Workshop FAQ
FAQ
- Model “X”
- Cost
- NDA
- Comparison to the Video Courses
- Beginners
- CFDs
- Online Workshop
- Account size
- Data
- Software
- Orders
- Strategies
- Live Trading
Model “X”
Q. If I attend the Key Breakout Workshop I’m wondering if 1 week is enough to absorb the information before learning another model from your Model X Workshop? Thanks.
You’ll certainly understand the content of Key Breakout and PortX³ as I distribute the manuals during the week before the Workshop. All attendees are encouraged to read the manuals so the Workshop becomes a reinforcing function to thoroughly understand the content. Attending Model X one week later should not be too challenging as both my strategies, Key Breakout and Model X, are relatively simple.
I hope this helps.
Cost
Q. Do you offer a money back guarantee if I don’t like your Workshop and strategies?
Unfortunately not. I fully disclose everything and once seen, it can’t be unseen. I’m sorry.
Q. I have been burned in the past by up-sells, and proprietary subscriptions, etc. Is everything to understand Key Breakout and PortX³ included in the AUD5,500 Workshop price or are there extra costs?
Everything is included in the Workshop. Everything is fully disclosed. There are no after Workshop add-on sales pitches. There are no add-on subscriptions. Everything is fully disclosed.
NDA – Non-Disclosure Agreement
Q. You say attendees will need to sign a non disclosure agreement. Why do you require one when your Workshop is an online event?
It’s because I take my IP seriously. It’s an unfortunate situation in this enterprise of trading where very little works. Very little. Despite hundreds of books written on trading very few contain any ideas that actually work and are durable through time. Key Breakout works with 17+ years of positive out-of-sample performance. PortX³ is unique and is a game changer for small private traders. I value both very highly. I ask attendees to also value them very highly by agreeing to not disclose them to third parties.
Comparison to the Video Courses
Q. How is the Workshop different from your Introductory, Intermediate and Advance video courses?
In a nut shell the main difference is Key Breakout’s out-of-sample performance and length of live trading. Please refer to the comparison table below.
Beginners
Q. I’m a novice without much trading experience. Is your Workshop suitable for beginners?
The short answer is no.
The long answer is that it’s not ideal for beginner traders, but rather is aimed towards more experienced traders. I will be sharing an extraordinary amount of information which I feel would overwhelm someone new to trading.
I’d suggest an alternative course of action if you’re new to trading.
For beginners I’d suggest its best to start first with reading my two books;
- The Universal Principles of Successful Trading (Wiley, 2010) and
- The Universal Tactics of Successful Trend Trading (Wiley, 2020)
If you like what you read I’d then suggest you do my introductory video course The Truth About Trading.
It’s inexpensive at AUD149.99 and it will be money that you will not regret spending. I actually think it will be the best AUD149.9 you will ever spend on your trading education.
If you like what you learn, and your objective is to embrace a good process of trading, which is primary to secondary considerations like markets, instruments and timeframes, then you should consider doing my intermediate video course the Pathway to Sustainable Trading.
I believe my Pathway to Sustainable Trading course represents the best value of money on my web site and is the ideal destination for a beginner trader.
Q. If after the 90-days of live trading I’m still unsure of the strategies will you still be able to offer any assistance?
Yes. Any trader who has ever attended any of my Workshops can still ask me a question whenever they like.
So I won’t be disappearing after 90 days. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask me.
Also please remember you will have 6-month access to the Workshop’s video recordings.
CFDs
Q. Does Key Breakout work on other derivative markets like CFD’s? Or is it all just purely Futures contracts only?
I really can’t say as I don’t trade CFDs.
However since they’re similar in both being derivatives and both being priced off the same underlying physical cash market, you’d expect them to behave or trade the same.
If this is correct then I’d expect Key Breakout would work on CFDs.
But as I’ve said I can’t say it with any authority as I’ve never traded CFDs.
Online Workshop
Q. I may have to miss part of the Workshop. Will there be video recordings made available so I catch up on what I miss?
Yes. I will be recording the Workshop and attendees will receive 6-month access to the video recordings.
