Simpler Trading – The Simpler Trend Trading System

There are not a whole lot of different ways that trend following can be done. The minor tweaks may have positive results but the effect is usually very minor. If you spend too much time looking at minor variations of entry rules you risk missing the important parts. The truth is that most trend following system rules do the same thing. They show highly similar results simply because they attempt to achieve the same thing. By all means, play around with the detailed rules. Just make sure you do that after you have tried the basic strategy. Understand where the value come from first and you’ll realize just how little the entry rules really mean.

The value in professional trend following strategies come from the diversification. The rules presented here are good enough to achieve results on par with the large trend following futures hedge funds. Making the rules more complex does not aid your performance. The most common amateur mistake is to spend all the time tweaking entry and exit rules and not enough analyzing position sizing and investment universe.

The simple rules presented here are good enough to replicate the performance of many large name trend following hedge funds with high precision and correlation. In my book I detail several ways this can be further enhanced and improved upon. Make no mistake though. The trading system rules is the least important component of your trend following trading strategy.