Discuss ForexHippo.com (Matt Robinson)

[Dirk58]

hi bayon

well, there are times needin food and times needin a little rest
anyway the H you have should be same I have, the

one....

 

[Dirk58]

and look

at the charts..... everybody is waiting for the US FOMC, charts are like freezed.
So The H can relax

 

[Dirk58]

he´s my man....

my

got me 29pips this morning with an EURUSD trade.
I took off the EURGBP because I never liked this one to trade manually and it seems The H doesn´t like this pair either. 7 pairs are enough for trading and perhaps more comin over the time because I think Ken is testing this out.
always good trading

 

[nzfriendlee]

Strange Hippo

I bought a hippo yesterday, and doing a demotest. His behaviour is funny enough. He buys at resistance and sell at support.
By the way, which settings do I have to follow, recommended settings or default settings? What is the default settings, pt 30/sl 100 or pt 30/sl 0.
Quite a confussing!

See you guys! I will post my test result from time to time.

 

[Dirk58]

hi nzfriendlee

Hi there guys

One of my customers asked me to join in on the discussion here and explain a couple of things...

1. It seems as if the settings for EURJPY is not inline with the other pairs on the FPA demo test. All the other pairs seem to trade at a fixed lot size? and EURJPY be set on MoneyManagement. The recommended settings have the Risk of EURJPY A LOT lower than the other pairs. Infact its on 2, while the other pairs are on 15. On the FPA test quite the opposite is observed. EURJPY runs with the highest risk settings. This pair also has a much higher loosing % compared to the other pairs, and thats why its recommended Risk is so much lower. When EURJPY pair wins, the wins will be big compared to the loses, because of the higher TakeProfit. ForexHippo - Strategy Testing
Unfortunately the test results of FPA is skewed now because of this pair running with incorrect settings...

2. Forex Hippo does not make use of any Martingale strategy!

3. A lot of people believe that the previous version was a lot better than the new version 1.2. Well, the good news is that you can still get the exact same results as the previous version by using just the default settings. (And not the recommended settings.)
You can also get version 1.0 results by using the following settings on version 1.2:
MoneyManagement=false
Lots=0.1 (Adjust this according to your account size. I use between 0.05 and 0.1 lots per $1000 in my account)
StopLoss=0;
The rest of the settings on default.

4. What settings do I personally use? I still run version 1.0 settings on all my live accounts.


Hope this clarifies some issues ;-)

If you have any questions, please do feel free to ask!

Kind regards
Matt

this was the answer of the developer and I use them too......
always good trading

 

[Ken Long]

this was the answer of the developer and I use them too......
always good trading

Just for a little clarification. 1.2 is what we probably all have, with the supplied recomended setings. 1.1 is the same EA without the optional filters or recomended settings. 1.0 is the same EA with default SL 0, and the option to change it.

Matt supposedly still uses SL 0, and recomends manualy managing open positions. In his published account he supposedly holds the open possitions with no SL for the sake of honesty, but still recomends managing them manualy.
......................

Myself, I've done several things. First I have every filter ON. Each has a benefit. The MA open filter will keep you aligned with the longer term trend. You may lose a few trading oportunities, but at a 3:1 risk:reward ratio, the goal is to eliminate a few lossers. The MA Close filter doesnt have much affect with a SL, but it will close your trade if the average turns against it. The BBand filter will prevent opening a trade outside the BBands, which has a much higher chance of reversal, and a poorer chance of making its profit target. I've tested this one and it works.

I've also cut the Time Out period in half, from 360m to 180m. I do lose some wining trades this way, but my feeling is that this is a high risk scalping strategy that relies on strong momentum, and is at constant risk of a reversal. The best trades seem to happen immediately, and close within the first hour or two. Holding longer may give a trade a chance to develop and come back to you, but will also give a trade a much better chance of reaching the SL. If the trade doesnt go for me immediately I want out at the first opportunity. Again, this is about eliminating stop outs, and waiting on the next opportunity.

I've eliminated the recomended settings as anything but guide lines. I follow the Default format with my own SL and TP levels based on an average of a long term ATR. I have been using an ATR 50 on the H1 and H4 charts to choose an average level that would, 1. make an easy target within the 1 hour range, and 2. make a good stop distance outside of the 4 hour range. This is a manual method that requires checking and regularly updating each pair traded.

