This is to commend highly the efforts of Steve, Shelley and all the contributors to this project. Its steady and relentless improvement has been quite impressive.
I have never before used a trading EA on a live account. In fact, my view has always been that if I am going to lose money, I will like to have the privilege of doing it myself rather than handing it to an EA. And the reasons are not far-fetched, as I’m sure many would agree with me. Most EAs seem to hold up for a while and then suddenly, they sustain some really big loss, or a series of them; and then follows their immediate abandonment by all concerned. I am yet to see an EA that has been able to withstand the test of time and is still currently held dear by those who wrote or use it. If anyone knows of any such, he should let us all know.
I believe the reason why this is so is that EA users expect their EAs to perform day-in day-out, irrespective of market conditions. It has done well in the last few months, why not this one and the next? Little consideration is given to the fact that no single trading system, manual or automated, can prosper in all market conditions. And when along comes a different market situation that an EA cannot handle very well, then begins the handing back of previous profits if not ending in outright net loss.
It is on this basis that I would like to suggest that consideration be given to the market conditions that BASA is best suited to and provision made for it to QUIT TRADING when such market conditions cease to exist. At least, a user option should be available which when switched on will stop BASA trading when its ideal market conditions are not prevailing, not minding what RSI, Sto and the MAs are indicating. In such adverse market conditions, greater initiative than an EA is able to summon is required to trade successfully, if at all.
Bob’s 10.xx logic on which BASA is based is a trending one. And it has been obvious in the last 2 weeks or so of a trending forex market that the EA has been performing increasingly well. So how will it be determined when a trending market begins to turn around? This is where Baluda’s GlobalMarketTrend (GMT) indi comes in. It is these considerations that gave rise to this post:
http://www.stevehopwoodforex.com/phpBB3 ... 088#p69088
and close monitoring along with regular use since July, have more than verified how vital it is.
In summary, if such an option is written into BASA, it will:
1. Turn the EA loose on the market whenever GMT tracing is above 1.2 AND inclined upwards
2. Turn the EA off anytime the tracing inclines downwards.
I am not a coder and so don’t know how amenable GMT will be for BASA manipulation. Steve and the other versatile coders here will have to determine that if, at all, they consider this worthy of appraisal. I am also not saying that BASA cannot be used in a non-trending market by anyone who chooses to. I am definitely saying though that a user who so wishes should have the option to spare BASA any blushes and afford his trading account good protection when the markets do not quite suit the EA.
BTW, the 1.2 figure, whilst being the possible default setting, may also be left configurable by the user.
