- 金币:
-
- 奖励:
-
- 热心:
-
- 注册时间:
- 2006-7-3
|
|

楼主 |
发表于 2008-4-20 19:20
|
显示全部楼层
Settings in Ensign
We use two charts for each instrument that we trade: a 5 or 30-minute Price Histogram chart, and a Range chart with the Stochastic and Keltner studies. You can download the chart templates here. For more detail on how the charts work, see our separate section below.
The recommended charts and templates to use are shown below. Right-click, download, save in your Ensign Templates folder.
| 2/22/2008 Update: We have made several changes to the template. In summary:
- Moved the trade entry and exit prices next to the actual price bars.
Benefit: Easier to see entry and exit prices, and confirm them with your own results.
- Changed the colors of the price bars to reflect the fast stochastic.
Benefit: Easier to prepare for a trade, as the current price bar will flash a color change as the stochastic is preparing to cross
- Added range bar prices for current price bar.
Benefit: This shows the price that is one tick above and below the current bar. In conjunction with (2) above, this allows you to prepare for the trade by entering your Stop Limit price before-hand. Works great with IB's Book Trader, Bracket Trader, or Ninja Trader.
| Ensign Sound Set
templates/sounds.zip
Unzip this file into your folder c:/ensign/sounds
If you don't have a Sounds folder, create one.
Manual Settings for Other Traders
Remember that this is a two-chart system:
- Fast Stochastic: 9,3,3 with an adaptive average. In Ensign, we use Howard's special version.
- Slow Stochastic: 81,27,27 with an adaptive average. Note this is 9x the faster stochastic.
- Keltner: 3, 60 for es; 3.8, 60 for ER2; 3, 60 for ym; with an adaptive average.
We have had many requests from users of other charting programs that do not use Range charts, for how to "port" the settings over. The most important chart for intraday trading is the Market Profile or Price Histogram. Of lesser importance is the Univeral. Instead it is important to understand what the Universal does: it simply uses oscillators (one short term, one longer term for confirmation) to help you get into the trade. It then uses a Keltner band, which is an average of the trading range, to target the exit. You can use any oscillator, including MACD, CCI, RSI, or even two moving averages.
As for time frames, if your charting program does not have Range bars then we would suggest you use tick charts (start with 100~300 tick), or a 1-minute chart. You can "map" the time frame to ours by observing the charts that we post to the blogs.
That's it!
How the Universal Template works in Ensign.
Price Histogram
You don't really need to download the Price Histogram template, just set your PH study as shown. Here are the settings in Ensign for the Price Histogram indicator that show only the Virgin POC's. This was created specifically for us by Howard! It is yet another reason why I prefer to use Ensign - Howard is very receptive to traders' needs.

Universal Template
The first thing you must do is set the VPC's manually each morning, based on the lines from the Price Histogram study or whatever other source you may use. For this we use the DPL (Daily Price Lines) study. On your Universal Template, it is the second study from the top:

This is what you should see:

Note that I have it set to sound an alert when prices hit any of the VPC lines. Quite helpful. Be sure to set your own alerts to your own sound files, as they may not match mine. You can turn it off by clicking "silent."
What Are All Those Arrows?

Key (number colors match to color of arrow or indicator)
(1) | These small orange arrows appears above the high, as a short indicator, each time BOTH (a) the slow stochastic [13] is above 80, AND (b) the fast stochastic [14] is above 80 and crosses down. It appears below the low, as a long indicator, for longs. | (2) | Unfiltered Universal Short Trade (Automatic): A larger Yellow down arrow appears if it is the beginning of a trade. That is, if the previous trade has exited and we are 'flat.' Note this has nothing to with trades based on the VPC's, it is just an 'open trade' system that trades the Universal every time there is an entry signal. | (3) | Unfiltered Universal Long Trade (Automatic): same as above, but for a long. Notice that these all have a (1) arrow with them. I hope you understand why. | (4) | Unfiltered Universal Trade Exit (Automatic): this large arrow indicates the exit from a long trade as prices hit the opposite Keltner band. | (5) | Unfiltered Universal Trade Exit (Automatic): this large arrow indicates the exit from a short trade as prices hit the opposite Keltner band. | (6) | Unfiltered Universal Trade "In Trade" color band. This simply indicates that you are in a trade - green (long) or pink (short). | (7) | Unfiltered Universal Trade: Entry Price. You can use this to confirm how close you got to the optimum entry price. | (8) | Unfiltered Universal Trade: Exit Price. This is the price at which the Keltner was hit. Note you can actually look at the cumulative profit & loss of these unfiltered trades by clicking on Charts > Trade Detail. | (9) | Kelter band price. This is a DPL study that I created to paint the Keltner band prices. That makes it easier for you to set your limit sell price to exit your trades. | (10) | VWAP Price. This is worth watching. It's similar to the intraday POC. | (11) | These little dots indicate each time the fast stochastic [14] is above 80 (or below 20) and does a cross. | (12) | The 80 band turns light grey when the slow stochastic is above 80. This is means as a visual cue to tell you that a short trade is setting up. Same applies if it is below 20. You will notice a visual alert as well "Alert: Short Condition" or "Alert: Long Condition" | (13) | Slow stochastic | (14) | Fast Stochastic | How Do I Match Your Sounds?
Unzip this file into your folder c:/ensign/sounds
templates/sounds.zip
Now Trade the Charts
Suggestions:
- Paper trade this system with each individual instrument that you intend to trade on, for at least 50 trades (this could take up to two months).
- Keep a record of every paper trade: entry, exit, max and min of each trade. This way you can begin to optimize for stops and exit targets.
- Once you have obtained objective information for stops and targets, begin trading with only one contract.
- Bracket each trade with the optimized target and stops, so that you do not have to worry about execution in case of an internet disconnect. I use Ninja Trader with the IB platform.
- To study the methods, please refer to our blog archives. Usual disclaimers exist - these are only indications, etc.
- Read more about the Market Profile and Price Histogram, so you understand how they work.
- Read more about other pivots, which you can also use with the Universal.
Templates are also available in Investor/RT and eSignal. I did not create these, so if you have any questions, please join our Yahoo Discussion Group and ask some of our members there.
Where to Trade with us, Ask Questions, or just Chat
We have three places you can trade the Universal, all free.
- Live Chat Room in IRC
- Type "/server irc.othernet.org"
- Then type "/join #enthios"
- For more information, click here.
- Enthios Group on Yahoo (2,000+ members)
- Here you can discuss the Universal, and other methods, with thousands of other traders.
- The Group is private to keep spammers out, so just send an email to [email=info@enthios.com?subject=Join Enthios Yahoo Group]info@enthios.com[/email] with the words "Join Enthios Yahoo Group" in the subject heading. (If you click the link, it will already be entered!)
- Yahoo! Instant Messenger (limited to 300)
- Here we send out real-time alerts to the trades.
- Just send an email to [email=info@enthios.com?subject=JOIN ENTHIOS ALERT SERVICE]info@enthios.com[/email] with the words "JOIN ENTHIOS ALERT SERVICE" in the headline.
- We will then send you a set of instructions. A trade with the Universal
2/29/2008
Winning trades are easy, in hindsight. I prefer to show how to do a losing trade. But the beginning is always the same.
First thing you do each morning is check your Price Histogram chart. If you don't have one, then you can just get the numbers manually from our web site. We post the NTR each morning on each of our blogs (ES, ER2, YM, NQ). The Price Histogram chart is 5 or 30-minute, day session only.

