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Fair price for ATS


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Fair price for ATS

  #41 (permalink)
 
mattz's Avatar
 mattz   is a Vendor
 
Posts: 2,493 since Sep 2010
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Thanks Received: 3,789

Zoetheus, I want to give you useful info about the retail traders: Most will pay $150-$200 per subscription for the month, and many will even pay that per lot of subscription. Small percentage will pay one a one time fee of $1500-$2500 if the account if large enough ($25K and up). Sharing profits with the vendor is out of the question if soliciting retail accounts, as that would require licensing.

Allow me to share some input that you and your vendor might find useful.

1) The "code" could not be given out to the public, and allow them to trade that on their own. If the system is any good, traders will pile up lots, and that in it self will cause slippage for and deteriorate the returns of the system. So if there is a broker trading this, he/she must be conscious of the number of lots any one trader is given and that info has to be know to him.

2) You must look at the drawdown of any given system, Double it! and ask for an appropriate account size.
Systems sooner or later go through a draw down, and if the customer is not being explained on that, sooner than later, will pull his subscription out. My suggestions: ask for bigger account sizes that trade less lots, this potentially will minimize the risk. Small accounts can't survive most systems.

3) If the system is executed in the hands of a broker or a vendor, how is it being executed? what process is taken place to come as close as possible to the hypothetical/real results for the customers that will come on board? How is the low latency execution will be done?

4) Something I have learned the hardway: Did the vendor program it himself or did he come up with the concept and someone else has programmed it? This is SO critical. The vendor will have to give support on the program that it is running on. For me, if the Vendor wrote the code it's a huge plus, and any potential problems he would be able to support.

I think the data you are gathering is an excellent idea! This shows that you want to help the vendor and the people make the right decision.

Many traders are against automated trading, and I understand the passion of being in control, getting educated and the challenge. But in reality, many traders lose. Automation allows for discipline: automation does not change the number of lots on perception, it takes losses and it takes its profits. I have seen systems that have been trading for years without one single line of code changing.

I hope this will be useful and may many gather info like you do before they release anything out.

Trading futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. You may lose more than your initial investment. All posts are opinions and do not claim to be facts. Please conduct your own due diligence. Use only Risk capital when trading Futures.
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  #42 (permalink)
 Zoethecus 
United States of America
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: NT
Posts: 1,145 since Aug 2009


Dragon View Post
I am with Mike on this one. I pay nothing until the vendor proves himself.

Lately I have wondered whether there are new vendors emerging after hacking through Aardvark or Hurley here on futures.io (formerly BMT) and claiming that work as their own (strats of which were never meant to be traded as is). Before we know it, it shows up all over Collective2 and people are buying into it based solely off one equity curve. Wait...
That's what we are all getting asked to do here right?

Well I guess I still better answer the question. What is the going rate for an investment manager? 2 or 3% of profits? If you are good enough then you could even charge .5% of profits because everyone would want you to trade their money.

Dragon, thanks for your reply.

A typical hedge fund recieves a 2% fee of assets under management and 20% of the net profits.

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  #43 (permalink)
 zikonc 
san ramon
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: ninja
Broker: zen
Trading: es, 6e
Posts: 136 since Oct 2009
Thanks Given: 98
Thanks Received: 76


8500-5*135(+/-)=7825/9months=870/mo profit, so you have to trade some serious contracts to make money. To risk 10 contracts I would not ever pay him %, maybe 50-100/month after I review his statement and match it with the backtest results. What is the likelihood of that scenario?

I still have to understand why would I sell something that makes me money. On the other hand, I would sell something to make money. Said that, I would pay him 0 based on the info you provided. I hope this helps.

z

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  #44 (permalink)
 
mattz's Avatar
 mattz   is a Vendor
 
Posts: 2,493 since Sep 2010
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Zoethecus View Post

A typical hedge fund recieves a 2% fee of assets under management and 20% of the net profits.

I have dealt with hedge funds that will pull the plug on 20% drawdown from any new equity high.
This hard to achieve with automated programming done by most retail programmers/traders.