Q. I assume the $5,500 cost of the Workshop is in Australian Dollars, am I correct?
Yes, the cost is in AUD.
Q. Will a video recording be made available?
Yes. Attendees will have 6-month access to the Workshop’s video recordings.
Q. I know the Workshop will be recorded and the recordings will be available afterwards. It is very unlikely, but if I suddenly have other important commitments over that weekend and I cannot attend the live Workshop, can I watch the recordings on Mon/Tues/Wed to catch up on everything before I attend your 90 days live trading?
Yes. You can watch the recordings following the weekend Workshop. It’s my plan to give attendees a week to process the information before commencing live trading.
Account Size
Q. What account size would I need to trade Key Breakout?
This is a problematic question for me since if falls into “personal” advice which I’m not licensed to give. In addition not every trader is the same in regards to their individual risk appetite (drawdown tolerance), financial position (amount of risk capital) and investment objectives.
However, from a general perspective Key Breakout combined with PortX³ is flexible enough to be used by all traders regardless of account size or risk tolerance.
Flexible in that traders can choose anyone of 4 trade plans to use.
Flexible in that traders can choose the number of markets they’d like to trade.
Traders with say only a $10,000 account could choose to trade only one or two markets, depending on their own level of individual risk tolerance.
For help in determining what is an appropriate account size to trade with you can refer to the following link: Starter Account
For initial help in determining what is an appropriate portfolio to trade you can refer to the following link: Portfolios
For additional help on determining an even better approach to creating small portfolios attendees of my Workshop will learn PortX³, my proprietary portfolio construction technique. I believe learning PortX³ alone will be worth the price to attend my Workshop. :o)
Data
Q. What data provider do you use?
I use Premium Data and Data Tools futures data; https://www.premiumdata.net/products/datatools/index.php
Software
Q. I can see attendees will receive all historical trades in an excel file to assist with validation. You say you do all your own programming in VBA for Excel. Will attendees also receive your excel file where all the systems are already programmed in it?
Unfortunately no. I’m not a software/charting guy. I only make available and teach the methodologies that I fully disclose. Apart from the trade history file which I supply in excel I do not provide any software. I’m sorry.
However I am happy to introduce attendees to a trader of mine who can help traders in coding Key Breakout and PortX³ in RealTest. Please refer to my Software page.
Q. Your FAQ section indicates that you do all of your programming in visual basic for excel. So if you already have the strategies programmed in excel then why don’t you offer them to attendees? Your Workshop page makes it sound very easy to trade where attendees will not need to give up their day job. If attendees have to follow a lot of manual chart instructions then it’s going to take a lot longer time.
Although I do all my own programming in VBA for excel I’m not a programmer.
My VBA excel models are good enough for me, but they’re not polished/professional enough for third party sale.
Without a doubt attendees who can code up the models in their trading/charting software will be a better positioned to both validate and trade the models.
Software without a doubt speeds everything up.
And I am happy to introduce attendees to a trader of mine who can help traders in coding Key Breakout and PortX³ in RealTest. Please refer to my Software page.
I will be encouraging attendees to code up and validate the strategies as checking historical trades without software is time consuming.
Once a trader knows and has validated the strategies with software and gets organized, they should be able to spend no more then an hour each day managing open positions, finding new setups and placing orders before the next session starts.
Orders and stops are placed on a set and forget basis.
There is no need to watch the markets intra day.
But it will take hard work to study, validate and get organised.
As I say above a requirement to attend my Workshop is an open mind and preparedness to work hard.
Q. Would you be able to provide the code behind Key Breakout and PortX³?
Unfortunately no. Although I do all my own programming in VBA for Excel (Visual Basic for Application) I’m not a software guy. I do not offer/sell software with my strategies. My whole focus is to fully disclose all the trading rules behind the strategies I teach. Nothing is locked, hidden or held back. Naturally people can contact me if they have any questions. No worries at all.
However I’m fully aware many traders are looking for a suitable software solution. For those interested in help in coding up Key Breakout and PortX³ I’m happy to introduce students to a trader of mine who is very familiar with Marsten Parker’s RealTest program. Please refer to my Software page.
