Stopping Daytrading

Well, that didn't last long. I think it is definitely possible to make money using this daytrading method, but it is definitely not for me. The problem is that though entry to positions is "automated" the exit is discretionary. If you say it is the end of the session, then you can't do it exactly at the end  -say at 4:30pm for the ASX200 futures. So, do you do it at 4:00 pm? 4:10pm? 4:30pm?, 5:10pm? or what? There is a temptation to hang on for the price to improve. And I seem to have a strong self-destructive tendency, which I need to control with rules based trading.

Long Only Bitcoin Trading

I continue to struggle psychologically with shorting Bitcoin futures and as a result make mistakes and lose money. So, I investigated how taking only the long trades would perform. If the "model" says to short Bitcoin, we close the long and stay out of the market. This is equivalent to being always long 1 unit of Bitcoin and going long or short one unit in addition.

Statistics since March 2018 for long trades only are very similar to the statistics for all trades. But because you are in the market only half the time, total returns will be lower. Since the beginning of 2019 total returns have been the same - short trades have added nothing to returns. Winning long trades outnumber losing long trades 10 to 6. Losing short trades outnumbered winning short trades 10 to 5.

So, I think that in the interim I will only take long trades in Bitcoin.

Note that in the last 10 months of 2018, long only trades gained a total of 18% while Bitcoin lost 65%. So, taking long only trades doesn't mean losing if Bitcoin returns to a bear market.

Trading Account Equity Curves

Thought I'd just post the "equity curves" from our three trading accounts. Moominpapa:

There is trading in the first half of last year and then in this year. In between, I didn't trade in this account for tax reasons and then because I wasn't trading over the Australian summer.

Here is Moominmama's account (which I trade too):

There is trading in the second half of last year instead. Most of the recent moves in this account and Bitcoin long trades. The short trades are in Moominpapa's account.

Plus 500 CFD account:

This is mostly long Bitcoin trades. As it is expensive to trade in this account I use it for hedging Bitcoin positions over the weekend and for experimental trades at a smaller scale than I can do with futures contracts.

Generally, the curves show a two steps forward one step back pattern. Hopefully, we can recover from the recent drawdown soon.