Trading futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. You may lose more than your initial investment. All posts are opinions and do not claim to be facts. Please conduct your own due diligence. Use only Risk capital when trading Futures.
1 800 771 6748 local 561 367 8686 email [email protected]
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  #45 (permalink)
 
nanobiotech's Avatar
 nanobiotech 
Brisbane, Australia
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader
Broker: Mirus/Zen-Fire
Trading: CL
Posts: 670 since Jun 2009
Thanks Given: 134
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Dragon View Post
Lately I have wondered whether there are new vendors emerging after hacking through Aardvark or Hurley here on futures.io (formerly BMT) and claiming that work as their own (strats of which were never meant to be traded as is). Before we know it, it shows up all over Collective2 and people are buying into it based solely off one equity curve. Wait...
That's what we are all getting asked to do here right?

Interesting point Dragon and I would not be surprised given the number of commercial ATS' out there, many of which are less than ethical at the least, so plagiarism is probably rampant. I say good luck to them as if I find any useful code I may use it too. My experience with Hurley & Aardvark has been a learning one. One of the things that is obvious to me now from these threads and my own observations going back more than 15 years now is that people are very keen to invest time & $$$ on trading systems that promise more $$$ than the investment (who here hasn't done that - indicators, trading software such as Elliot Wave a few years back, etc etc) and give up after struggling to correctly understand the system or discovering that is simply doesn't work ... in their hands.

As that great sci-fi show promised "the truth is out there" and while this may be true for ATMs (someone has to be making a killing with an ATM somewhere - without sharing it) the real truth is within each of us - we just have to individually discover "what works for me". For many of us this is discretionary trading futures or Forex, for others it is trading shares or options and yet others it is an ATM, each applied using your own rules that are proprietary to you.

I have lost track of the number of times I have read about a trader who is clearly very successful and yet many and probably most others who try to use their system fail. For example I subscribe to a share trading newsletter and by following it I quadrupled my $30k starting nest egg in 3 years applying my own interpretative rules to the newsletter advice, which to me seemed totally logical. However I note from the published annual newsletter report cards many people who subscribed to the newsletter failed to be successful even though they received the exact same advice as me. Therefore there is always an "X-Factor" in trading.

Perhaps the point I'm trying to make is that any ATS also requires an X-Factor in the head of the user to be successful - some intuitive function (preferred timeframe, number of cars, variable settings etc) unique to that user that makes the difference between being a winner or a loser. Loading and forgetting is definitely not the X-Factor.

Nano

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  #46 (permalink)
 David 
UK
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader
Trading: Futures
Posts: 88 since Jun 2009
Thanks Given: 35
Thanks Received: 84

It never fails to surprise me that so many people take the view that an "ATS can never work", or that they fail over time.

This is so wrong!

TBH I am particularly surprised that Big Mike takes his view about automated systems. He must have been barking up the wrong tree in his endeavours.

I personally know of a commercially available, but not well known, ATS based on NinjaTrader that is consistently profitable, is almost completely "set and forget" as it has very few parameters to tweak and as it trades around the natural tendencies of the market, is not prone to diminishing performance over time.

This is mainly because it does not use any indicators at all, but has a lot of internal logic to make trade decisions. BTW I am not saying anything more about what the system is or where to get it.

I am working on my own ATS and am close to finishing it. It has taken me months of work - thousands of hours, probably - but it seems solid now, though I worry that NT might not be the best platform for it (time will tell).

It is a set and forget system and this is what has been the challenge. The system has to deal with all market conditions without user intervention or parameter tweaking. Implementing this has been extremely challenging - in fact I think this is pretty much the most difficult software project I have undertaken, and I have many years of commercial programming experience with blue chip and Government clients.

Would I sell licences for this ATS, assuming that it actually works under live conditions? Almost certainly not, and if I did, I would charge $1000s per month for the licence as it would actually be worth that.

Having said that, I have two very good friends who are multi millionaires and are very senior and experienced in capital markets and both have expresssed a desire to give some me funds to manage with the ATS. They have great contacts so fund management could be a possibility, assuming that the transition to live goes smoothly. The ATS should work with any liquid future, by the way.

Another friend is the best programmer I've ever come across. He develeoped a HFT system for a major bank that made £500,000 profit a day! He has spent a year developing another HFT system for a fund that is finally live and most importantly, finally profitable.

So automated trading systems are possible, profitable and do work over time, even based on NT. They are far from easy to develop though if you want to avoid curve fitting and guarantee longevity.

To answer the question about an ATS being detrimental to the love of trading from my point of view:

I personally do not love trading, even though I find it quite enjoyable when I manually trade the signals that the ATS uses, to test the veracity of the system.

I have decided that I am not a good discretionary trader, but want to benefit financially from the opportunities in the markets.

