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Hi All,
I suppose there are 2 sides to every story, so I
just thought I would relate my experiences with OT:
I have been using OT2002 EOD for a couple of years
with pretty good results. Actually, I have just ordered the 2004 upgrade ($149),
which promises major improvements. AmiBroker is my favorite TA software, it cant
be beat for value and versatility - at this price, it should be in *every*
trader's toolbox. But, for someone in my position (spend 60hrs/wk working and
commuting, often dont get around to TA until 8 or 9PM), OT makes it very quick
and easy to automatically view a large variety of signals on short notice with
little or no programming. I have done pretty well with OT's divergence signals,
which I had some trouble trying to program in AB. Also, some of the stocks that
were called to my attention by OT had very nice patterns and have become some of
my favorite stocks - I have continued to trade them profitably to this day
using my own discretion rather than simply relying on OT's
signals.
It is true that OT is very fast for the amout of
optimization it claims to do. Does it actually do what it claims? I dont know,
but I am inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt. I just figure
that if *I* can write an optimizer (which I have : - ) , I have to
assume that Ed Downs and his crew can do it. I suppose it should be noted that
by default, OT's indicators are generally optimized by 3's or 5's, which may
help account for the speed.
It now has limited OOS capabilty - it allows you to
reserve the last X bars (user-selectable) for walk-forward testing.
Re changing signals - I think this is a normal side
effect of replacing old data with new data between optimizations, so one answer
is not to reoptimize every day, but in OT2002, there is also an option you
can select so that signals on open trades dont change, allowing you to track a
trade until it closes. I believe I read somewhere that they have now made this
automatic in the newer versions.
It is true that they refer to their product as
a "prospecting tool" rather than a trading system, but I think all TA tools are
quick to use the disclaimer that "results are not guarenteed" In general, I
think that OT's signals are no more or less reliable than other TA software
with the same "out-of-the-box" indicators - some signals work out and some
dont - *you* have to decide if it really looks promising or not before
betting your money on it.
True, their Yahoo groups are not that
intersting, but their forum is not too bad - some discussion, some ideas
and reasonably quick answers from one of the development team or sometimes
ED himself. (We may be spoiled by the support, traffic and discussion level on
this group : - )
Bug fixes/betas arent that bad either in my
experience - no one brings the fixes like Tomasz, but I would say OT
releases a new beta maybe every 4-8 weeks on average. These are generally bug
fixes, without new features.
Finally, OT comes configured so you can use it
right out of the box if you want to. This makes it very easy to use, but of
course, it has its share of signals that dont pan out. But you can also
play with many aspects of it to improve the signals if you want to - optimizatin
parameters , filters, entries, exits, etc. Then you can save any combination of
these that you like, along with a watchlist of stocks that they work well on,
in a "profile" for future use. I have gotten the impression
(rightly or wrongly) over the years that many of the people who have had bad
experiences with OT have not put much effort into experimenting with its
options.
OK thats about it. No argument intended here
( I am sure that Howard has forgetten more TA knowledge than I
will ever know : - ), but after reading several negative reviews I
thought, in fairness, that I should relate some positive
experiences.
My conclusions:
1. Definitely buy AmiBroker ( World's best TA value
) - for a very small price, you can implement virtually any idea that you can
conceive of.
2. For those occasions when you are strapped for
time (or I suppose, if you just cant program at all), OmniTrader will quickly
present you with a large variety of trade signals to review. By putting
some thought in and not just taking them blindly, I have been able
to make money with it, so I dont see why others couldnt do the same. (
But if you dont, its not my fault! : - )
Best Wishes and Happy Trading,
Steve
<BLOCKQUOTE dir=ltr
>
----- Original Message -----
<DIV
>From:
Howard
Bandy
To: <A title=amibroker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
href="">amibroker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Sunday, December 07, 2003 10:02
AM
Subject: RE: [amibroker]
OmniTrader?????
<SPAN
>Hi Anthony
–
<SPAN
>
<SPAN
>A few years ago, I
was actively writing articles and reviewing programs for technical analysis
journals. I was asked to review OmniTrader by a publication whose name I
have forgotten. I spent weeks working with it.
<SPAN
>
<SPAN
>As you may know,
OmniTrader is crammed with indicators. One of its features was an
optimization during which it calculated the optimum value for all
indicators. For one thing, the speed of the optimization worried me a
bit – it completed far too quickly to have done a thorough testing. For
another, there was no out-of-sample period, and no walk-forward
capability. In order to test the profitability of signals, I had to add
one day of data at a time and rerun the analysis. A third problem was
that signals would appear, and then disappear one or more days later.
<SPAN
>I found most signals
to be unprofitable and concluded that it was over-fitting the models to the
data.
<SPAN
>
<SPAN
>I talked with the
principals at OmniTrader about my findings, and was told that I should not be
thinking of OmniTrader as a trading system, even though it clearly issues buy
and sell signals. I didn’t get a very good explanation of what they
thought it was.
<SPAN
>
<SPAN
>The review I wrote
and submitted to the publication was not very favorable to OmniTrader – it was
never published.
<SPAN
>
<SPAN
>A quick check this
morning shows two Yahoo groups for OmniTrader, each with about 100
members. The messages posted to one of the groups were mostly spam for
porn sites. The other was mostly about OmniTrader, but the postings were
not very helpful or insightful.
<SPAN
>
<SPAN
>Howard
<SPAN
>
<DIV
>
<SPAN
>-----Original
Message-----From:
aadicker698 [mailto:aadicker698@xxxxxxxxx] <SPAN
>Sent: Saturday, December 06, 2003 7:44
AMTo:
amibroker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx<SPAN
>Subject: [amibroker]
OmniTrader?????
<SPAN
>
<FONT face="Courier New"
size=2>I had purchased OmniTrader two days ago,
and am awaiting it's <SPAN
><FONT
face="Courier New">arrival. Then, yesterday, I ran across the Amibroker
site and loved what I read.
Has anyone ever used OmniTrader? Would it be worth my
time to learn it, or should I
focus on learning Amibroker? All <FONT
face="Courier New">honest and frank suggestions/opinions would be greatly
appreciated!Anthony
<TD
bgColor=#ffffcc>
<FONT
face="Times New Roman" color=#003399 size=2><SPAN
>Send BUG
REPORTS to <SPAN
>bugs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<FONT
face="Courier New" size=2><SPAN
><FONT
face="Courier New">Send SUGGESTIONS to
suggest@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<FONT
face="Courier New">-----------------------------------------<FONT
face="Courier New">Post AmiQuote-related messages ONLY to:
<SPAN
>amiquote@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx<FONT
face="Courier New" size=2>
<SPAN
><FONT
face="Courier New">(Web page: <A
href="">http://groups.yahoo.com/group/amiquote/messages/)<FONT
face="Courier New">--------------------------------------------<FONT
face="Courier New">Check group FAQ at: <A
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<SPAN
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href="">Yahoo! Terms of
Service.
Send
BUG REPORTS to bugs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxSend SUGGESTIONS to
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