After mentioning this to Matt Robinson as a possible method for creating automated TP and SL settings, he immediately created the function to run and test it, and I've been testing a development version on my demo accounts. I immediately found that the ATR 50 was too volitile for automated use, giving numbers that were both too high and too low. Generally following a consolidation period the range will drop, right before a big move, and visa versa, following a volitile period the range will widen, right before a quite consolisation period. This didnt do exactly what I wanted, which is to compensate for the different pairs, and long term changes in volitility. I've since changed this to an ATR 500, which give stable results very close to what I would choose manualy. It doesnt change greatly, or in responce to short term volitility, but it does adapt to the different pairs, and any long term changes in volitility very well. I now use this number for all TP levels, and am currently using a 3x multiple of it for the SL levels, and this is working very well in forward testing on my demo accounts. I am still concerned about stop losses, and being prematurely stoped out. A longer 4x or 5x SL would allow more space to move, but would seriously comprimise the risk:reward ratio. In most cases, if the price is going to reverse far enough to hit the 3x SL, it will also hit the 4x or 5x SL, and the resulting damage would be far greater.

Keep in mind that this is what I consider to be a momentum scalping strategy. It buys at the highs, and sells at the lows, counting on strong momentum to pull it through to small targeted gains. It uses the overextended ranges of the RSI 14 to determine strong momentum, and the short term Stoch 5 to target minor fluxuations at this level. Sometimes it can catch a strong momentum move and open multiple successful trades, but most often it just captures its small profit before a larger reversal takes place, and often relies on a rebound to breakeven. In most cases any strong reversal, even just a counter trend reversal, will take it to a SL. Extending, or eliminating the SL could prevent some of these stop outs, but the danger is always from a true trend reversal, that could cost 1000's of pips.

If you want to try this on your DEMO account yourself it is easy to run an ATR 500 and use this value as a TP level, and a multiple of it as a SL. Compare these to the recomended settings Matt has supplied and you should find that they are very close to the normal recomendations. There are a few special case recomendations that are much different.

Hopefully if this all works out well Matt may include it as an option, or possibly even as the default setting, in a new version.

 

[Dirk58]

damn Ken

your posting is damn good but I understand only just a bit of all. So what I understand is that you are testing The H with different settings but they are not close to me.
So would you tell me in straight words what the in your opinion best settings are. I now use the default settings and MoneyManagement=false, LotSize=0.1 (because of my 'Alpari Classic Account minimum) and Stop/Loss=0.
Is this ok or do you think, all filters On will have a benefit too with these settings? because I do not wanna watch The H trading for manually closing the trades.
And damn good and nice from ya to do all the testing and stay close to Matt. I think The H is a good one right now, but with your effort and teamwork with Matt The H will become a great one.....

always good trading

 

[bayon]

hi dirk

I think it s best to let hippo trades on default or recommended settings for a while..
since there 2 to 3 trades a week for each pair its difficult to have a clear overall view for now.
how is it doing on your live account..?

regards

 

[Dirk58]

hi bayon

well, The H had a few trades this week and went out

because the EURUSD made 101 red pips. So next week should be recover week......... overall it´s not that bad because the other trades made me small gains.......

always good trading

 

[Ken Long]

your posting is damn good but I understand only just a bit of all. So what I understand is that you are testing The H with different settings but they are not close to me.
So would you tell me in straight words what the in your opinion best settings are. I now use the default settings and MoneyManagement=false, LotSize=0.1 (because of my 'Alpari Classic Account minimum) and Stop/Loss=0.
Is this ok or do you think, all filters On will have a benefit too with these settings? because I do not wanna watch The H trading for manually closing the trades.
And damn good and nice from ya to do all the testing and stay close to Matt. I think The H is a good one right now, but with your effort and teamwork with Matt The H will become a great one.....

always good trading

Dirk,

Most of what I said dosent really matter to your running the EA. I was talking about developing an automatic SL and TP adjustment control that would automaticaly choose good levels for the different pairs based on a long term average of the current range.

For now you should just use Matt's recomended settings on the more reliable pairs. I would avoid the EURGBP and USDJPY, there really isnt enough movement in the range to capture the gains easily, and I would be cautious with the strange settings, like on the EURJPY. I would also be careful of the pairs that have a very wide risk reward ratio. Try to stay closer to 3:1. This is still an inverse ratio, but the EA seems reliable enough to make up for this level of loss.
Its not necessary to use any of the additional filters to trade well, but I like the MA Open filter and the BBand filter, and I use these on all my pairs. Also, remember that Matt's recomended settings are not tried and true, they are simply backtested settings. Many people are using the default settings with good results, and that is the basis I am working from. I am simply adjusting the 30 TP and 100 SL setting to fit different pairs better, after all a pair like the USDCHF and EURCHF doesnt have the range that a pair like the GBPJPY or GBPCHF has.