negative correlation

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Chris67
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negative correlation

Post by Chris67 »

Dear All,

If 2 instruments have a lon term negative correlation .. say -0.85 , are they considered correlated if one gets a signal to buy both ? this happens to me a lot .. where as some may say this is ok as it probably reduces risk ,,, i feel it limits profitability .. maybe simply take the first signal only !!!

regards
d-b
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Post by d-b »

Chris,

By long term negative correlation, I take it you are calculating correlation in terms of price movement.

I think it depends on how we measure correlation. As far as it is valuable to us as traders, I think correlation should be considered in terms of the likelihood of the outcomes of trades in different instruments being different.

While prices in two markets might be shown as somewhat correlated (either positively or negatively), the more valuable question to ask might be “are the two markets experiencing different market conditions at any given time?â€
William
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Uncorrelated vs Not Correlated

Post by William »

David,

Funny, this post couldnt be better timed, i was messing with some numbers today. I want to clarify the terms un-correlation vs. not correlated because it may be causing some confusion for me. (For me, non-correlation means negative correlation, not correlated means 0% correlation.)


100% Un-correlation is = +1, +2, +3 vs -1, -2, -3. Those two number strings are 100% un-correlated. For trading purposes, the US dollar index and Australian dollar are around -90% uncorrelated. (Data from CSI Data's correlation study) So when the Dollar Index trades down, the Australian dollar generally trades up in equal magnitude. To me these instrument's prices movements are very correlated. Dollar up trend = Aussie down trend but choppy dollar period = choppy aussie period, which negatively impacts the smooth return benefit principle.

However, i believe what we discussed at the seminar and what you are touching on here a bit is the idea of not-correlated (). When one is going up, the other is going flat. In that case we are looking for numbers close to 0%, assuming to me that when one is trending the other is mostly flat.

Is that correct? I have a feeling the answer will be test it and find out.... :)

Hope all is well...
d-b
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Post by d-b »

William,

The distinction you make is valid. According to your definitions, the same system trading two markets which are “un-correlatedâ€
William
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Thanks

Post by William »

Thanks David, in rereading my post i think i put too fine a point on the wording....thanks for the clarification.

Something i find slightly interesting is JWH has a trading system that trades the dollar vs. foreign currencies. Perhaps making a system that would focus in an area of strong uncorrelation may add some benefits if one were going to deploy a multi-system trading system.

http://www.jwh.com/templ007.cfm?id=007D ... &tid=007PP
BigBrad
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Post by BigBrad »

Aren't you really determining two things with the correlations:

1. The closer to 0 the correlation between two series the less "predictive" they are, i.e. just because X went up it doesn't mean Y will go up. But at any point in time for short term they could be moving up together.

2. As the absolute value of correlation increase and approaches 1 then there is a "predictive" component. X is up so I expect Y to be up. If they are anti-correlated (-1) then is X is up I expect Y to be down.
Kiwi
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Post by Kiwi »

First -- Merry Xmas to everyone and I hope that your markets trend in your desired timeframes this year.

What follows is my opinion.

Correlation and negative correlation mean the same thing from a system development perspective. C=1 means the two commodities are identical with some factor of proportion. C= -1 means that when a goes down a certain amount then b goes up the same proportional amount.

What you want is a correlation close to zero. This means that although they might be correlated from time to time they are, on average, over the period you ran the correlation, not correlated. So, on average, over the period you ran the correlation, a does not alway go up when b goes up or vice versa.

Notice how many qualifications I put in there. YOU REALLY SHOULD. The reason is that uncorrelated commodities can become correlated for a short period of time ... and you will almost always perceive this at the worst possible time. When your stops get hit on currencies, gold, and energies at the same time.

So be careful of a nice general long term historical statistic like correlation.

And correlations are not predictive. A correlation is a historical statistic (like discovering that israeli airforce pilots where having girl babies ... then in the next period this was not true). What correlations can "show" is that the portfolio you chose because it shouldnt be correlated was uncorrelated in the period you just examined. Making assumptions about datamining is dangerous and very similar in its affects to overoptimisation.

Look for portfolios that are likely to have a low correlation ... but dont count on future = history if you want to be trading in 5 years time.

John
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