This is why I have invested so much time in developing an ATS .I have enjoyed (mostly) the technical challenge and really deeply want the controlled risk/rewards and discipline that the ATS brings. I just don't trust myself to follow my own rules day in and day out and I also don't want to be tied to the screen for hours on end.

In effect, I am using my programming expertise, and interest in trading, to overcome my failings as a discretionary trader, but that is fine by me!

David

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  #47 (permalink)
 
mattz's Avatar
 mattz   is a Vendor
 
Posts: 2,493 since Sep 2010
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David, thank you for infusing such a positive spirit about automated trading.

In my honest opinion, it also takes lots of discipline to tun your own systems on without jumping in, second guessing and letting the machine do their own thing. The benefits could be incredible, from trading a consistent number of lots to no revenge trading of "have to make my money back". I also believe that many trader could automate their trading with simple price action, using the NinjaTrader features (NinjaTrader--Tools--New NinjaScript--Strategy)

I am not saying that all methodologies could be automated, but if one can, he /she should try.


As for outside vendors:
The challenge of course is always to over come the "why is it sold?", and to that I have a few answers:
Some developers while have the ability to develop systems, don't have the ability to follow their own systems.
Like I said, it takes nerves of steel to follow...even your own system.
Not all system developers have the capital to trade the system they develop, like your friend who made $500K a day in HFT, I doubt he has the capital himself to make such profits, never the less, a talent.

I hope that those of us who do have a a passion for it, could help each others in this department.
From exploring the automation in NinjaTrader and MultiCharts to evaluating what vendors offer.

Trading futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. You may lose more than your initial investment. All posts are opinions and do not claim to be facts. Please conduct your own due diligence. Use only Risk capital when trading Futures.
1 800 771 6748 local 561 367 8686 email [email protected]
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  #48 (permalink)
 Zoethecus 
United States of America
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: NT
Posts: 1,145 since Aug 2009

Folks, please try to stay on topic. The purpose of this thread is not to debate the pros and cons of ATS, but rather to express an unbiased opinion of what the ATS in the OP is worth on a monthly susbscription basis.

Thank you for your cooperation and participation.

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  #49 (permalink)
 David 
UK
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader
Trading: Futures
Posts: 88 since Jun 2009
Thanks Given: 35
Thanks Received: 84

Sorry, Zoe, I did not want to take this thread off topic. I'll just post two very quick replies to the points that Mattz made and then I'll shut up


Quoting 
In my honest opinion, it also takes lots of discipline to tun your own systems on without jumping in, second guessing and letting the machine do their own thing.

Yes, you have to have real faith in the ATS, just as you need real confidence in your own abilities as a discretionary trader.


Quoting 
like your friend who made $500K a day in HFT, I doubt he has the capital himself to make such profits, never the less, a talent.

It wasn't his money, as he worked for one of the UK's biggest banks


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  #50 (permalink)
 eensor 
New Braunfels, TX
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader
Broker: Zen-Fire
Trading: futures
Posts: 129 since Aug 2009
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Zoethecus View Post
I'm in the midst of trying a vendor's ATS product. I am going to withhold his name until this little project is over.

I have optimized the results strictly using MM because I don't have access to the indicators, so this is best one could hope for trading this. (The results using the vendor's default setting were approximately $1500 less.) This is a time bar based ATS, so the results were achievable. In addition, I have observed the ATS live and the performance backtests accurately. The posted results are for one contract. Be sure to consider the cost of commission (which I didn't include) in your analysis.

What I'm looking for from the community is an answer to this: On a monthly basis, what would you be willing to pay for this ATS, if you were interested in this sort of thing. It doesn't matter if you'd never purchase an ATS--you can still give your opinion as if you were interested. After I compile your responses--and please be serious--I will post the actual price and the vendor's name.

I am doing this because I often think there is a disconnect between what a vendor thinks his product is worth and what the market will bear. Products like this are easier to evaluate because they can produce real results and profits. It's not totally nebulous or a major leap of faith by the buyer if they believe the performance can continue in a like fashion as the past.

Be advised that I have no interest, nor affiliation with this vendor or his product. In no way is this an endorsement of the vendor.

Thanks for your participation and time.

Post script: If I determine in my sole discretion there isn't enough feedback to make this meaningful to the community, I will not disclose the vendor or his subscription price.

900/contract per month = 99/month.

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Last Updated on October 21, 2010


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