Background to the tool
The tool was built out of frustration. Having traded for many years with a reasonable level of success I was always frustrated that my trading never went up a level. The world of trading is filled with people having so much more success than me and this level of FOMO really bothered me and resulted in inconsistency and countless hours sitting in front of a screen, hoping for the best. I also became a little bit of an indicator junkie - was there a holy grail indicator out there for me? I always felt that as a retail trader I was behind the curve. I started to investigate how the major market participants trade and make money and I was astounded at the level of success that they get from creating strategies and sticking to it. The market is driven largely by a "black boxes" which, for us retail traders are outside of our ability to access. I wanted to build a tool that could give me a traders edge.
Another factor that has always bothered me was when reading investing books there is a general assumption that a standard entry, say 8/13 cross over, works on all stocks. However, it is not the case and it can be frustrating for a trader using a set up and not realizing that the set up was/is the problem, not the trader. This realization alone has made a huge impact on my trading. The big boxes that control the market know this already.
Also, a lot of indicators that are available don’t take advantage of the backtesting capability provided in Tradingview. It is fairly simple to find 8-9 trades where a set up worked and then fall into the trade of assuming that it cannot fail. Knowing which set ups work and how frequently it will print will change the way that you trade.
The goal with the tool is to identify setups that have worked in the past with a high degree of profitability, high profit factor and low drawdown and using the planning tool allows you to customize the setup to find exactly what you are looking for across any tradeable asset on TradingView.
Over the past 20 years I have realized the following:
1) Not all entries and signals work the same on all stocks and knowing the historical performance of a strategy is critical
2) Not having a plan in advance lowers your probability of success
3) Developing consistency in analysis is critical
4) Developing confidence in your own plan is more important than whose trades you try to copy
5) Having 30 indicators does not help you trade better - it leads to more frustration
So here is the product of these realisations:
1) The tool looks across the most common entry strategies (RMA / EMA / SMA / HMA / WMA cross on 5 dimensions of type and 5 common crossovers) and can be used on 19 different time frames giving you guidance on what the best set up is for the stock you are analysing
2) It incorporates volatility into the strategy – when stocks are trading outside of a predetermined volatility band, a trade will not be entered. This accommodates traders who tend to get shaken out of trades too early.
3) It looks at the impact of “buying the dip” – often a common strategy employed by many traders which now can be backtested and reviewed to see if it actually helped or hindered the trade.
4) It measures your trade plan against your R – what you are willing to risk – and calculates your target profit based on your R multiple
5) It provides a non repaint signal on your base strategy and provides you with signals to trade smaller or shorter signals within the bigger strategy.
6) This includes elements from the Squeeze Tool namely the histogram and. stochastic entry and exit criteria
There are some additional visual tools:
• Squeeze signals - I am a big fan of the TTM squeeze however the Squeeze by itself can be hard to trade. Seeing a squeeze fire long on a chart can add to trade confidence.
• Seeing zones of support and resistance rather than single lines can also give you some leeway in terms of not getting pushed out of a trade too soon.
The backtester is always reviewed on a 2 to 3 year period to get an understanding of win rate %, profit ratio and average duration of trade. As an option trader knowing that a high probability move is playing out allows me to make sure that I don’t undercut the time frame for the expiration of the option relative to the historical average duration of a trade. Backtesting on shorter times is unrealistic.
Key benefits
1) It will save you a ton of time. I don’t have to sit in front of a screen watching ticks each day. I can plan for an entry, set an alert for a trade and when the conditions are met the TradingView system sends me a message and I will go and confirm a trade, execute it, set my alerts for control and move on with my life.
2) It allows me to review trade ideas in a consistent manner using the best trade plan and set up for a stock.
3) It forces me to be patient and not panic (always a good thing). With an adjustable volatility feature I can modify the volatility band in the trade plan to accommodate choppy market conditions.
4) It looks at both sides of the market (long and short) and you can calculate the impact of being market neutral or having a directional bias.
I hope this tool helps you to achieve some degree of peace in your trading.
To get access to the tool, please contact the author.