StrategyTrading1

What is StrategyTrading1?

My name is Tom Loffman and I have been actively trading the financial markets for almost 30 years. I have traded just about everything including stocks, ETFs, options, futures and futures options. I have been writing trading formulas (code) to help me make my trading decisions for most of my trading life. I am not a professional and do not work for anyone other than myself. If you are like me, I hope you will enjoy this web site.

I have a background in statistics, forecasting, and computer programming. I do not pretend to be an expert in any of these disciplines.

About ten years ago I started a web site called Equity Systems. I have moved the posts over to this site, and they may be read under the Links category

I haven’t done much with Equity Systems in recent years. However, I have decided to use the new Internet tools now available to create a site that will, hopefully, help all of us who are active traders of the financial markets.

I have been searching the net for similar sites, and have noticed that they all seem to be commercial sites. One has to become a member, subscribe to some service, purchase a product or in some other way, pay money to gain knowledge from the site.

StrategyTrading1 has a different focus. It is a site where we can all share ideas about Strategy Trading and hopefully, will be able to improve our trading techniques and profits.

I use TradeStation as my trading platform, and TradeStation likes to call its focus “StrategyTrading”. These ideas and techniques would apply to any trading platform that incorporates formula generated trading signals.

Here is my definition of “Strategy Trading”:

The trading of financial market instruments (stocks, ETFs, options, futures, Forex) using buy and sell signals generated by numerical formulas and quantifiable patterns of price movement based on current and historical price and volume data.

These formulas are used to generate trading signals that may be automated and executed in the real market.

The formulas can be backtested and optimized.

Some examples include but are not limited to:

• averages
• moving averages
• oscillators

and various studies including:

• relative strength
• overbought/oversold
• breakouts/consolidations
• trending/channeling
• volatility

I realize that many traders are reluctant to discuss their formulas and techniques for fear that someone may use their ideas, and any advantage they may have will be lost. I have found that trading the markets is much more difficult than it appears to be, and that we need all the ideas we can get.

It is my hope that StrategyTrading1 will help you gain some  trading ideas that will be helpful to you, and that you will contribute some ideas of your own. Together we can all profit. It do not believe that trading is a “zero-sum” game.

StrategyTrading1 is being run by WordPress software. This is my first adventure with WP and it will take some time to include all the features that I would like to see here. So, over time the look and useability of the site will improve.

In addition to blogs and comments I will be adding a forum, links, and anything else that will be helpful. Suggestions are welcome.

I have read many posts about stocks and trading in various places on the net, and these posts can get heated and include disrespectful language and attacks. This is not the place for such comments.

Wishing you great trading success,

Tom Loffman

January 27, 2009