Q. Can you help me in programming Key Breakout and PortX³?
Where I can I will.
However you have to understand I’m not familiar with the current back-testing packages available today. Although I owned Trade Station 4 back in the 1990s I only opened it a few times to realize that Easy Language didn’t look that easy! So I went off and learnt VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) for Excel.
But if I can help, I will.
Also for those interested in help in coding up Key Breakout and PortX³ in Marsten Parker’s RealTest program I’m happy to introduce them to a trader of mine who is very familiar with it. Please refer to my Software page.
Q. I use MultiCharts exclusively, although I can use Tradestation as a possible alternate. Will this be adequate to be self sufficient?
Although I don’t use either MultiCharts or TradeStation (I use VBA for Excel) I believe they should be fine due for a few reasons;
- What I do, once it’s understood, is relatively easy,
- They are both leading charting programs and
- Students of mine do use both MultiCharts and TradeStation.
Q. Do you use any software like e.g.TradeStation/Multicharts to generate trades according your strategies?
No. For software I do all my coding in VBA (Visual Basic for Application) for Excel.
And I enter all my orders manually into Interactive Broker’s Trader Workstation.
Q. Can you recommend an appropriate trading/charting program?
This is a difficult question for me as I haven’t used a third party trading/backtesting program since 1998 when I purchased Trade Station 4, only to realize Easy Language wasn’t that easy! I subsequently threw myself into learning VBA (Visual Basic for Application) for Excel and have used it ever since. So unfortunately I don’t have any first hand experience with any current commercially available off the shelf packages.
However students of mine do use the following packages that you may like to review;
- RealTest
- AmiBroker
- Multicharts
- Trade Navigator
- TradeStation
- Trading Blox
However one program that has caught my attention is Marsten Parker’s RealTest program. Please refer to my Software page.
Orders
Q. Can you please list the type of futures orders Key Breakout uses? I use Interactive Brokers TWS for my stocks and futures trading. I only want to use simple futures orders. I don’t want to do complex ones.
The majority of entry orders are on “stop”.
This is a screen shot of the first page of my current IB TWS orders.
Strategies
Q. How many strategies will you be teaching and what kind are they?
I thought I was clear on that one. :o)
I’ll be teaching Key Breakout which consists of 3 patterns.
Q. What timeframe does Key Breakout operate on?
That depends on the trade plan applied to Key Breakout. The model comes with 4 trade plans. Please refer to the Workshop page for more details.
Q. Is Key Breakout similar to the Donchian/Turtle breakout strategies?
No.
Q. Could you share the nature/concept/idea/belief behind Key Breakout?
Key Breakout is a trend following strategy that enters on an impulse, or breakout move. And I should say here, before you ask me, Key Breakout does not enter on a volatility expansion.
Q. Will you share your development or evaluation process?
It’s not my plan to, however no doubt during the Workshop I may discuss where the original idea/s came from. However if you wish to learn how I develop strategies you should get yourself a copy of my book Universal Tactics of Successful Trend Trading (Wiley, 2020) where I discuss my process and/or consider undertaking my advance video course Strategy Building, introducing Universal Bandit.
Q. Can you please share with me Key Breakout’s SQN score?
Yes.
SQN
- Key Breakout 7.5
Now before you get too excited I think I need to share with you my thought’s on Van Tharp’s SQN metric.
And since not everyone reading this will be familiar with Van’s SQN I think I’ll need to spend some time unpacking it.
Please refer to the following page for my thoughts on SQN. Van Tharp’s SQN
Q. How many indicators and optimisable variables are in Key Breakout?
Good question. If you have read my books you’ll be aware that I’m not a fan of variable dependent indicators that can be tweaked to produce picture perfect historical equity curves.
The simple answer is;
- Strategy Variables
- Key Breakout 1
And during the last 17 years since its release I have never tweak Key Breakout’s single variable!
Q. Does Key Breakout have any bias to the long or short side?
Great question. No. Key Breakout is both homogeneous and symmetrical.
