You are definitely at the cutting edge of working in, and with, trading groups.... no doubt the trading capability of your group, or at least the
potential, exceeds mine. It just happens that I don't have the capacity to work in trading groups ... I am too grumpy for a start. I think that there are individuals in this forum who are at the cutting edge in any trading area. I noticed recently that a lot of the literature I referenced this month all came out of NewYork ... Covel, Steenberger, Mandelbrot ... to close a collaboration seems a little incestous and unhealthy to me. I think the diversity and freshness of this forum is an advantage ... a little intragroup tension is healthy too. Another observation I have made is that the distinction between investors and traders is arbitrary ... we are all in the business of engineering returns to maximise reward and minimise risk. Everything that I do has been influenced by academic financial theory that has filtered down to the institutions and from there to me, via books, websites and discussion boards. On the flip side I believe that the investigations made by retail traders should be of interest to institutional investors (its a pool of research they can tap into) ... that is why I return the favour by 'publishing' as much of my efforts as I can (except for my core 5%). So, over to your discussion: <snip>This can also be useful when traders use different data sources - often screens and signals vary with data source.<snip> Given that your trading friends are using different datasources etc ... do they get different results on average i.e. is the distribution of their trade series, using the same system, on the same instrument significantly different? It seems to me that in any group their is always a compromise between individual interpretation and application and the group function (going to the well to draw the water). This seems to be evidenced by the fact that you are using different data? Are you all using the same broker? If you use different brokers is there any evidence of a marked difference in 'slippage'? I think your statement below indicates that you are thinking about the group dynamics as much as a method to implement your group developed systems. <snip>In an extreme application remote trading could be employed to give traders more freedom. The system would only place trades if there is a majority consensus. A trader could take a short break while his system tracks the others<snip> I am considering the axiom that majority consensus is an old world model .... I don't think this operates in alphagroups ... if it does it is subliminal ... no vote is ever taken. <snip>Being able to share signals and trades in real time could also be used to distribute processing.<snip> The benefits of parallel processing could be outweighed by the time penalty involved in transmitting the signals/consensus decision etc. When it comes to speed etc ... how could we beat an institution that is sitting on top of the markets with big pipes, wall to wall servers and distributed processing? There is no reason to believe that institutional traders aren't as smart as us or can't design systems as well as what we can? <snip>Now, whether "email" would be the right tool to use is another question...<snip> I think that your chosen group model determines the tools you should use e.g. you might interact, in the way that programmers typically work on group projects, to design your systems and then consider the options for implementation: - hypothetical synchronized models .... collectively design and implement algorithmic trading of your system(s) .... a mother server controls the computers of the group members at different locations .... OR an agreed algorithmic method is common to individual computers and you take turns to trade the system at each location according to a roster (round the clock implementation with different people living in different timezones OR you implement your collective algorithmic trading from the location of the member who is closest to the market. - hypothetical fluid models ... the group designs systems collectively and individuals trade different models separately OR on behalf of the group i.e. with a pooled account (diversification by trader?) etc These are all hypothetical ideals though. In reality group friction will always detract from the ideal .... no matter what. We will only achieve 'one mind' when the universe dissolves back into the 'womb of the creator'. This forum is about as close to trading co-operation as I am going to get ... I am not up to anything beyond informal discussion.
