Institutional Equivalent Education?

Sometimes it seems that almost everybody knows how to trade except a few newbies.
There are so many trading educators and Forex Gurus out there, so why is it that the Brokers are still in business?
I have searched for 7 years - almost full time. And have paid $3K and $5K several times for courses that ultimately I had no confidence in.

The Educator appeared to be able to trade their system, or at least be able to trade and finesse their system, but when I tried what appeared to be the same thing it often didn't work and I could find no real reason why.

In April 2014 I came across somebody who claimed to be able to show me not only how the markets work, but WHY they work like that.
And I found that as somebody said, the better the Why, the easier the How - at least for me.

I have spent a fair bit of money with this guy but this time I think it has been worth it.

If you are interested take a look at these recordings taken from His free (promotional) webinars.

https://mega.co.nz/#!Xg90GYjD!XpEDiQ...NiSylPUg2CRE5Q

https://mega.co.nz/#!u4UzWLzY!j6lOLe...KZW2MagzPeq7Fk

Oh and just to let you know, the guy I am talking about is the one with the Scottish accent in the first video clip (Ray) - not the Canadian in the second one (Steven).

If you want to see more free stuff from Ray, then you have to do a little work:

Go to http://compassfx.omnovia.com/proptraderexp and type in an email address (it doesn't have to be a real one) then enter the password goprop

You will then have to give a name.
This gets you to an Omnovia 'room', in which down at the bottom left there is a tab called documents
Click on that and you get a list of different recorded sessions:
from 01-29-15 Thursday Market Briefing ....
to 01-30-15 Friday Part 5

and also 10-17-14 friday Part 3 Intro minus Development
etc.

I just got an email from Carlos Diaz (of Foresight FX ) about whether it is a good idea to trade News Releases.

Of course he says no it isn't. But he obviously knows crap about how the Institutions trade News Releases (or even how the ex-Floor traders trade them).

The answer is a resounding YES, but trade them the right way. I traded the GU on the UK Manufacturing PMI this morning.
I traded it long for 15 pips (an Undercooked trade i.e price not reflecting the new post news fair value).
Then I traded it short off the spike high (an Overcooked i.e. price more than reflecting the new fair value) for another 10 pips.
I wish I had stayed with that 2nd trade because it just kept going.

The best 3 out of 4 good news trades ALL require you being able to calculate the new fair value based on the news announcement.
You can :
1. Trade the pre-news positioning by the big boys - all completed BEFORE the news comes out.
2. Trade a Contra (enter before news and exit after news) when too big a pre-news price move means that the news forecast is over factored in.
3. Trade and Undercooked or Overcooked ( entry and exit both after the news).
4. Trade a short term pullback in the impulsive move after a big news release.

All of those have high to decent strike rate and good to amazing Return to Risk.
But hardly anybody teaches them!

So you are probably wondering if All news releases can be traded like that?

All I can say to that is not by me they can't.

For me to trade a news release I need a nice uncomplicated release (not too many others out at the same time).
I need one that is historically predictable - one that previous fair value calculations would have given decent trades.
I need ones that are not too Huge or Spiky - I need to be able to get a trade on and exit it without paying a huge spread, or getting my stop loss spiked out.

My Broker doesn't offer MT4 on the my live account, so I use a demo for charting.
So please forgive the MT4 chart mark-up:

I have found another of Ray's old recordings (promoting a course last October)

http://www.compassfx.com/mastertrader/replay

http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?p=3717093

another guy from compassfx that was reviewed here (dean malone) not sure they are related but they do work at the same place

No, it isn't ! That Thread is about Dean Malone with some stuff about Ronnie.
Neither of which traded for the big institutions.

That thread ends in 2012 .

Ray only contacted Compass in 2014.
Before making any judgement, look at some of the recordings I have posted links to.
They are completely different from Ronnie method or Dean's Synergy.

Ray doesn't teach a method, he teaches you everything (that a retail trader can use) that you would be likely to learn on a trading desk at a big institution.

Ray has a contract at a London Prop Trading desk and is also a Quant. He commutes into London by air from Glasgow Scotland.

He does not work for Compass, they could not afford him.

He approached them because he wanted to see if it was possible to create a 'Prop trading Desk' in the retail space.
He is crazy - but that is good!

For full disclosure, I am a student not paid by Compass or anybody else.
I run a completely FREE self - help group for Ray's Students so we can learn faster and better.

Thanks for clarification. I am a quant myself (and also on big institution's trading desk). I am not sure you can use knowledge of how institutional traders trade to make money in retail. Institutionals provide liquidity and so have good view of the big flows going on in the market. That is not possible for retail traders. also institutionals have big loss bearing capacity (you know big banks lost over 100mm over CHF).

anyhow will check what Ray has to offer. always good to hear others viewpoints

Hi STT,
There aren't any freely available recordings which show the evidence of Ray's Algos at work.
As you know, retail cannot compete with Institutional Liquidity providers who use Algos and no spread.
But we can understand the areas where the Biggest institutions moving huge size will tend to get in, take profit , add more size and exit.
We can position ourselves alongside them, exiting or reversing where they take profit.
And because we are so small and nimble we can trade anywhere, unlike them we don't need deep liquidity and don't take days to get a position on or off.

