Become an Automated Trader
Here you will find our guide to becoming an automated trader. Written by QuantVue General Partner and Chief Technology Officer Anthony Garcia. He is the creator and coder of many of our algorithms.
Step 1: Understand what automation is, and what it is not
Automation is not "press play, make money," with minimal time investment and a 'get rich quick' scheme. If that's what you're looking for then you can email hello@quantvue.io within your first 30 days and get a refund if you're on the Elite membership. That does not exist at this price point for a retail trader - and anyone who tries to tell you it does is lying.
What automation for the retail trader really is, is a set of configurable strategies and tools that allow you to exploit an edge in the market when properly employed. We're handing you a tool box, it's your job to take those tools and apply the proper one to the task at hand. Don't worry, we'll give you a hand figuring out which tool applies and when.
Automation does not suddenly make someone who isn't a trader into one. It's not a magic bullet or a cure-all for a lack of intrinsic discipline or education. It allows you to remove some of the emotion and the subtlety out of finding entries and exits.
The best automated traders are those who test extensively and in an orderly manner. They take notes and record things. They are disciplined in their journey, and don't give in to emotions.
So, you still have work to do. And that's what this guide is for. By the end you'll have a pathway to getting yourself off the ground.
Step 2: Learn the habits of successful, and unsuccessful automated traders
We have now had well over a year of observing our customers, guiding them, and watching them succeed and fail. There are a few things that stand out about those who are successful and those who are not:
Successful customers will:
Pick a single strategy at a time to focus on.
Use established and forward tested settings in live accounts and save new sets of settings for demo environments only.
Run demo accounts for 1 to 2 months to thoroughly learn the way to operate the system, and how the strategy reacts in market environments.
Come up with rules (on their own or taken from other successful customers), follow those rules, and never break those rules.
Follow our advice to the letter.
Take ownership of their own mistakes, correct them, and don't repeat them.
Learn how the economy works, how reports impact it, and how the markets interpret them.
Understand they are not special, they are not smarter than the markets, and take all of this to heart and work hard.
Unsuccessful customers will:
Strategy hop, trying numerous strategies in a short period of time when one "doesn't work."
Use brand new sets of settings in live accounts that haven't been thoroughly tested.
Never use demos, and jump straight into paid evals.
Not follow rules, or follow them loosely.
Ignore our advice.
Blame everyone else for mistakes.
Not take the time to learn how the reports work or how the markets interpret them.
Believe they are special, will read all of this, and think it's nonsense.
Bar none, these are the differences I have personally observed. The ones posting profits day in and day out are in the successful category and they do those exact things.
If you do not want to be the person in the successful category, then you can get a refund if you're an Elite member in the first 30 days by emailing hello@quantvue.io.
Step 3: Prepare your workspace
If you're still reading, then hopefully at this point you understand that this is not a quick fix to your bank account, and you're ready to go on a journey. Great! Now we can begin.
It costs $12.95 a month, along with applicable data subscriptions for Tradovate and your charting platform. If you're on TradingView, you will need TradingView premium and the real-time data for the instruments you're going to trade.
Trading isn't cheap. You pay to play. If these minor costs are the deterrent for you, then you can still get a refund in the first 30 days if you are an Elite member. But by incurring the small fee for a paper account you will save yourself hundreds, potentially thousands, in prop eval fees.
Step 4: Watch our webinar for automated traders
The information in the webinar is extraordinarily vital no matter whether you're just an Elite user or you also have ATS. Some of it is ATS only information, but listen to the whole thing even if you're in Elite. We continually discuss basic concepts of automated trading.
Step 5: Decide how you are going to automate
If you have ATS, then the decision is already made since you have ATS.
If you do not have ATS, then you're either on TradingView or Ninjatrader. They both house different strategies, and no TradingView strategies are being ported to NinjaTrader.
If you want to try to automate Elite to prop firm accounts without ATS then you're limited to a few third party options like PickMyTrade, CrossTrade, or a few others. Be aware however that the latency is pretty bad and will delay trades by 2-3 seconds leading to significant slippage. We do not support or endorse any of these companies, they're mentioned here only for completeness.
Please note that QuantVue does not provide support on linking our strategies to these third parties. All third parties have a different linking procedure that they provide the documentation on. They are not our products so we do not have any sort of guide on the procedure.
Step 6: Decide what you're going to automate
You now need to decide which strategy you want to automate. The majority of our customers are automating either Qkronos, Qkronos_EVO, or Qzeus. The second two are ATS only.
There are numerous sets of settings for Qkronos and Qkronos_EVO. Visit our Discord, and look in the automated trading forum. The J12 settings are very popular and have resulted in tens of thousands in payouts for our members, but requires significant management. Qzeus on default settings has proven itself in forward testing for over a year, but is slow and may trade only a couple times per week.
Spend some time looking through the forum and learning. When you've decided which strategy you'd like to try go to the #automation-charts-layouts channel at the bottom or check the first post in the applicable thread in the automation forum and you'll be able to copy the chart and layout for the strategy into your own TradingView account.
Remember, whatever you pick you need to make a commitment to testing and learning. Do not strategy hop. Spend a month testing the strategy to truly learn how it works and responds. That commitment and testing procedure separates the successful from the unsuccessful.
Step 7: Educate yourself on your chosen strategy
Step 8: Set an alert and begin testing the automation
If you're using a third party connector, then consult their documentation.
Remember, this is running into your fake money account. Do not test into paid prop evaluations. Remember the webinar and the habits of successful traders from above?
Step 9: While it's testing over the next several weeks, educate yourself on the markets
You will now have plenty of time on your hands while the strategy tests and you can see how it behaves.
Learn about the basic reasons why it moves and how economic reports affect the markets. This information is vital to becoming a successful trader. You will need to know what the markets are expected to do if you are ever to know which tool in the toolbox to use.
Spend a lot of time in the Discord. Ask questions. Watch what other traders are doing.
Step 10: Develop your rules
The best way to do this is to look at consistently profitable automated traders in the discord's #profit-wins channel. Search their usernames and look at how they operate. Ask them questions to fill in the gaps.
You need a consistent and repeatable set of rules regarding how and when you will be running automation.
By now you should have a fairly decent understanding of where to start. If you're struggling with these steps, then drop us a line in the Discord.
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