Thanks very much for your advice @bendigo I appreciate it mate. I do realise that most indicators are lagging and only represent the historical price action, and I use these tools only to FOLLOW the trend and to find entry points. I don't attempt to predict the swing in trend direction, for me personally this proves to be a costly past time.
You see, my problem (along with many others) is that too often I let emotion and my own thoughts affect my trading and delay making decisions that should be instantaneous, hence the Algo. Apart from always being ready to trade it only does what I have told it too. So in essence it sticks to my game plan far better than I can.
I agree you about the sudden big moves that occur on the DAX and again the speed and accuracy of the Algo helps in these times to minimise losses but also to jump on the move at the same instant. Of course it does get whippy from time to time but again I have learnt to EXPECT losses and not to avoid them totally but to keep them small.
Im going to try using the FTSE's movement as a filter for my trades also, so again thanks very much for this input. I do already use the price movement of gold as filter but im sure that this along with DOW will make a handy addition to the Algo.
I do try to keep my system as simple as possible too and also use moving averages for entries and exits, although I use numbers from the fibbonacci sequence. I use many other indicators also but not all together. I take many entry signals and put on many trades, sometimes simultaneously. If the Algo has multiple trades open then it is an indication of the strength of the current trend.
Like yourself I too have traded the FTSE, Dow, and the XJO but I have focused on the DAX primarily because to the length of their Trading day but also what I think is a healthy ATR in general. The XJO and FTSE can be a bit slow, and require are larger lotsize targeting a smaller number of pips which I have found to be risky. The Dow well it can be as crazy as the worst of them with huge sudden moves so I tend to steer clear of it. Also the DAX seems to like sticking to chart patterns a little bit better I think.
