New Technique  |  JUL 1997

Dynamic Zones by Leo Zamansky, Ph.D., and David Stendahl

Dynamic Zones by Leo Zamansky, Ph.D., and David Stendahl Most indicators use a fixed zone for buy and sell signals. Here’s a concept based on zones that are responsive to past levels of the indicator. One approach to active investing employs the use of oscillators to exploit tradable market trends. This investing style follows a very simple form of logic: Enter the market only when an oscillator has moved far above or below traditional trading levels. However, these oscillator-driven systems lack the ability to evolve with the market because they use fixed buy and sell zones. Traders typically use one set of buy and sell zones for a bull market and substantially different zones for a bear market. And therein lies the problem. Once traders begin introducing their market opinions into trading equations, by changing the zones, they negate the system’s mechanical nature. The objective is to have a system automatically define its own buy and sell zones and thereby profitably trade in any market — bull or bear. Dynamic zones offer a solution to the problem of fixed buy and sell zones for any oscillator-driven system. An indicator’s extreme levels can be quantified using statistical methods. These extreme levels are calculated for a certain period and serve as the buy and sell zones for a trading system. The repetition of this statistical process for every value of the indicator creates values that become the dynamic zones. The zones are calculated in such a way that the probability of the indicator value rising above, or falling below, the dynamic zones is equal to a given probability input set by the trader.

by Leo Zamansky, Ph.D., and David Stendahl