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Order Flow Analytics' D.B. Vaello (President) - Ask Me Anything (AMA)


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Order Flow Analytics' D.B. Vaello (President) - Ask Me Anything (AMA)

  #1 (permalink)
 
Big Mike's Avatar
 Big Mike 
Manta, Ecuador
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D.B. Vaello, the President of Order Flow Analytics, will be monitoring this thread so that he may answer any questions that you post here relating to OFA products and services.

Please keep in mind that some customer service/technical support issues are best handled through proper channels at OFA.

OFA (Order Flow Analytics) is well known for their unique approach to order flow concepts, including Order Flow Exhaustion & Momentum Analysis, Volume Cluster Analysis, Stop-Run Analysis, Trader Commitment Analysis, and Volume-Based Pivots & Range Analysis.

In addition to this thread, I will also be asking D.B. Vaello to stop by on occasion for a casual webinar where he can answer questions via audio while also sharing his screen to visually demonstrate any points as needed. The date/time of those sessions will be announced here in this thread. These sessions will be limited to questions only, there is no prepared presentation. After the session ends, the recording will be posted in this thread.

You can find more on their website:
Order Flow Analytics

Feel free to ask any questions below and we'll do our best to get them answered.

The futures.io (formerly BMT) "AMA" (Ask Me Anything) series is by invitation only. It is part of a new program we are launching shortly called "Certified Trustworthy", something that has been months in the making. I will provide all the details of this new program as soon as it is ready for launch.

Mike

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  #3 (permalink)
 
OrderFlowAnalytics's Avatar
 OrderFlowAnalytics 
San Antonio, TX, USA
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: OFA, Ninja, eSignal, R-Trader
Broker: Dorman/ZenFire + IQfeed + eSignal
Trading: ES, 6E, 6B
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Mike & BMF Members,

Thanks for allowing me to share what I can here. I've been a member for 2+ years but on day-1 Mike rejected my first post because I was identified as a "vendor"... I had no idea how evil that branding was! I was just trying to be a part of the conversation, not dictate the content - regardless here we are so I'd like to make a brief introduction and welcome questions from any and all...

First off, I'm not your typical vendor. I hate sales people and I've bought the same dollar value of garbage that every noob trader today has (or more) - the only difference is I did all that 15 years ago. I remember opening the trade rags and seeing ads with pictures of guys standing in front of mansions with 8 cars parked in front hawking their black box S&P systems - and this is back before the ES. This was the big one and there was no execution process like we have now. You called in orders and went to lunch - awesome strategies! So I've witnessed first hand the evolution of garbage and while it's certainly piled high right now - trust me it's always been that way in one form or another....

So I strive to be different. I'm not a self-proclaimed guru and I'll be the first to tell you I don't make millions trading. I don't have a secret formula and I can't guarantee I'll make you rich. Trading is hard work regardless of your method. Expect to lose before you win and expect to lose after you win... I have losing days just like everyone and sometimes they really hurt. It took me years to get over the break-even-loser stage and while I'm not buying jets and sitting in front of 8 cars, I make more than I lose and I love what I do. After 15 years, that's called winning in any language or currency.

While I'm obviously setup as a vendor here, my real objective is to be a source for those wanting to learn more about order flow - and you don't have to pay me to get straight answers. More importantly I'll tell you the truth when I have no idea how to answer you. I've learned that knowing that you don't know everything generally keeps you profitable as a trader and wealthy in life.

My entire OFA philosophy is considered by most to be in direct contradiction to "what's commonly accepted" in BID-ASK volume theory. I tend to ruffle feathers. The only reason I built OFA was because every vendor I approached 6 years ago with my idea told me to get lost and to "not invade their intellectual property". This is a nasty industry and I prefer to stand on the other side knowing I'll never treat anyone the way I was treated. I embrace others ideas and I try to share freely with people who ask for help... So ask.

I'm happy to answer questions about OFA products and services (which is why Mike set this up) - but I'm more than happy to answer questions about the topic in general (assuming I can). There are lots of free (or cheaper) tools that do similar things - but if you don't know why or how to use them, it wont matter the cost. "Free" will turn into a waste of time - which to most of us equals a waste of money too.

So here's my pitch: Don't buy anything. Ask questions and do your homework.

I look forward to it!

DB Vaello
Order Flow Analytics, Inc.

If you have any questions about the products or services provided by Order Flow Analytics, please send me a Private Message or use the BMT " Ask Me Anything" thread.
Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal
  #4 (permalink)
 
Big Mike's Avatar
 Big Mike 
Manta, Ecuador
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Posts: 50,399 since Jun 2009
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DB,

In terms of usefulness, where do you rank Cumulative Delta? Do you use Cumulative Delta in any of your analysis or trading tools?

