To Optimize or not to Optimize ? ... The winalot and EAzeGor expert advisors

If you have been reading my blog recently you may have read my reviews on the winalot and EAzeGor expert advisors made by the easy-ea company. You may have noticed that both of these reviews had a quiet favorable tone to them because I think both of this experts fulfill a good chunk of my criteria for a long term profitable expert advisor. However, I did say in both cases that backtesting from 1999 was missing and that such testing would be necessary to assess long term profitability.

After requesting backtesting results from 1999 the company answered that they did not have such tests because experts were optimized on an 18 month basis and were then traded in optimized settings. This is obvioulsy the reason why such limited backtesting is available on their website, because of course, they cannot show further backtests if settings are bound to change on the middle of the expert's testing.

Now, the big question arises. Is this good or is this bad ? To optimize or not to optimize ? Well, I of course always favor expert advisors that can self adapt to a certain extent like the god's gift ATR because even though there is an inherent lag in the adaptation, the lag is less than 30 days long and the expert just worries about aligning itself against market conditions. Optimization using 18 months of data could also be a strategy you could use, however, it has to be said that if market conditions for the next 6 months are very different from the past 18 months, then the system is likely to fall into draw down but then, it might realign once optimization is done again. The live testing done on both experts confirms at the moment that this optimization strategy works albeit on the changes happening during the past year.

Given this fact, the fact that considerable live testing exists and the fact that the expert advisor's trading style fits many characteristics I demand from profitable trading systems I will say that this experts are worth testing. From next Sunday a demo account will be opened and the testing of the winalot EA will start with testing results being commented each week on my weekly newsletter. Susbcribers should also expect the next newsletter to include demo account investor access information.

If you would like to learn more about automated trading systems and what the necessary characteristics for a profitable trading systems are (and why most commercial experts out there just fail bluntly) please consider buying my ebook on automated trading or subscribing to my weekly newsletter to receive updates and check the live and demo accounts I am running with several expert advisors. I hope you enjoyed this article !

Forex Expert Advisors : EAzeGor an unbiased review

After reviewing their winalot expert advisor a few days ago, I though it would be worthwhile to review the EAzeGor EA made by the Easy-EA company. I have to say that the fact that their winalot expert advisor is in good standing was with no doubt a very good reason to continue reviewing their expert advisors. Today's post will be dedicated to the unbiased review of their EAzeGor expert advisor system which is elegitely based on the results of an EA championship contestant.

On their web page, the authors talk a little bit about the EAzeGor expert advisor and the fact that it only wins 40% of it's trades. I have to say that I am pleasently surprised by both the way in which this expert is tested and the evidence that is given to support the experts trading. The EAzeGor expert advisor has backtesting results which match live testing statements to a good extent although I would still need backtesting from 1999 to confirm that the expert advisor is in fact long term profitable. Backtesting also exagerates profit potential, which seems to be a general problem with certain types of expert advisors (depends on how the choose to open and close positions) even if one minute interpolation errors are absent.

The live tests show us that the system delivers quiet as expected with the average loss being several times less than the average win. The system has therefore an excellent risk to reward ratio which is a characteristic of realiable trend following systems. I have to say, I rarely find trading systems that match what I would expect for a long term profitable trading system. Specially the fact that we have almost year long live testing and backtesting that is consistent (to some extent that is) proves that the expert, at least was profitable in 2008-2009. However, I have to stress that I would still need backtesting from 1999 to show that the expert was actually able to make money consistently under several market conditions because there is still the risk that the expert is only able to profit under 2007-2009 market conditions which are quiet specific. I have requested this backtesting from easy-EA and will update this review if they send it to me.

This EA has realistic yearly profit targets and draw downs (as the live testing indicates) and I would defintely consider it long term profitable if It shows profit it backtesting for the past 10 years. Well, I hope we can continue to look at the development of this expert's testing for the next few years. As far as my opinion about this EA goes I would consider it worth testing, if backtesting from 1999 would prove the system to be independent from changing market conditions. If they lack this, then the system could start to fail dramatically once market conditions start to change more (at least with the 10 year long backtesting we know it can at least endure a bigger set of conditions). This system will definitely be tested in my weekly newsletter if such conditions are fulfilled.

Again, I applaud this company's lack of hype and their commitment to providing long live testing and backtesting data. I would also ask the website creator's to add investor access passwords to the live account so that we can ensure the live testing results are in fact authentic.

If you would like to learn how you can evluate expert advisors, top wasting money and start actually making realistic profit targets in the forex market please consider buying my ebook on automated trading or subscribing to my weekly newsletter to receive updates and check the live and demo accounts I am running with several expert advisors. I hope you enjoyed this article !