Homogeneous in that Key Breakout uses the same setup for all markets and uses the same variable value for all markets.
Symmetrical in that Key Breakout uses the same pattern (but reverse) and same variable vale for both buy and sell setups.
Please understand these homogeneous and symmetrical attributes are the key reasons for Key Breakout’s robustness as evident by its 17+ years of positive out-of-sample robustness.
If you view the split in profits for Key Breakout across all 4 trade plans you’ll see its roughly balanced between buy and sell setups. There is no bias to either the long or short side.
Q. Is Key Breakout based on daily data?
Yes. I only trade off end of day data so I only use the open, high, low and close. I don’t use volume. Key Breakout does use weekly data but I build the weekly bars off my daily bars.
Q. Does Key Breakout work off intraday data? Or have you tested it on intraday data?
No. Key Breakout works off end of day data. I’m not a day trader so I haven’t tested my strategies on intra-day data. However, being universal in nature, I wouldn’t be surprised if Key Breakout did have an intra-day edge, but that is only my opinion and is not based on any historical scrutiny.
Live Trading
Q. Do I have to watch the markets to trade Key Breakout?
No. I follow a “set-and-forget” process where I trade off end-of-day bars. Once a session has finished traders can start to look for a Key Breakout pattern setup. If a setup exists then they can email/enter their order instructions (entry/stop/exit etc) before the next session starts. Once everything is entered they can relax or forget the market/s until the following session ends. Although I trade multiple strategies over multiple timeframes over 30+ markets I do not watch the markets. My daily operational job is to collect/download my end of day daily data, run my models which search for new setups and monitor open positions. I will then enter all the new order and trade management instructions before the markets open. Once I have done that I can “set-and-forget” or be relaxed about the markets. So there is no need to watch the markets or leave your day job. :o)
Q. It looks like all the futures you trade are in the US. Does this mean I have to trade during the US open hours?
Yes and no.
Yes, if you wish to trade the same futures as me. Your orders will need to be live during the US open hours.
No, in that you don’t have to be awake during US hours. I’m not. You just need to have entered your orders on a “set and forget” basis (entry and stop) before the start of the US session.
For myself, since I’m based in Sydney, Australia, I make sure my orders are entered before the next session begins in the US. As a result I’m asleep when my orders get triggered during the US session. When I wake up I get to work checking my IB TWS to see what was triggered and what was not.
Q. How will the 90-days of live trading work?
I’ll deliver my 90-days of live trading through my Daily Study Guide.
The Daily Study Guide has two parts, the setups and a chart example.
For the setups I will send out an email detailing each markets’;
- Trade management instructions for all open positions and
- Trade orders for all new setups
Before attendees open the email they should attempt to work out the trade management instructions and new setups for themselves. They should use my email as a checking mechanism.
The second part includes a detailed chart example for one particular Key Breakout setup. Included in the chart example is a copy of my actual IB order.
The Daily Study Guide will go out before the start of the next session.
Now the whole point of my Daily Study Guide emails is not for me to do all the work but to allow attendees to check their own daily analysis and order preparation against mine. If there are any discrepancies attendees can then email me with their question/s.
I believe it’s only through daily repetition of seeing strategy setups develop live in real markets that we as traders can really learn a strategy and really create new and sustainable trading habits.
Q. I know the Workshop will be recorded and the recording will be available afterwards. It is very unlikely, but if I suddenly have other important commitments over that weekend and I cannot attend the live Workshop, can I watch the recordings on Mon/Tues/Wed to catch up on everything before I attend your 90 days live trading?
Yes. You can watch the recordings following the weekend Workshop. It’s my plan to give attendees a week to process the information before commencing live trading.
Q. I see that the Workshop will be recorded which I’ll need since I most likely will not be able to attend live. I see there is a bonus component where we can watch you trade live for 90 days. Will the live trading be recorded as well for me to watch?
No, the 90 days of live trading will not be recorded. I’ll be delivering my live trading through my Daily Study Guide that will contain a copy of my orders before the markets open.