Predict Prices

If I can predict prices, I can then know what trade/positions to take.  If I know the prices of EURUSD is going up, of cos it will influence what types of trades/positions to take.

Can tech indicators help us?
I can't imagine anyone trade without using any indicators.  Use intuition?  Use guessing game?
Of cos tech indicator can help us...it's depends on which appropriate indicators/parameters we are using to measure.

Indicators are just mirrors reflecting price at different angles...ability to show us the future?
Let's get it right first of all.  It is price that influence the curves and movement of the indicators, not indicators influencing/directing the prices.  When price move, the indicators curve/graphs on your MT4 moves or cross over.  When price don't move, indicator graph don't change.

Can we use indicators to predict the future?
Yes of cos.  Or else how do we trade or make our trading decisions?

Forecasting/prediction vs Actual Trading
Anyone fool can forecast “correctly”, it’s a matter of timing. The price/trend will go up…it’s a matter of when (after how many downs)?

Forecast and place actual live trades with stop losses and managing that trade to profitability have NOTHING in common. Timing is everything. It works, but you must understand that Timing needs confirmation. Price and volume. If you can understand Timing works. Even poor technique works if timing is good… without timing, nothing works.”

Forecasting and placing actual live/demo trades with good high entry/exit accuracy requires totally different level of skills.

Anyone can forecast…it’s a matter of when to place the trade and when to exit. I can forecast that EURUSD is going up…it’s a matter of when.

What makes using tech indicator hard to predict future prices or make future trading decision is because...we don't know which direction the prices will go in the future and how much is the rate of changes etc.

When I look at my indicators and see a "cross over" is about to happen.  I can predict that the price is going up or down "soon" but how "soon"? I don't know, it can be the next hour, the next day or the next week....cos it all depends on how "fast" or "slow" the market/price move.  And since price don't move in consistent speed or direction, I can't tell when will the "cross over" happened.  But I can tell that when the "cross over" does happen, a breakout is very likely to happen and I  can make good pips at this juncture (prediction vs actual).

Essentially, every trade we place, we are "guessing/predicting" via mathematical calculation/probability/indicators etc the direction of the price will go.  We can either predict and enter before the "cross over", enter at the "cross over" or enter after the "cross over"....hence Timing and Prediction are utmost importance to be profitable.  Lastly, exiting or predicting when trend will change is another part of the prediction/trading strategy.  Without good entry and exit plan, there is no profitable EA.

Hence we can see, Forecasting (in terms of giving a general prediction of price direction) isn't enough to be a successful trader.

a) If a system can only forecast but can’t automatically trade for me, that system is rather “useless” to me. What’s the point of paying so much for a system when it can only forecast but can’t automatically execute for me the trade with high entry/exit accuracy. If I pay for a system, it is to trade on my behalf so that I don’t have to sit in front of my computer, staring at the market/software to wait for the “right” timing of entry/exit.

b) When a system that can only forecast, it is easy to blame the customers for poor results because the blame is shifted to the customers for entering wrongly or not reading the indicators correctly.

c) You can be 70% accurate but the other 30% when you are wrong, can wipe out all your 70% profit and make huge losses. Predictive power is not good enough to be profitable.

d) It take more than good predictive skills (of the trader or software) to be profitable. Besides, good predictive power, a system/trader need to have high entry/exit accuracy and good management. Predictive power is only a small part of the profitable equation.  Entering/exiting a trade with good timing makes a whole lot of difference between profitable and losing.

IF a software company claimed to have a set of indicators and algorithm that can calculate when is the window of opportunity, whereby I can predict the highest probability and learn trading setup so that I can start using right away to “be there” when banks “open up their vaults” to trade…

I wonder what is stopping this software company from turning it's trading theory into trading rules for automated trading?

Is it the lack of technical expertise or resources to transform these trading theory into specific rules to scan the market at all times, looking for the “correct” or high probability market entry/exit and execute these trading rules via an automated system?

Is it the lack of faith in it's own system?

Is it the fear of facing the truth that the system isn’t profitable after all?

What happened if a predictive software company  really turned it's trading theory into applicable concepts and make it available for automated trading?

The answer is very simple.  The customers will know EXACTLY how profitable the system is. No more guessing, no more blame shifting. All trading performance can be easily measured statistically and the customers will know for sure whether the system truly work or not.

But with a forecasting system…it’s hard to quantify the software’s success since it’s is all very SUBJECTIVE and DEPENDABLE on customers’ level of understanding of how to apply the theory or concept, dependable on the timing of entering and exiting from the trade, money management, and a whole lot of many other factors which a software company can claim why the software or system fail…it’s all the customers’ fault, lack of skill, lack of trading, lack of discipline, lack of whatever you can think of…bottom line is, such software companies can always hide behind this excuse of SUBJECTIVITY, to explain why customers aren’t getting the kind of success rate they hope to get.

However, in a fully automated trading system. There is no grey areas…no more pointing of fingers. The automated system is fully quantifiable without anyone to blame. It is either profitable or not. Straight forward and objective.

Honestly, if I have such powerful predictive indicators as what some companies claimed to have and given the team’s ability to “program” unique algorithm etc…nothing would have stopped me from going another step further to transform these highly predictive indicators or trading theory into automated system. It definitely require a higher level of skill to create highly profitable automated system. It would definitely put one’s trading theory to the ultimate test…with 1 final verdict, profitable or unprofitable (if profitable, what’s the win/loss ratio, Profit factor, sharpe ratio etc), all these quantifiable measurement of success, nothing subjective, no grey areas, straight forward results/performance.

Thus I'm highly skeptical of those companies that sell "forecasting" or predictive or trade signals etc and invite their customers to their trading rooms to see how they use those indicators to trade etc.

1. Why waste so much time attending those trading room sessions to learn how to trade when you paid so much for a system that can't even trade for you?

2. Why some of these customers can attend these trading rooms and still didn't know how to trade on their own?

3. Essentially these companies is telling their customers that without their indicators to help them predict and with their mentorship, these customers can't trade confidently on their own.

4. If I pay so much for a predictive system and yet still have to watch the market to enter the trade and at the end of the day still clueless of how to trade, I might as well save up the money paid to the software company and use it as my initial capital for Zulu trading, at least I can choose which trade signal provider to follow with proven past performance/results.  This forecasting companies hardly produce any of their own live/real account to show how profitable it is to use their systems.