paydirt's Account Talk

paydirt

New member
Perhaps in another post, if I think it's worthwhile to explain my trades and such, I'll do that, but for this post I'd just like to say that I've been a fan of TSPTalk for several years, and this year I've decided to get off the sidelines for a while.


I'm rooting for all the players on the AutoTracker, and just to mention a few:
Wildwoman: #821 in 2011 to #481 current. --way to go.
nfdennis: #1 in 2011 to #466 current.
Rickter_Spatz: #2 to in 2011 to 624 current.
Mr_Shekels: #5 in 2011 to 598 current.
VooDoo22: #4 in 2011 to 950 current. --what happened? I have a feeling you're just waiting for that one fat pitch before you swing.
coolhand: Your blog is excellent, but what's with the 7-Sentinels: -12.37% in 2011 and +13.25% current?
Birchtree: on a roll.
Boghie: on a roll.
WorkFE: on a roll.
--and of course, too many more to mention.


(total players were 821 in 2011 and 1003 current)


I can see it's going to be tough keeping up with any of these. I'm already in the bottom half and behind most: #617 current.
 
About time Paydirt! A good thing watching the Tracker and monitoring returns, they have to be doing something right to be at the top.
Best of luck with your TSP.:D
Norman
 
coolhand: Your blog is excellent, but what's with the 7-Sentinels: -12.37% in 2011 and +13.25% current?

Hello paydirt. Glad you decided to join us.

The disparity in the 7 Sentinels is one of volatility and TSP deadlines. In a highly volatile market where prices swing by several percentage points back and forth in a matter of days, that can push the system into a whipsaw condition where it's triggering buy and sell signals quickly. But the system is designed to capture the "intermediate term" trend. This point is important, because our TSP accounts are difficult to trade short term with only 2 IFTs a month. Not impossible, but difficult. Anyway, because the 7 Sentinels are an intermediate term system it is not designed to roll over quickly from one signal to another.

Another problem, is our deadline for transfers. That's obviously not the system's fault. It's bad enough to get a sell or buy signal in a volatile market, but when it takes an extra day to get in or out of the market that can be detrimental to the overall system performance. (it can also work in our favor at times)

The past couple of years have seen some highly volatile action at times where the market was not trending, but spiking in either direction in short time frames. If the market can maintain a trending character, this system should do very well as it is now.

Absolutely no system can operate effectively in all market environments. And changing a system's parameters to meet short term character changes can be a lesson in frustration. I think it may be better to simply sit on the sidelines should the market begin to make large, short term swings again. I'm thinking VIX may be a signal that might help is this regard, but I'm still evaluating that potential solution.

I am still compiling the system's performance for the past few years too, but I can tell you that in 2008 the system sidestepped virtually all of the losses that year. And those were some significant losses.
 
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