Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

nautilustrader.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 134 posts

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#71

Post by OutOfHere »

adamiscool8 wrote: post #63
jjangkke wrote: post #43

I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades The problem is the 0.5% of the time, it erases all the gains made on the successful ones. I'm convinced without information edge or some capital sunk cost edge (for HFT) you are literally just flipping coins when it comes to trading. What's dangerous is fixation on strategies that form after a period of success. All in all, I think just buying stock…

This doesn't make sense. If you had a 99.5% success rate, you could simply use a fixed $ stop and clean up. I agree you need an information edge, but the difficulty of finding one inversely correlates with your scale. Buying and holding is the best strategy for almost everybody - but that is orthogonal to whether trading is a "coin flip" vs mining an edge.

It does make sense. A small fixed stop loss is just asking to be triggered. A large fixed stop loss will result in a zero-gain zero-loss scenario over many trades.

More generally, there is no optimal amount of stop loss. It ultimately gets auto-stopped out at 3:30 pm, although by then it could have gone nearly to zero anyway. Either the strategy works or it doesn't, and with Trump manipulating the market on random days with significant news, it increasingly doesn't.

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#72

Post by cosmicgadget »

Projectiboga wrote: post #58
jjangkke wrote: post #43

I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades The problem is the 0.5% of the time, it erases all the gains made on the successful ones. I'm convinced without information edge or some capital sunk cost edge (for HFT) you are literally just flipping coins when it comes to trading. What's dangerous is fixation on strategies that form after a period of success. All in all, I think just buying stock…

The best is just buying the whole market via a index fund. Much lower management and overhead costs. Trying to trade without being online all the time is a battle against time delays and costs. To buy stocks, and especially options you are always against the bid/ask spread. The basic math problem for a statistics major is the Gambler's ruin problem. And basically your chances are your money over the whole table's mon…

This is what passive traders tell themselves to feel better about letting institutionals have free reign with their money. If there was a best strategy basic economics would tell you that it immediately becomes not the best strategy.

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#73

Post by [deleted] »

mtlynch wrote: post #65
jjangkke wrote: post #43

I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades The problem is the 0.5% of the time, it erases all the gains made on the successful ones. I'm convinced without information edge or some capital sunk cost edge (for HFT) you are literally just flipping coins when it comes to trading. What's dangerous is fixation on strategies that form after a period of success. All in all, I think just buying stock…

> I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades Do you mean this literally or is that an exaggeration for effect? I'm not sure how you'd do that unless all your trades are like selling a put with a $50 strike price expiring in a month when the stock is trading at $100.

[deleted]

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#74

Post by OutOfHere »

mtlynch wrote: post #65
jjangkke wrote: post #43

I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades The problem is the 0.5% of the time, it erases all the gains made on the successful ones. I'm convinced without information edge or some capital sunk cost edge (for HFT) you are literally just flipping coins when it comes to trading. What's dangerous is fixation on strategies that form after a period of success. All in all, I think just buying stock…

> I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades Do you mean this literally or is that an exaggeration for effect? I'm not sure how you'd do that unless all your trades are like selling a put with a $50 strike price expiring in a month when the stock is trading at $100.

> Do you mean this literally or is that an exaggeration for effect?

As a fellow options trader, I can confirm that it is spot on what is seen with SPY; it is not an exaggeration at all.

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#75

Post by andrepd »

jjangkke wrote: post #43

I used to trade options and had about 99.5% success on all my trades The problem is the 0.5% of the time, it erases all the gains made on the successful ones. I'm convinced without information edge or some capital sunk cost edge (for HFT) you are literally just flipping coins when it comes to trading. What's dangerous is fixation on strategies that form after a period of success. All in all, I think just buying stock…

Option trading is notoriously difficult. HFTs simply don't take a position at all: they build portfolios that are as neutral as possible in every measure (not only delta, but in vol, its higher order terms, higher order delta terms, etc). This is very difficult to do unless you have substantial capital to absorb short term fluctuations, but if you do you can capture a consistent and very low risk profit.

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#76

Post by pawelduda »

cosmicgadget wrote: post #72
Projectiboga wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best is just buying the whole market via a index fund. Much lower management and overhead costs. Trying to trade without being online all the time is a battle against time delays and costs. To buy stocks, and especially options you are always against the bid/ask spread. The basic math problem for a statistics major is the Gambler's ruin problem. And basically your chances are your money over the whole table's mon…

This is what passive traders tell themselves to feel better about letting institutionals have free reign with their money. If there was a best strategy basic economics would tell you that it immediately becomes not the best strategy.

Can you elaborate?

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#77

Post by energy123 »

browningstreet wrote: post #18

I've been wading into algo-trading for a little while now. I've read a few books, set up a few strategies on paper trading platforms. Right now I'm trying to figure out how to consistently make $1/day as a POC exercise. That's it. I did ask the various advanced LLMs the path to earning/clearing $200K/year as an algo-trader. Fun & sobering responses. I'll give the LLMs this -- no uplift in these conversations.

If you can make $1/day you're already 95% of the way there.

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#78

Post by andrepd »

cosmicgadget wrote: post #72
Projectiboga wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best is just buying the whole market via a index fund. Much lower management and overhead costs. Trying to trade without being online all the time is a battle against time delays and costs. To buy stocks, and especially options you are always against the bid/ask spread. The basic math problem for a statistics major is the Gambler's ruin problem. And basically your chances are your money over the whole table's mon…

This is what passive traders tell themselves to feel better about letting institutionals have free reign with their money. If there was a best strategy basic economics would tell you that it immediately becomes not the best strategy.

It is the best strategy for someone who does not do this full-time (and for many people who do!). That is the point.

A trader with experience, working in a firm with deep pockets and terabytes of historical data and FPGAs that can execute his/her strategy and a legal team and an engineering team... can outperform you yes x)

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#79

Post by andrepd »

cosmicgadget wrote: post #62
rytill wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Boglehead > 140% gain on your holdings this year Choose one.

Generally true but nvda and pltr are normie stocks and can account for these returns from this year.

But then it's not a Boglehead lol

Re: NautilusTrader: Open-source algorithmic trading platform

#80

Post by bproctor »

Having wasted 6 years of my life intensively working to create an algorithmic trading system (and failing to make it consistently profitable), what they have here is the easy part. You need a system for discovering strategies. That's were almost all your effort will go. The simulator for backtesting, integrating with a broker, etc. is such a small part of it, if you're serious about it, you're probably better off writing your own.
Post reply on HN