Ed Seykota - one of the fathers of mechanized trading strategies
Ed Seykota is one of the first traders who was able to realize the idea of automatic trading strategies in
reality, despite the fact that personal computers had not yet been invented in that era.
His innovative views allowed him to go down in history as the most innovative trader, providing himself and his clients with stunning returns with virtually minimal intervention in the trading process.
Edward was born back in 1946 in the Netherlands. He spent the first years of his life in the town of Voorburg, but after another move he had to graduate from Den Haage school.
Difficult family circumstances forced the Seykota family to immigrate to the United States. A very young Edward had a passion for trading on the stock exchange from an early age, as his father was a broker and repeatedly taught the basic principles of trading futures and stocks.
First steps in the stock exchange world
Like any novice trader, Edward made a number of mistakes at the beginning of his journey, which, instead of stopping the beginner, on the contrary, pushed him to deeply study the market. A situation has developed in the silver market when the authorities have limited the production and sale of silver abroad.
A novice stock trader could not miss such fundamental news, because according to the laws of logic, if there is a shortage of metal in a country, this should immediately lead to an increase in the price of silver. Naturally, Ed invests half of his funds in the purchase of precious metal, or to be more precise, silver futures, but for unknown reasons the price begins to fall.
In bewilderment, Edward decides to buy more, but the price without a hitch continued to fall until the balance of the young stock trader was reset to zero. It was this incident that made Edward think about psychology and the weakness of fundamental analysis as such.
While studying various literature, Ed comes across a book by Richard Donchian, where the author argues and claims that it is a technical trading strategy based on dry mathematical calculations that will allow one to defeat unexpected passions in the market.
So Ed absorbs the idea of mechanical trading strategies, where the basic indicator is the moving average.
Getting started with automated trading.
At the age of 70, Edward got a job as an analyst at a major brokerage company ( http://time-forex.com/vsebrokery/brokerskie-kompanii-forex ). There he was able to realize his ideas for the first time and, using a computer, collected data and processed it using punched cards. Thanks to his work, Ed begins to manage the capital of the fund's investors, but due to repeated interference from management, the program did not give the maximum positive effect.
Once, when the broiler (chicken) market began to bearish mood, Ed sent out a letter to his investors asking them to refrain from buying positions, which the management of the brokerage company did not like, for which he was fired.
Edward Seykota, having recovered from his high-profile dismissal, has been on his own for 10 years. Thanks to his programs, he successfully increases his capital, as well as the capital of investors who trust him with money.
Some features of trading.
Believe it or not, Edward doesn't even have a chart with quotes, since his program does all the analysis and recommendations. Thanks to his innovative approach, Ed managed to set a record for increasing money for his clients, having traded from 5 thousand dollars to 15 million in just one account in 15 years, and what can we say about other investors.
Ed Seykota is the greatest personality who gave further impetus to the development of automatic trading systems , both in the stock exchange and in the forex market.