Trading results and conclusions 2017
Hi there. I want to show you my trading
results for this year and tell about experience which I received. There is a
saying: The cobbler always wears the worst shoes. In our business there is a lot of mistrust to all who teach others
how to trade. Because we don't know exactly is this person really has success
in trading or just talk about. (see full video here:
https://youtu.be/n-nzeHBnN20)
I was trading on real
account on Russian market (MICEX exchange) during 9 months and right now I will
show results and conclusions which I did during this period. This is my equity
curve. As you can see I started with small sum about 300 000 rubles (equivalent
5200 USD) and during this year I invested once more than 700 000 rubles ( about
12100 USD) on this account. So my total investment was one million and sixteen thousand rubles. It
was about sixteen thousand three hundred dollars.
I chose MICEX Exchange for several reasons. Firstly this is
real exchange, not a FOREX or CFD or something else. I can see my orders in Order Flow and I don't trade against my
broker. Secondly futures here have very small initial margin so I can trade
a lot of instruments in the same time.
I invested not so big sum and it was experimental account so
for me more important was final result in percent and approving of my ideas. I
traded mostly futures and options and rarely stocks. I used about 5 - 7
strategies in the same time and bet with a little size. And I like what I
received because it was corresponded with my theory.
First of all I received very smooth curve without big
drawdown. It's not the biggest profit
which I received, nevertheless I think
this is the best result which I have
ever had. I had much bigger profit in money and much bigger profit in
percent. But I have never had so
consistent result.
Every month I had profit. Average profit was about 4-5%. At
times I had profit about 7-10% per month
sometimes about zero. But in general I received 373 000 rubles (it’s about six thousand
and four hundred dollars) or 37 % per 9 months or fifty three percent for the
year.
Let’s check more in detail how I did it. If we check my
performance report I have one-third more profitable positions than unprofitable
ones. But my average profit trade is too small about two hundred and fifty
rubles (it's about four dollars) and my loss is two hundred and ninety rubles
or five dollars. I did a lot of trades about ten thousand. Because I know that
only on big figures we can receive true result.
My biggest drawdown was 13 416 rubles (it's about
250 USD) but it was part of my delta hedge in my option strategy. The biggest
true drawdown was 7711 rubles (about one 130 dollars). The biggest profit was a bit less: 6328 RUB (about 110 USD).
But usually my profits and my losses were much less. Now it
looks unbelievable that I had average profit 4 dollars but eventually I made
6.4 thousand of profit. But answer is
about 10 000 trades during about 150 working days (I didn't trade every days).
When I trade it was about 50-100 trades per day.
I used scalping strategies, intraday position holding
strategies. I traded several instruments in the same time. And in one of them I
hold position during several seconds in another I was in position all day. I
used diversification and my bets were small.
What I found out during this period? First one there is not
any "the best strategy" (holy grail) which you could use everywhere.
Every instrument has own character expressed in volatility, reaction on news,
correlation with others similar and so on. What can be work good for one
instrument might be not useful for
another one.
The second one - timing has very big influence. Input in
trade before fast movement - this is real mastery. And vice versa to be in
position before balance or whipsaw it's bigger risk to receive stop loss, you
hold your initial margin, you can't trade other possibilities on this
instrument and pay a lot of your attention sometimes without any result.
And the last one but the most important it's using of your
money management. Usually traders don't account power of compound interest and
power of big drawdown, and possibilities of big series of unsuccessful trades.
And also in this case usually people underestimate the impact of psychology.
But impact and pressing yours profits and losses on yourself could be very big.
What else? You should have a rational expectation from your
trades and you should be in agreement
with it. And better to undervalue your skills than overestimate them. We often
do unreasonable actions and should understand that we sometimes can't control
ourself. It too difficult and sometimes useless to fight with our emotions so
we should accept them and to make an amendment about them in the future.
I wish you good health (this is the most important), good
profits, and be more happy!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
