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I intend to take a TopStepTrader combine, but I think it's only prudent if I could first pass my personal combine, so I've decided to start one next week.
I use SierraChart with CTS datafeed. I'll post my chart and my trading stats after each trading day. At the end of every week, I'll post a combined trading stats for the week.
For money management I'll follow these simple rules:
1. daily loss limit $500 per contract;
2. weekly loss limit $3000;
3. maximum Drawdown is $4500;
4. if Profit < $2000, trading size is 2 contracts;
5. if $2000< Profit < $4000, trading size is 4;
6. if profit >=$4000, trading size is 6;
I'm hoping to find out about my risk tolerance and profit potential through this personal combine, to help me determine which one to take when doing the real thing.
my trading product is GC, and my trading method is completely discretionary. basically I buy when I feel that the market is going up, and vice versa for sell.
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I like your idea of running a test Combine before the real thing, after all, why pay for it, if you have no chance of passing? Not to mention getting to know the platform is also a good thing.
But I am not sure which Combine you want to try eventually? Your Daily Loss Limit and number of contacts indicate one of the smaller ones, but your max. DD says otherwise. You also forgot to set a profit target.
So my advice is, set the parameters like in the desired Combine, and go accordingly. There is really no point in making them much stricter than they already are. The DLL sounds too small. And I hope you are not planning to hit the DLL 5 days in a row, so there is no point in setting a weekly loss limit that high. (and there is no weekly loss limit in the Combine anyway)
I think you should aim for the 50K Combine 10 days or 20 days it is up to you, but since you are using probably the 2 weeks trial version of T4, the 10 days is more logical. So I would set the parameters for that one....
Also you might want to tweak your trading system according to the special Combine rules...
Hello Pedro40, there is indeed no weekly loss limit for combines, thank you for pointing that out.
so here is my new revised money management rules:
1. daily loss limit $500 per contract;
3. maximum Drawdown is $4500;
4. if Profit < $2000, trading size is 2 contracts;
5. if $2000< Profit < $4000, trading size is 4;
6. if profit > $4000, trading size is 6;
I haven't decided which combine to take yet, I'm using this personal combine to find out. I limit my trading size for two purposes:
1. I don't want to suffer too much slippage. I've noticed in GC, the last trade size is seldom larger than 4, that means even institutional traders and algos are trading with less than 4 contracts for every single trade. of course they trade all day long, and usually accumulate much larger positions by the end of their trading. but still, the point remains. personally I think for individual traders like me it's best to trade with just 1 contract and scale in to get bigger, but I haven't been able to develop a successful method for scaling in.
2. I want to keep my choices open, so that if at the end of this test I found out that I couldn't make enough profit for larger combines, I could still try smaller ones.
1. You still don't have a profit target. Without it, how would you know if you made the Combine at the end or not? So set one. But to set the profit target, you kind of have to know which Combine you are aiming for. Also, if you hit your profit target rather early, you can take it easy and just cruise for the rest, not risking much for no good reason...
2. The difference between your DLL and the max. DD is too big. There is no Combine where the max. DD is bigger than twice the DLL, so either your DLL should be at least 2K or your max DD not more than 1-1.5K. There is a logic in this. If you hit too many times close to the DLL, even if you don't hit the max. DD, your winning day% is going to be most likely less than 50%, thus you won't pass. So there is no point in having a large max. DD with a small DLL....
So since you are not planning to use more than 4-6 cars, as I said, try to mimic the 50K/10days Combine. The max. number of contracts there is 5, profit target is 3.5K, max. DD is 2K, DLL is 1K.
Also, there are 2 set of rules in the Combine, one for getting funded and a little bit less strict ones for getting a refund.
Hello Sayounara, this might be off topic. But I cannot help noticing you user name is in Japanese, and Yokohama is a city in Japan. However your profile says South Korea.
1. You still don't have a profit target. Without it, how would you know if you made the Combine at the end or not? So set one. But to set the profit target, you kind of have to know which Combine you are aiming for. Also, if you hit your profit target rather early, you can take it easy and just cruise for the rest, not risking much for no good reason...
I don't set a profit target for 2 reasons:
1. I want to see what the market gives me each day instead of setting a fixed profit amount;
2. I'm not going to take it easy even if I hit profit target for the largest combine, after all, my goal is to become a consistent winner, passing a combine is only of secondary consideration.
2. The difference between your DLL and the max. DD is too big. There is no Combine where the max. DD is bigger than twice the DLL, so either your DLL should be at least 2K or your max DD not more than 1-1.5K. There is a logic in this. If you hit too many times close to the DLL, even if you don't hit the max. DD, your winning day% is going to be most likely less than 50%, thus you won't pass. So there is no point in having a large max. DD with a small DLL....
$500 is my DLL per contract, and the $4500 DD is my worst case max drawdown. I start with 2 contracts, so my initial DLL is $1000. it's indeed less than 1/4 of my max DD, because I want to survive and keep trading even if I would have 3 losing days in a row. the only thing I can do about my winning day % is to take only high probability trades and try to have no losing days at all https://futures.io/images/smilies/ammo/sarcastic.gif
So since you are not planning to use more than 4-6 cars, as I said, try to mimic the 50K/10days Combine. The max. number of contracts there is 5, profit target is 3.5K, max. DD is 2K, DLL is 1K.
thanks for the suggestion. the purpose of this test combine is to find out about my profit potential and risk tolerance by trading. if this test goes well, I'll decide which combine to take according to my test result.
Also, there are 2 set of rules in the Combine, one for getting funded and a little bit less strict ones for getting a refund.
