Not Just for DayTraders

In the Real Traders section of this web page, one of our users (Eric Hoyle) said it best:

"The DayTrader is great because it allows you to use a lot more data over shorter time periods. Shorter periods are particularly advantageous when the markets are rapidly changing. I now train my nets on only a month or two of data, using 10-minute bar increments. I may not technically be 'day trading,' however, day trading is not necessarily my goal. My trades typically last two or three days …"

Eric's comment notes that with the NeuroShell DayTrader Pro, it is possible to get a lot more data in a shorter period of time. You'd like more data for more robust models, but you'd like not to model ancient history. The NS DayTrader solves that problem.

There is another reason why end-of-day position traders may want to use the NeuroShell DayTrader. Many trading systems rely on intraday information, even if the practitioners don't consider themselves daytraders.

For example, many systems don't depend upon orders placed at the end of the day for market order or even limit order fills the next day. The order might be placed after evaluating early trading. It might be placed near what looks like a low point of the day. Some schemes may look back during the same day to decide how to set stops, or how to exit. Some depend upon knowledge of the day's open, or the low or high so far for the day. All of those things are difficult or impossible without the NeuroShell DayTrader.

Data Feeds

You will no doubt want an intraday data feed with the NeuroShell DayTrader Professional. We support several intraday data feeds that can supply historical as well as up to the minute prices over the internet. Click here for details.


Popular Issues are Now More Amenable to Modeling Technology

One interesting thing about the NeuroShell DayTrader is that it opens a whole new world in terms of what stocks or other issues are predictable. For the first time, you can use neural nets on rapidly rising stocks like Yahoo, AOL, and Dell, because they fluctuate greatly during the day, even though they mostly go up on a daily basis (at least they did prior to the new year!). 

You can use neural nets on rapidly rising stocks with the DayTrader because they fluctuate during the day.

Avoiding Overnight Price Jumps

Another interesting thing is that now you can avoid the gaps between today's close and tomorrow's open, gaps that often aren't explained by technical indicators. Get in and out of an issue as many times as you wish during the day, and close the position at the end of the day. 

You can avoid the gaps between today's close and tomorrow's open with the DayTrader.

This "gap avoidance" is done in two ways. First, when you insert an indicator, you can check a box that instructs that the indicator NOT be computed across day boundaries. Neural nets will not train on bars where the input indicators are missing.

An option can prevent an indicator from computing over day boundaries.

Second, you can add trading strategy conditions based on time of day. For example, you can enter a trade if both of the following conditions are true:

Your Indicator > 50
Time < 3:30 PM

Then you might want to exit if either of the following is true:

Your Indicator < -50
Time > 3:45 PM

Simple Models and Less Data

In our experience, the more complicated models that are needed for end-of-day position trading are not necessary for intraday trading. Simple models often work well. 

Furthermore, since you are dealing with shorter bars, you won't have to go back years in time to build neural nets and backtest strategies. That way you aren't using training sets on market conditions that are now ancient history. If you download 2 days of 1 minute bars, you have the rough equivalent of 3 years of daily bars. Training sets of just the last few days are not only feasible but also advisable in our opinion.

On the other hand, some will disagree with us (after all, that's what the Trader is all about: building models the way YOU want them instead of how someone else tells you models should be built!). Some will feel that longer periods may be better for training to pick up trends. If you use 90 trading days of 30 minute bars, you will have about 1170 bars, roughly equivalent to around 4.5 years of daily bars! So still, you do not have to go back to the Stone Age for data.

Interface

The interface for the NeuroShell DayTrader is basically identical to the interface of the NeuroShell Trader Professional. The first difference you may notice is that instead of just daily, weekly, and monthly bars, you can also chose smaller intraday bars down to 1 minute bars. (Note: even though we only go as low as 1 minute bars, you can still see the ticks as they change the current bar being built.)

Smaller bars have been added for intraday purposes.

The next difference you will see is that the charts are no longer just daily. Since the bars occur all day, the charts can be zoomed in to intervals less than one day.

Charts can be zoomed in to intervals less than one day.

The third difference is that other intervals such as training periods, evaluation periods, backtest periods, etc., can also be chosen in smaller time intervals.

Backtest, evaluation, and training periods can be chosen in smaller time intervals.

Daily Data Too!

It is worth noting that our intraday servers can also supply daily data as well as intraday data. Just check the little box marked "Use server as an end-of-day source". Then, when you load a daily, weekly, or monthly chart, the intraday server will download the data. Downloading usually takes only a few seconds for about 10 or 12 years of data, but could take longer during busy periods.