Jun
9
Performance Measures, from Stefan Martinek
June 9, 2016 |
When we research strategies, there is a need to measure performance. Some techniques like volatility targeting tend to improve more the equity based measures (e.g. Sharpe, Sortino) but damage or not improve the trade based measures (e.g. Profit Factor, Expectancy). Some techniques like term structure used in asymmetric sizing tend to improve more the trade based measures. Is there any clear argument for or against equity vs. trade based performance statistics?
Rocky Humbert writes:
Ed Seykota was fond of saying "Everyone gets what they want out of the markets."
That's an elegant way of saying that every investor has their own utility curve.
So an answer to your question is it depends on what portfolio/trade parameters that you are trying to maximize and minimize. Each of the approaches that you describe involves some sort of a trade-off. Academics will talk about optimally efficient frontiers, but for practitioners who are in the markets for the long run, I believe it's a function of what you and your investors want to achieve and most importantly, maintaining the discipline to consistently apply the tools that you mention.
There are many paths to heaven. There is no free lunch.
Bill Rafter writes:
We prefer equity stats. Our primary metric for longer term research is (Compound Annual ROR)/(Max Drawdown). For example, the equities markets depending on the period chosen tend to have a CAROR in the single digits, while having max drawdowns of ~55 percent. With work and diversification you can invert those numbers such that the ratio is greater than 1. Most of your success will come as a result of reducing losses.
In theory one might argue that if you take care of the trade stats, the equity stats will take care of themselves. As in, fight the battles and the war will take care of itself. This is most exemplified by HFT. If that is the trading time frame of your choice, then by all means go with that. However it is hard for the individual to compete in the HFT framework, meaning that you will probably have to lengthen your trading, gleaning greater gains, but also larger losses. Eventually I think you will come around to preferring the equity stats. But your choice is going to be subjective or trading-plan-specific, which agrees with Rocky's every investor having their own utility curve.
anonymous writes:
The conception of Seykota's quote as a utility curve is Rocky's. Seykota might have been making a point about market psychology more akin to a Deepak Chopra quote. That's not to say that Seykota did not make money trading. My sense was that his idea about everyone getting what they want from markets applied to those who might have hidden motivations in things other than in optimized financial gain according to a risk adjusted measure.
Comments
WordPress database error: [Table './dailyspeculations_com_@002d_dailywordpress/wp_comments' is marked as crashed and last (automatic?) repair failed]
SELECT * FROM wp_comments WHERE comment_post_ID = '11112' AND comment_approved = '1' ORDER BY comment_date
Archives
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- October 2019
- September 2019
- August 2019
- July 2019
- June 2019
- May 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- January 2019
- December 2018
- November 2018
- October 2018
- September 2018
- August 2018
- July 2018
- June 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
- March 2018
- February 2018
- January 2018
- December 2017
- November 2017
- October 2017
- September 2017
- August 2017
- July 2017
- June 2017
- May 2017
- April 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- January 2017
- December 2016
- November 2016
- October 2016
- September 2016
- August 2016
- July 2016
- June 2016
- May 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
- January 2016
- December 2015
- November 2015
- October 2015
- September 2015
- August 2015
- July 2015
- June 2015
- May 2015
- April 2015
- March 2015
- February 2015
- January 2015
- December 2014
- November 2014
- October 2014
- September 2014
- August 2014
- July 2014
- June 2014
- May 2014
- April 2014
- March 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- November 2013
- October 2013
- September 2013
- August 2013
- July 2013
- June 2013
- May 2013
- April 2013
- March 2013
- February 2013
- January 2013
- December 2012
- November 2012
- October 2012
- September 2012
- August 2012
- July 2012
- June 2012
- May 2012
- April 2012
- March 2012
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
- September 2007
- August 2007
- July 2007
- June 2007
- May 2007
- April 2007
- March 2007
- February 2007
- January 2007
- December 2006
- November 2006
- October 2006
- September 2006
- August 2006
- Older Archives
Resources & Links
- The Letters Prize
- Pre-2007 Victor Niederhoffer Posts
- Vic’s NYC Junto
- Reading List
- Programming in 60 Seconds
- The Objectivist Center
- Foundation for Economic Education
- Tigerchess
- Dick Sears' G.T. Index
- Pre-2007 Daily Speculations
- Laurel & Vics' Worldly Investor Articles