QuoteOriginally posted by: WodenI hope it is okay if I post in here from time to time, if this is just a personal type of thread for you let me know and I'll just let you do your thing.I hope you will tell me I am a faggot and a retard, and have a worse haircut than Kyle Bass.25 years ago, I worked all day to find the bug in a program. Some people came into my office, and I told them them I can't find the bug, it is right around here. I pointed to the screen, and saw the bug.

In the same space of time, I also got the direction of bonds on Bernanke testimony right, and the direction of yen on Japan election right. But both of these I fumbled, even though I made money on the first move on the news. Both of these events were rare and had complex timing, so I was not ready with a mechanical routine to win or lose with. But I think I have developed the right sort of recipe for these sorts of situations. I actually had the right recipe last week, but I changed it to do something else which I also lacked at the time. And as usual, I spent a few days with random numbers in the arrays after forgetting to initialize them to zero when shifting in the race subloop, not just in the slow outside loop.

Shoot and miss. I really have no clue, and should leave it to the pros, when it comes to housing.

We have Euro flash PMI's coming up tomorrow. My methods are probably as bad at sentiment surveys as they are at housing. But who could endure a story about French sentiment if he didn't have a few dollars riding on it? Here is today's story that may contribute to the "whisper number" and dictate what type of result will be treated as a surprise by the market:QuoteFrench business confidence rose to the highest in 15 months in July, indicating that improving demand is helping to support an economy that's stagnated for the past two years.Sentiment among industrial executives increased to 95 in from 93 in June, national statistics office Insee in Paris said today. That's above the reading of 94 that was the median forecast of 21 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. A broader index including the services, wholesale and construction industries climbed to 87 from 86.The production outlook indicator climbed to minus 30 in July from minus 41 in June, according to today?s report from the statistics office.Surveys tomorrow may show that French manufacturing and services shrank at a slower pace in July. A factory index from Markit Economics Ltd. rose to 48.8 from 48.4 in June, according to the median of 18 estimates in a survey. A services gauge increased to 47.5 from 47.2, a separate poll showed.So we have a bunch of people in US and Japan buying the haute couture, but the French themselves cannot afford it. Owing to the repair bill on their old Citroen and no job.The stock market is up, exports are probably up, the taper and China/metal shocks are past. These executives are probably happy. Despite my calculations saying otherwise. I will probably be a little smarter than I was with the existing home sales, and let the PMI's go.

Here's how it is going to go down. They are looking for PMI improvement from France and Euro as a whole, but worse in Germany. After French business climate was up, and the French flash PMI comes in decent, they are going to move the whisper number up on Germany to maybe an improvement. At this point the risk will be to the downside, and I will go with my calculation and bet Germany stills comes in down. The euro will dip slightly, then the Euro overall flash will come in good, as expected.Germany flash PMI for July: Disappointing relative to unpublished whisper consensus.

Farmer, don't take this the wrong way. Are you still laying around in south Florida, drunk? Just get yourself a job, man!

QuoteOriginally posted by: OrbitFarmer, don't take this the wrong way. Are you still laying around in south Florida, drunk? Just get yourself a job, man!The only way to take it is that you are an idiot. Why would I get a job when I can dick around with economics all day?If you are recommending I imitate you, you are not doing much of a sales job. At least post some pictures that portray your recommendation as exciting.Seriously, if you can post one picture of your life that would make people want to listen to your recommendation, do so. If not, then quit whatever it is you are doing, because your sorry life blows.

But seriously Orbit, I have made money almost every month trading forex. It is much easier than working. And I would probably have made money every month if I didn't skew with big bets.Because you are stupid and have no idea what I mean, consider a gamble which makes 50% or loses 50% on every bet. 75% of the time you will be down after two bets: lose-lose = down 75%. win-lose and lose-win = down 25%.I think forex trading is easy. Given the runs I have had in the past year, I think that anyone who targeted normal returns, such as 15% a year, could make money.Consider that big trend traders make like 5% a year betting a billion dollars. If I take signals that are only a fraction as good as theirs, I can many times as much because I can enter instantly without moving the price at my size.I am not going to go through proving this to you. But if it is possible to make money with $1 billion, it is almost inevitable to make money with much less, using a very simple system.My main effort lately has been to try to automate the basic concepts I have been executing by hand. The key role that news trading plays in that, is to keep my mind in the market. Since it is much easier to get lazy, the more you turn over to a computer. I put my most important decision into an automated system a few weeks ago, and I was depressed for days with nothing to do.The computer has not made the money I can make using the same set of decisions. But the other goal is to eliminate the worst downside tail risk. And either the cost of that is not making money every day, or my system is just not doing it right. The system misses too many good trades, and make too many bad trades, in an effort to eliminate huge losses, and not miss huge gains.But as to whether it has achieved this goal, or is just flailing around, is a matter for thought. If I had not withdrawn half the money in the system account on the most volatile day of the past two months, which screwed up my half-assed position logic, the system would be about the same profit as trading by hand.Other than that, the system is a bit ahead of where it was a few months ago. And I have to remind myself of this on days when I get killed because of stupid programming errors.Unfortunately, volatility has died down a bit in the dog days of summer. It seems like a lot of the orders just aren't there. And so it is hard to draw sensible conclusions and make advancements out of the immediate market action. But it is still WAY more fun than working.