Conditions for a Trade
Now, move to your UNI chart. Mark the VPC lines manually in your UNI chart. One you have done so, you don't need to look at the Price Histogram chart again. Make sure your UNI chart is set to "All Sessions" (not day session only).
A long trade is signaled when prices move down to the VPC from above, as shown here.

We have two indicators to alert you to a long trade setup. First, the 20 band panel will turn light grey when the slow stochastic is < 20. Also, a text alert will pop up in the upper right hand corner:

Anticipating the trade entry
Trade entry is always difficult. I have set up the charts specifically to make trade entry as easy as possible. After all, isn't that what charts are for?
Once prices have touched or moved below the VPC line, and assuming (1) and (2) from the above chart are also true, you are then looking for the %K to cross above %D on the fast stochastic. The fast stochastic is the green and pink spread line in the stochastic window. When the color changes from red to green, that is a cross.
- Note you can anticipate the color change because the spread bars get shorter as they get closer to a cross.
- Note I have colored the price bars in the main chart window to be the exact same color as the stochastic spread bars. So you can see the impending color change in the main window.
- Note the color will start to change as the bar is in the process of being created (from one or two minutes, to a few seconds). During this time, you may see the color flash back and forth between pink and green. Or you may see it hold green for a while.

Entering the Trade
You are now waiting for the green price bar to complete. Once it is complete, you can enter the trade.
Here we have set up two price arrows that show you the price that is one tick above, and below, the current price bar. So as the entry bar is about to complete, (in this example) you can look and see that 12416 is one tick above the high. So you can prepare your stop market long order using your broker, or an bracket trader.
Note that the initial exit target is also shown, here 12469. So if you use a bracket trader, you can input that information as well.

As soon as the bar "prints" and a new price bar is started, you will see a Blue Arrow confirming the entry bar. It will also print a price, for reviewing later.
Why do you place a market stop order? Sometimes, prices might continue to fall. If so, you may want to trail your stop entry price downwards with each successive bar, to give you a more advantages entry price.

So what do you do when the trade moves against you? Read on.

Following our Alerts for a Trade:
If you are in our chat room or receiving our live alerts from Yahoo Messenger, as prices approach the VPC, you will get an alert to go to the blog page. It shows the trade signal is approaching. Note how you can also see the target, which is the other end of the Keltner band.
Trade Setup
This confirms the VPC line and number, and shows roughly what the trade should look like after it signals. It uses a curved dotted arrow.

Signal Confirmation
The next chart confirms the trade entry. It uses a straight dashed arrow, and also shows the initial Keltner exit target.

Trade Exit and "Natural Stops"
We then use a solid arrow to confirm the trade. The charts automatically paint a yellow highlight around the exit bar as it touches the Keltner.
Here the trade moved against us. You can use stops or not; that is totally up to you. However if you do not use stops, then the Keltner exit provides an excellent Natural Stop. It is the same target you would exit at on a winning trade. Note how it minimizes the loss on this trade, which went as much as 63 points against us before exiting at -22.
Warning: Trading without stops is dangerous. You should always do your homework first, and be aware of 'worst case' situations where the market makes sudden moves. A "9/11 failsafe stop" is a good idea. Another good idea is a stop based on your own liquidity, which of course your broker will do for you if you are not careful. That's also known as an 'electronic margin call.'

|
Other Applications for the Universal
You can use the UNI chart on other time frames as well. For instance, you can use it filtered, or unfiltered, on a 30-minute chart as a swing trading system. Be sure to use Ensign's built-in back test function to give you a quick look at how the trade would look on the instrument and time frame that you are considering. Simply click Charts -> Trade Detail. Very handy, when used in conjunction with the UNI chart!
- Note this gives you 'unfiltered' trades only, i.e. it assumes that you take all trades that have the UNI setup, regardless of whether it occurs at a VPC line.
- Note if you use the method on a 5 or 30-minute chart, you might want to consider 'upping' the time-frame of the Natural Trading Range accordingly, to give you a nice filter. Try a Weekly VPC, for example. |
|
|