Systematic Trend follower

Rule-based trend-following trader | 7 years profitable
Still making mistakes. Still learning.
Documenting the journey.
#CutsAndRunners

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

Trading Insights Weekly – Issue 3

Trend Following Is Just Testing Doors

Imagine you’re standing in a long hallway filled with identical doors. Behind only a few of them lies a room filled with money — enough to pay for every wrong door you tried and still leave you with a profit. But you never know which door it is until you test it.   (How you know some doors have money that will offset the small fees will be discussed in the next post.)

So here’s the deal:

Every time you want to check a door, you must pay a small fee. You tap your card, the door cracks a little, and you get your answer. Most of the time, the door is locked. You lose a small fee and move on. No drama. No emotion. It’s just the cost of doing business in that hallway.

Door after door, you keep paying the fee.
Small loss, small loss, small loss — just like the tiny stop-outs in a trend-following system. You’re not trying to be right about which door is the jackpot; you’re simply testing whether this is the one that finally opens.

And then it happens.

You tap your card on the next door, expecting the usual rejection — but this time, the lock clicks. The door swings fully open. Inside the room is more money than you’ve spent on all your previous attempts combined. The room refunds every single fee you paid while searching… and gives you a stack of extra cash on top.

That one room pays for everything.

That’s exactly how trend following works.
You keep paying small fees (tiny losses) to test whether the market is ready. Most doors stay shut (whipsaws). But the one time the market opens — the one time a true trend forms — it pays back every fee you ever spent testing… and then rewards you with an outsized move.

This is why win-rate doesn’t matter.
This is why being wrong often is not a problem.
This is why trend followers survive and compound.

Michael Marcus described it perfectly in Market Wizards:
“You have to be willing to make mistakes regularly; there is nothing wrong with it… making your best judgment, being wrong, making your next best judgment, being wrong, making your third best judgment — and then doubling your money.”

In the hallway of markets, your job is not to guess the right door.
Your job is just to keep testing — paying small fees — until the market finally opens one. And that one open door makes the entire journey worthwhile.

Happy weekend
Happy Trading 😊

#MarketWisdom #TrendFollowing #SystematicTrading #Weekend

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

Taking a break from X. Will continue to trade the system. 😊

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

No amount of market knowledge eliminates the market’s ability to surprise you.🙂

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

https://t.co/Kda4E435mT

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

Me, 6 years later, reading this again…💥

[Trend Following™ @TrendCovel]

Most traders want certainty but markets do not offer certainty.

Trend followers trade anyway.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

The people you follow online didn’t press the buy button.

You did.
Own the outcome🙂

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@investingidiocy Pretty standard for trend following systems.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

No trade has a guaranteed outcome.

Loss is always part of the equation.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

No amount of market knowledge eliminates the market’s ability to surprise you.🙂

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@SJosephBurns The one who said the system is only as good as your ability to follow it.

Any guesses?

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@ACtradesfx The goal is consistency in execution, not consistency in winning.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@ACtradesfx The goal is consistency in execution, not consistency in winning.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@basso_tom @GrindeOptions 🫡

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@Covel 🙌

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@ACtradesfx 💯 Everybody gets what they want out of markets.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@LindaRaschke Sounds like a trend follower talking 👀

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@Covel No room for emotions🙂

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

@sourabhsiso19 Small gains? Not really.

Ed Seykota never aimed for small gains. He aimed to follow his system flawlessly.

The process was boring, systematic, and unemotional.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

Journaling.

For me, journaling eventually led to systematic trading. Simply recording my trades revealed where my edge was leaking, when I was breaking my own rules, and what was actually working.

If you're unsure where to start, just record your next 20 trades. Wins or losses don't matter. The patterns will reveal themselves.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

Journaling.

For me, journaling eventually led to systematic trading. Simply recording my trades revealed where my edge was leaking, when I was breaking my own rules, and what was actually working.

If you're unsure where to start, just record your next 20 trades. Wins or losses don't matter. The patterns will reveal themselves.

[Systematic Trend follower @cutsandrunners]

Which habit made the biggest difference in your trading journey?

I’ll start 👇