Understanding the 3 institutional business models is imho the key to understanding the way the markets move:

Liquidity Providers want constant rotation as tight as possible and are happy just skimmimg a tick as price rotates. They don't want trends and get out of they way when they see big real orders.

The really big guys place such huge positions on that they need days to get enough size on. They need big trending moves and very deep liquidity ot both enter and exit.

The Predatory Prop Desks, like the ones Ray works with are the ultimate predator, they can enter and exit in medium depth liquidity and exploit both the Liquidity Providers and the really big guys. They have the closest business model to retail. Obviously they have advantages in being able to see the institutional book etc. But retail have the advantage of being able to trade (almost) anywhere.

Some of us have been reeling in the pips with Scenario Planning trades over the last few days. In this case only demo pips for me, because I am very cautious about leaving trades set up for while I am asleep. But the AU has given me 2 out of 2 winning trades overnight in demo (set and forget) of more than 3R and a contact of mine stayed up and traded both Kiwi and the Aussie for 3 out of 3 winning trades in her live account (over 2 nights) - each of more than 6R.

Until Ray came along I had never heard of this type of trade.
I now have 3 different institutional news trades in my arsenal.

Today you get a chance to see somebody who does know what he is talking about :

If you want to see Ray live , then you have to do a little work:

Go to http://compassfx.omnovia.com/proptraderexp and type in an email address (it doesn't have to be a real one) then enter the password goprop

You will then have to give a name.
This gets you to an Omnovia 'room'.

Also down at the bottom left there is a tab called documents
Click on that and you get a list of different recorded sessions:
Last nights Briefing is 02-05-15 Thursday Market Briefing Ray

The older ones are the same as before:-
from 01-29-15 Thursday Market Briefing ....
to 01-30-15 Friday Part 5

and also 10-17-14 friday Part 3 Intro minus Development
etc.

All he does is talk alot, I watched the one video and he just highlights how the market already moved. I thought it was live trading but no live trading. Anyone could do that.

Did I miss something ? Other then his accumulative delta bars

Thank You for dropping in. Were you in during the live NFP session? I am not sure what you expected to see. Ray is attempting to teach everything a Retail Trader can use that would be a part of the first year's training for a new prop desk trader. So only a few of his many different tables and charts were applicable during NFP.

Perhaps you were not aware that Ray was actually trading during most of that time prior to and after the NFP. Several times he said he had to adjust his S&P positions and his USDJPY position. Of course his contract with the Prop Firm that he is working for prohibits him calling out trades live in the room. All he can do is tell us which markets he is looking at for trades and in which price zone. Since he never 'pays up', this information also lets you know the intended trade direction.

The ex-Floor Trader (Steven) didn't find any suitable trades and so just showed the 'Wobble ' trade and why he did not take it on EURUSD or GBPUSD. That 'Wobble ' trade is the basis of a $1K course taught by an ex- Floor Trader that Steven knows form his own days on the'Floor'

I myself got a piece of the USDJPY long on the Wobble and then a piece of the Oil CFD long off the Blue Zone, for a total of 1.26% gain on my account (initial risk 0.5%) which I reported in the room. I was far too hasty to exit on the Oil trade, but then it was the end of a long and successful week +4.74% gain on my account - so not quite as good as an average week. Note that I am not yet a successful trader since it is too soon to say if I have conquered my trading psychology problems.

I noticed that some people were expecting to see an indicator based system. It is institutional style trading, so is all based off Fundamentals and analysis of Bond yeild curves and the different COT tabs for Dealers and Asset Managers. Then the pullbacks within the Macro-trends are traded using Order Flow, Price Action, Volume Analysis and Technical Analysis. Ray tells us that if you can't be profitable with just price and volume, then you don't understand the way the market moves well enough to be consistently profitable no matter how many indicators you use. Ray shows just about every way he can find to help us trade like an institution.

His own Algos measure Buying and Selling pressure by executing 'probe' sized trades and checking the response. Retail traders can't do that (not big enough to be able to move the market with a small fraction of our normal position size). So he shows us how to use Cumulative Market Delta and/or Footprint Charts plus Price Action and Volume Analysis in order to get an approximation of the true Order Flow.

Catching up on old email in one of my lesser used email accounts I came across this short article on Market Profile.

http://www.traderplanet.com/newslett...istribution:8/

P Steidlmayer (its chief Author) did freely admit that you cant make a profit just by using Market profile, but Ray does teach its simplified concepts in order for students to understand the Market Auction Process.

So far as using it as an indicator is concerned, personally I prefer Volume Profile.

Ray is doing a live trading session Friday 13th February at 8am Eastern :

Go to http://compassfx.omnovia.com/proptraderexp and type in an email address (it doesn't have to be a real one) then enter the password goprop

You will then have to give a name.
This gets you to an Omnovia 'room'

There is also a live Briefing event Thursday 12th February at 6pm Eastern where Ray will go over trades from the day and lay out plans for trades on Friday.
This one is in gotowebinar, so you have to register:

https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8562729740223820289

It is being claimed that Ray traded a $50,000 LIVE Account to over $787,031.25 since Jan 11, 2015 .

This is misleading since it was NOT a retail account, so he did not have to put up any Margin.

American friends inform me that to trade the way Ray did (aggressive Gamma Scalping) a retail trader might have to up up as much as $500,000 due to the punitive regulations and nervous Brokers.

Still a very worst case of +157% in 1 month is still quite impressive.