What is Best? Manual or EA

Just a discussion thread about the experience of using manual style of trading verses the automatic style.
I have used both and I am very skeptical about the ea I have seen or tried.
Luckily they were used on a demo with no real money lost.

Best manual styles
Verses
Best Ea
Anyone one want reveal their success stories!

well if you have a system for trading, it is better done by computer than by you because of the cold calculated nature of machine

but....

that does not mean EAs are necessarily the right answer. plenty crash and burn..... know the strength and weakness of the EA, and then accept risk

The short answer, both.

The long answer:

This is the same argument as those who go back and forth between fundamentals and technical trading.

Personally I use both EAs and manual trading. My logic is pretty simple:

Many systems here on FF have mechanical entries. Thus, an EA can be used to get you into a trade. The main problem is that the exit strategies of these systems is almost never nearly as developed as the entry strategy. That's where my manual trading comes in. I have trained myself to focus almost exclusively on the exit strategy and coupled with my coin toss training method, I am able to make my account grow on a coin toss. So, couple the positive edge given by the mechanical entries, and the positive edge I can get with my manual exits, I have a super system of sorts.

Add to the above that I trade with several EAs, which I turn on and off based on the current state of the market. Let's say I had 10 trending EAs, and I turn them all on, and a super trend comes on. I have a large position which keeps getting added to in the direction of the trend, and that allows me to bank huge profits with reduced risk.

If you want to learn to trade then manual is best because it forces you to watch price action. It takes a huge amount of live price action experience to be able to begin to recognize set ups that actually favor one direction over another. If there was such a thing as a reliable ea, I would ditch screen watching and let it fill up my account while I went fishing. That is never going to happen cause such a thing would cost more than the earth to obtain or, could be sold for as much if I ever developed it. Having said that, if you were able to manually select trades profitably (& that's a pretty big "if"), I wouldn't be opposed to an ea to help manage them. There are lots of aspects of my techniques that could be handled better mechanically.

Hey; It's your Money. If you want to give it to a .bot then go ahead. Me; I don't think so.

If the EA is good and has given 12 months of consistent profits then I do not mind using it.

I think that most systems with human discretion allowed (i.e. a "manual" system), in the hands of most traders, are bound to fail.

Of course, there are traders that use a very high level of discipline and control that can do well with systems that allow discretion but they are few & far in between. I am not one of them, therefore I use a very strict "black box" system that decides when to trade and carries out the trade for me. I only monitor a couple of basic things to make sure that the system is running properly, but otherwise I just let it run and let it do its thing.

Fact is that good EAs are veery very rare. Out of 1000 that you will find on the Net maybe one has the potential to make money over a longer time period.

This question has been asked a few times on the forum. Personally, I really like ea's but you have to learn programming on your own or modify stuff by coders guru or others like him. Not easy..thats for sure. Sometimes you miss nice moves with ea and sometimes you get chopped up with a hatchet... I think the market is designed to take both the buyers and the sellers out so whatever you develop has to be lightening fast but still have the art of trading in place. I think manual traders have it better in the regard of securing profit/pips for the day but worse if they have a day job and they need this cash as an occupation. Whats fun is there is a lot of money to be had if you can make it work...I would say though, coming up on 4 years for me; there is a lot of ups and downs in this field. It may take me another few just to get used to winning and losing. Some real experienced posters/traders giving you the advice so you may want to take it.

unless I'm a blind and deaf man ..... manual

If one is able to trade a mechanical system manually with success then why not try automating it. Otherwise stay away. Today there are many people who are trading with EAs and they do not even have a basic understanding of the way these programs operate. Trust me, market conditions will change and almost all of them will burn their accounts, then they will come here to tell us that it is impossible to earn money with automated trading.

manual trading you have greed, fear, and many other emotions. that interfere with your trading.

EA trading, the problem is the rules are set in stone and when the market changes its Pulse, personality, or maybe its speed. than the EA is not good for trading.

my advice. learn both. but treat your EAs as employees and keep them on a short leash

My manual style is just basic chart reading. I would not know where to begin in programming it. Plus it is over 10 years since the last time I have written anycode.

Lots of good responses here already. Interesting one from RR, who has been making EAs since he was one year old. If anyone would know about EAs, it's him. My thoughts are that you really need both. If you don't know a thing about trading, an EA can get you into trouble. I like EAs, because they can trade for me while I'm not here, and saves me from constant chart watching. I also like them because they are unemotional, and place trades based on a set of rules that humans sometimes won't follow.