I first coded up the trading system linked at the bottom in a moment of inspiration a few months ago. Over the next few weeks, I added in a bunch of random crap I saw in the charts, just to see if it would make money.I waited every day for the random crap to lose money, so I could take it out. But it made money for the first month. Then in the second month, after I thought I had even improved it, it had a bad run and lost for days on end. I said it is finally time to take this random crap out, or maybe I can fix it.So I ran a simulation to see which of the random crap was losing money and when. In the simulation it made money. I traced the difference to 1) uninitialized variables in arrays which fucked up the euro worse than the yen, and 2) being in the euro when the yen made money and vice versa, purely at random based on my half-assed position-size system.If I have something that makes right predictions every month, why would I get a job? Withdrawals plus account balance in the system account are at least three or four times account balance at the time I put in the random crap.

Why would I get a job when I have predicted market direction on news 5 out of 6 times just since the start of this thread? And that is even taking a gamble on two items I don't even think I can predict. I am so right, I have rightness to spare. I have a glut.Today a guy offered me a job. The exact text of his email was as follows:Quote5:21 PM (3 hours ago) to meIf you do it I will pay you. He Felipe is eating from my plate so I would like to fix this if you can name your price.This is a guy who just paid $300,000 for a car. As my friend said, whatever I ask him he will pay it, he has money to spare.I told him I would fix his problem at no charge. Maybe I am just a depressed person, Orbit. But if I had your life, I would kill myself.Here is a funny exchange I had a few weeks ago:QuoteJun 24 to meok bro, and how much will you charge for that customization?QuoteJun 24 to Rizmartoo much.QuoteJul 14 (9 days ago) to mehello brother, i just got they devices, so let me know if you can do the customization, or in other case i have to take another SBO solution from one other guy.QuoteJul 15 (8 days ago) to RizmarThe other guy is probably cheaper;.Work is for jerks.

QuoteOriginally posted by: farmerI will go with my calculation and bet Germany stills comes in down.Shoot, hit self, and go to hospital. I would have lost less if I at least had the time right. This stuff always comes in a 28 and 58, and don't know where the 30 and 00 stuff keeps coming from.But anyway, I have some ideas about this one, and I think I may actually get it right next time.

QuoteOriginally posted by: OrbitAre you still laying around in south Florida, drunk?It's a tragedy, I lost my taste for liquor about a year ago. For a while I tried changing brands and products. But it was still not yummy. Even after that, I kept going to the liquor store every day out of force of habit. Every day I would try to remind myself don't go to the liquor store tomorrow, this stuff is yucky. But the next day I would forget, and go to the liquor store.I just about had to tattoo it on my hand after so many years, but I eventually started remembering and not going. So I have had 32 ounces of beer in the last five months. It still works though. The last 16 ounces gave me a flash of brilliance where I told some girl to fuck off. But I won't force myself to drink, it is too yucky.I stopped drinking caffeine also, about three weeks ago. I still like it, but I stopped because it seemed like it might be stressing my blood pipes.

Shoot and... I was wrong about IFO, and made a few pips anyway. After French climate and euro PMI's came in huge, who is not going to be looking for a big number from IFO? That sounds like an overly simple pattern, but being contrarian would have made you money today.Though it could have been the money supply reported at the same time. Money supply is something my tools are actually designed to predict, which has at best a thin correlation to sentiment. But nobody else seems to care about money supply, which is perhaps why it seems to work well.

Japan June industrial production: above consensusJapan July PMI manufacturing: below consensusJapan July PMI composite: below consensusUnlike those last two (Germany PMI flash and US existing home sales), I am hoping to go three for three on these. -----------------------------------------US Q2 GDP: upside surpriseADP employment: consensus to slight upside surpriseBLS NFP: consensus to upside surprise-----------------------------------------EMU EC July economic sentiment: Anybody have a consensus on this? I am sure they are looking for continued uptrend, but how much?Germany June retail sales: Old interval, anybody have a consensus on this?Germany July CPI: Probably weak, but market won't react. Draghi is already accommodative for extended period. ------------------------------------------I will be short dollars for FOMC stuff. Data will continue to support September taper hypothesis. And bonds are already up a bit in anticipation of Bernanke. But I think, after preparing the market for taper, Bernanke will go back to treading softly with an eye on interest-rate stability.If I don't make money this week with all this news, I should probably... try harder. If I lose big, the culprit will probably be some crazy reaction to some random word uttered by Bernanke, followed by a retracement. On the upside, Bernanke could say "December" and somebody's algorithm will ring my cash register.

Actually, fuck it. NFP will come within 10,000 of expectations, Bernanke and Draghi will give identical forward guidance to last time, everything else will be mush. I need a goddamn crash to make some money. Either that or an aggressive countertrend system.I'm not going to get a crash, so where can I find a boom? US equities go parabolic? Some country with 10% stock margins?