I was quite excited about it a couple years ago but then with time determined it did not help my trading. I personally feel it's not a useful tool for my trading, but then again I am really not a scalper.

Second question - Are your tools platform independent, or do they require NinjaTrader to run (as an indicator)?

Mike

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  #5 (permalink)
 
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 fido 
Bangkok, Thailand
 
Experience: Intermediate
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Hi DB,

Will it work with a Kinetick datafeed ?

  #6 (permalink)
 
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 trendisyourfriend 
Quebec Canada
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OrderFlowAnalytics View Post
...
So here's my pitch: Don't buy anything. Ask questions and do your homework.

I look forward to it!

DB Vaello
Order Flow Analytics, Inc.

I have a straightforward question for you. I want to begin by saying your tools look impressive and well done. However, when i see the words "order flow" these days i kind of perceive in them a world of complexity. Most tools i have seen so far demand quite a bit of dedication to master. The promise i read from the many examples i see here on futures.io (formerly BMT) and at other places is a lot of work for a meager advantage. So my question is what is order flow for you and why would a trader uses what appears to be complex tools when most of us as we evolve want to simplify things?

  #7 (permalink)
 
OrderFlowAnalytics's Avatar
 OrderFlowAnalytics 
San Antonio, TX, USA
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: OFA, Ninja, eSignal, R-Trader
Broker: Dorman/ZenFire + IQfeed + eSignal
Trading: ES, 6E, 6B
Posts: 53 since Dec 2010
Thanks Given: 17
Thanks Received: 77


Big Mike View Post
DB,

In terms of usefulness, where do you rank Cumulative Delta?



Honestly I rank it pretty low in general concept (with a few exceptions I'll note below) - but to be fair this may be something I'm just too dumb to get my head around... I try to only trade with concepts/methods/tools that follow a constant stream of logic. If I cant understand the logic then I refuse to integrate something into what I'm doing even if "everyone" is talking about it. My issues are pretty simple and I would welcome anyone that uses CD consistently to straighten me out.

Over a span of price movement greater than what is generally accepted as retail psychological limits (so think maybe 2 points in the ES for a novice day trader)... If you're really focused on the swings of the other time frame trader:

1. How do you logically justify the concept that ASK trade is only buyers - meaning NEW trade executing a market long instead of

a. NEW trade executing a limit short
b. Existing shorts exiting with a market buy order
c. Existing longs exiting with a limit sell order

2. Consider the same above for BID trade being only NEW market sellers

3. How do you account for areas of churn in which positions come on and off very often NOT by the same order execution process (Algo triggers market long, price drops a few ticks, algo spreads OCO target/stop with limit uptick/market downtick, the limit uptick target is filled at/near entry) - now you have a CD +2 multiplied by thousands of similar executions all at the same few prices.

4. Consider the MMs and rebate trading

With extremely short term spans of rapid directional movement I can get my head around comparing buyers and sellers. Outside of that I think the logic fails and I assume that's why most traders I encounter have a similar experience to yours. It looks promising but in the end fails to bring any real benefit. Again, I know I don't know everything and I'm happy to be educated on the subject.


Quoting 
Do you use Cumulative Delta in any of your analysis or trading tools?

I was quite excited about it a couple years ago but then with time determined it did not help my trading. I personally feel it's not a useful tool for my trading, but then again I am really not a scalper.

I use it in 2 ways (and have a 3rd included below that I don't use)

1. I calculate the "Net" or CD of individual auction periods. In OFA they're created by what we call Probes and Rotations... A small directional move followed by a counter move. I derived it from Point & Figure concepts and it's evolved over the years going from highly complex uptick/downtick/velocity calculations to incredibly simple ones just using price movement. Sometimes simple is better and I learned my lesson. The purpose of this is not to say a period has more buyers than sellers - but rather to be used as a comparative basis against other auctions of a similar size and time span.

2. I calculate what we call the "COT" which is essentially just the Net of the Rotation or counter move. Again, this is not used by itself but rather as a comparative tool within the current short-term directional movement. I tell traders to think of the speedometer on a car. Without a comparative value, your speed means nothing. If you're going 75 MPH and have nothing to associate that with, it's basically worthless information. If you're going 75 MPH in a 20 MPH school zone then you can make better sense of the situation... Or if you're not moving at all and suddenly the vehicle jumps to 75 MPH you better get a grip.

3. We have a CD tool that we call Inventory Tracking. It allows the user to measure the CD from custom anchor points (maybe the high and low of a developing range) to triangulate the CD relative to the current market prices. It has similar historical functions as well. I give full disclosure to my clients that I do not use this tool because the logic does not make sense to me. It was developed as a custom build request from a prop shop and to reduce the development cost they allowed us to include it in the public version of the application. Some may find use in it - clearly the original clients do - but they did not disclose the how/why part of it to me and after months of fiddling with it I never saw any practical use. I taught a few classes about what I had learned in the hopes that some might find use in it and share that use with me. So far it hasn't happened and that was 2 years ago.


