Thread: Ex Insti Trader... AMA

Stuff alphaviech. Thank you for sharing

Originally Posted by ;

quote I think you misunderstood me. What I was asking is the chances. Do you think the chances of being profitable in intraday trading for retail traders are higher or lower against say, someone ready to hold their rankings over longer timeframes? Could you explain a bit more why? According to what you've shared, I am guessing that the answer is lesser chances. Thanks.

Ah yeah sorry I misunderstood the question.
Yes I perosnally think its tougher to trade profitable intraday than it would be to trade long term.
Two reasons
a) I find it more challenging to predict short term market moves
b) If you daytrade the costs you incur through spreads and comission can be very important whereas they dont really matter if you trade long term. Consider it this way should you buy 1 pip at comission/spread and have a 20 pips goal / 10 pips SL or cover the Identical comission and have a 500 pips target/250 pips SL afterward you can Eliminate money in the initial scenario and make money in the next scenario Though You've Got the Exact Same risk reward and get the Exact Same percentage of trades directly

Many thanks dear Alphaviech, I think that this topic was missing from the forum. Actually, a number of my queries were answered over and much more cheap questions are still tickling my mindI was wondering if you could clarify more.

1- Are banks and big gamers always profitable or they also can face trouble for bad decisions?
Two - when a big movement is running, do banks are making this or some stronger of them are behaving? . . .in reality, I wish to know whether all of them have the identical idea about the trend management or probably various other banks are fighting with them?
3- why sometimes we see big movements in days which there is no powerful news, how they opt to transfer the market in a specific direction?
4- It has been always a big issue for me if banks understand the news before discharge or not? If yes, how? (everybody has seen that sometimes markets have big movements (1-2 minutes ) before launch )

Many thanks in advance

Originally Posted by ;

Many thanks dear Alphaviech, I think that this topic was lacking in the forum. Actually, many of my questions were answered over and more cheap questions remain tickling my thoughts I was wondering if you could clarify more. 1- Are banks and big players always profitable or sometimes they also can face trouble for bad decisions? 2- if a huge movement is operating, do all banks are making this or a few more powerful of them are acting? . . .in fact, I want to know if all of them have the same idea about the trend direction or likely...

1) Haha hell no! I believe nobody that is always right would be stupid enough to work for a bank. But you have to distinguish between carrying prop positions and between handling the flow. Notably in G10 Flow trading is automated to a large amount and also a lot of the trading decisions are more about how you set your system than anything else. Client flows are warehoused and examined to see who could be hedged comfortably in a profit and who you have to be careful with. But of course you can be on the wrong side of matters.
Two ) As stupid as this sounds the Fx Market isn't really big as such a big share is controlled by relativley few banks. I mean if you work at Citi you can view 10 percent or whatever it's nowadays of all the fx transactions. So if you work at one of those banks you automatically receive a good idea of what the general flow looks like. And because all the big banks have the exact same or at least similar customers its just natural they will come to the same conclusion of that direction the interest will be...
3) Again its not like you simply go in the morning flip a coin and say okay lets market a few euros. A lot of these moves dont make any sense even if you sit at a massive bank and I think that the size of position banks take nowadays on Position desks are much much smaller than many retail traders would believe. Its more about the flow becoming one sided on these days and banks using that.
4) I've never been in a situation in which that was true but I suppose UK news was leaked before. But to banks or funds or other players who understands.

Originally Posted by ;

quote 1) Haha hell no! I think nobody that's always right could be stupid enough to work for a bank. But you have to distinguish between carrying prop positions and between managing the flow. Notably in G10 Flow trading is automated to a large amount and a lot of the trading decisions are more about how you set your platform than anything else. Customer flows are warehoused and examined to find out who could be hedged comfortably at a profit and that you have to be careful with. However, of course you can be on the wrong side of things. 2) As stupid...

Many thanks dear buddy

Originally Posted by ;

quote Discover what works for you and dont try to copy somebody elses egy. I'm convinced that not everybody could be profitable at trading because I believe there is a very unnatural idea process necessary in order to make money.

Hi alphaviech,
An excellent thread.
I'm particularly interested (and agree) on your announcement that profitable trading perhaps requires an unnatural idea process. Could you elaborate on which you see that as being?
Many thanks

subs. Thank you and
Regards

Great idea Alpha.

1) Hedging delta is theoretically a continual process but my understanding is that in practice it is done with discretion in balls. How did you handle it to the desk on a daily basis?
Two ) did you have any rough and ready methods for pricing up alternatives without going through the whole mathematical model?
Two ) The move to automation is winding its way around every dept. Just how long do you reckon until place desks are totally automated?

Thanks fella love it

Hi Alpha,

1. Where would you get fundamental news from? Would you recommend some good sources?
2. If fundamentals are more important, why is Currency Market trading now replaced by hft market manufacturers? Are the algos proficient at assessing news today or do they simply use customer order publiions for longer term prediction.
3. You said you are hold spot positions for months. The exchange rates in a lot of brokers are far worse than if you exchanged utilizing ccy futures. Have you got a good broker who supplied you great rates?
4. Why do you need to start a new career from scratch if you're able to trade well? Why don't you continue being a private full time trader? Are you able to share why you do not do trading anymore as it's a dream occupation for so many.

Thank you so much for sharing.

Hi Alphaviech,

I'd love to thank you that the fantastic thread you started.

All of the top,

Cheers