 11%, 15%, 20%, 22%, 24%, 27%, 30%, etc. you will only get the following trades written to the database: 0%, 10%, 20%, 30% etc.

When the trade database is produced it knows nothing about your available capital at the time of the trade. So when the simulator is run and it comes time to enter the first pyramid at 10% you may not have any cash available to take it, so the trade is skipped. But when a few periods later the 15% trade-entry comes up, you might indeed have the cash to take it. You will not be able to however if it was not written to the Trade Database in the first place.

Does that make sense?