Quoting 
Second question - Are your tools platform independent, or do they require NinjaTrader to run (as an indicator)?

Our model has always been to remain a standalone application do to the limitations of working within a defined programming environment or with groups that originally told me to get lost. We do work with NinjaTrader, but that is simply through an interface - not currently as an indicator or framework. We also work with R-Trader in the public standalone version - again just to interface trade sending and reporting commands. As you can imagine, we do a lot of custom analytical integration with existing proprietary systems so our motto is "anything is possible" but I think you're specifically addressing the retail platform side so here is the answer:

OFAv6 is standalone and can be custom coded to any platform but already interfaces NT and RT
Shortly we will be releasing framework plugins for various retail platforms
We really don't do "indicators" in the general sense because I don't think of OFA as a "system" but rather an analytical framework to assist in merging order flow strategies (why/when) to common trading tactics (where/how).
We'll leave the indicator programming to people using the framework in the hopes of letting them determine the best way for our tools and logic to benefit their trading.

Sorry about being long winded on the replies but thanks for the great questions!

DB

If you have any questions about the products or services provided by Order Flow Analytics, please send me a Private Message or use the BMT " Ask Me Anything" thread.
Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal
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  #8 (permalink)
 
OrderFlowAnalytics's Avatar
 OrderFlowAnalytics 
San Antonio, TX, USA
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: OFA, Ninja, eSignal, R-Trader
Broker: Dorman/ZenFire + IQfeed + eSignal
Trading: ES, 6E, 6B
Posts: 53 since Dec 2010
Thanks Given: 17
Thanks Received: 77


fido View Post
Hi DB,

Will it work with a Kinetick datafeed ?

As most of you know Kinetick is a private label of another feed designed specifically to interface NinjaTrader. Because of the specific use they do not have a way for external applications to program directly to the feed (no API). Our work around for this is to export the data in real-time from NinjaTrader with a NinjaScript from a tick chart. While not the best possible solution (for many reasons) it does work.

So yes, but there are a whole lot of limitations on what you can do with it.

DB

If you have any questions about the products or services provided by Order Flow Analytics, please send me a Private Message or use the BMT " Ask Me Anything" thread.
Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal
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  #9 (permalink)
 
Big Mike's Avatar
 Big Mike 
Manta, Ecuador
Site Administrator
Developer
Swing Trader
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: Custom solution
Broker: IBKR
Trading: Stocks & Futures
Frequency: Every few days
Duration: Weeks
Posts: 50,399 since Jun 2009
Thanks Given: 33,173
Thanks Received: 101,538

I don't mind naming Kinetick as the OEM of IQFeed. Kinetick is a good brand and Ray has done a good job with it. If you use only NinjaTrader, then it is cheaper than using IQFeed directly. But if you use multiple platforms, IQFeed is the way to go since all of them can connect up simultaneously.

Mike

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  #10 (permalink)
 
OrderFlowAnalytics's Avatar
 OrderFlowAnalytics 
San Antonio, TX, USA
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: OFA, Ninja, eSignal, R-Trader
Broker: Dorman/ZenFire + IQfeed + eSignal
Trading: ES, 6E, 6B
Posts: 53 since Dec 2010
Thanks Given: 17
Thanks Received: 77



Big Mike View Post
I don't mind naming Kinetick as the OEM of IQFeed. Kinetick is a good brand and Ray has done a good job with it. If you use only NinjaTrader, then it is cheaper than using IQFeed directly. But if you use multiple platforms, IQFeed is the way to go since all of them can connect up simultaneously.

You bet. I mean no disrespect to Kinetick at all. They provide an excellent feed. From an Order Flow developer's standpoint it would just be easier if we could access the feed directly because of the historical data limitations within NinjaTrader regarding bid/ask/last. No doubt we would all prefer to backfill the data directly rather than record it or write external application do do this for us. Gomi did a phenomenal job overcoming a fundamental issue tied to an ecosystem's limitations. We do it from another perspective - we access the API directly to provide flexibility for the user based on his needs.

Either way, given the extensive testing I've done on broker and subscription data feeds compared to the CME's BBO data, IQfeed (and subsequently Kinetick) rank at the absolute top for a retail (Internet) connection. At one point I manually shuffled through over 2 million ticks of data and IQ had misrepresented 2 ticks, for a total of 3 contracts. If you ever looked at the same comparison of $750-$2500/month feeds you would puke.

I'm proud to work with both companies... I just need to be clear that Kinetick requires an extra couple of steps to interface our standalone product.

DB

If you have any questions about the products or services provided by Order Flow Analytics, please send me a Private Message or use the BMT " Ask Me Anything" thread.
Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal
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