Automated futures trading has become my latest experiment in a much longer journey of building businesses, testing ideas and documenting what I learn along the way.
My name is Marco, and I'm the founder of Bottom Line Cents.
I originally started blogging while studying at university back in 2009. Since then, I've experimented with building iOS apps, buying and selling products online, eCommerce and dropshipping, any many other ventures
Bottom Line Cents started in 2018 as somewhere to document what I was learning about making money online. The subject has changed considerably over the years, but the basic idea behind the website hasn't:
Experiment. Learn. Document the results. Share what actually happened.
From Trading Futures to Automated Trading
For the past three years, I've spent an enormous amount of time trying to become consistently profitable trading futures.
I've studied strategies, built trading systems, passed funded-account evaluations and experienced profitable periods. I've also blown accounts. Eventually, I started noticing something uncomfortable:
I might be the biggest problem with my own trading.
I can develop a strategy with defined entries, stops, targets and risk. But once I'm personally responsible for executing it — and real money is attached to the outcome — things can change.
A loss becomes something I want to recover. A great-looking setup becomes a reason to increase size. A profitable day becomes an opportunity to make a little more.
Eventually, the rules that were supposed to protect me aren't necessarily the rules I'm trading anymore.
Why I'm Exploring Automated Futures Trading
Rather than spending another three years searching for the perfect trading strategy, I've decided to ask a different question:
Can automation solve the trader, rather than solve the market?
That's what my automated futures trading experiment is about.
I'm developing trading bots designed to execute predefined futures strategies without requiring me to make every trading decision in real time.
The hypothesis is simple: if I can develop a strategy with positive expectancy, can automation allow that expectancy to play out without my emotions interfering with the individual outcomes?
I don't know the answer yet. That's why I'm documenting the experiment.
Testing Trading Bots in the Real World
I'll be testing these automated trading systems through backtesting, SIM trading and eventually funded trading accounts.
I'll document the results along the way — including:
- Trading results and performance
- Win rates and expectancy
- Drawdowns
- Strategy changes
- SIM trading experiments
- Funded-account attempts
- Payouts
- Failed experiments
I'm not interested in pretending that every automated trading strategy works.
If a bot fails, I'll document it.
If an idea has negative expectancy, I'll show it.
And if something looks fantastic in a backtest but falls apart when forward tested, that's part of the experiment too.
Building an Automated Trading System Around the Trader
There's another side to this experiment that interests me just as much as the strategy itself: trading psychology.
Traditional trading advice often focuses on developing better discipline and emotional control.
I'm approaching the problem differently.
Instead of continually trying to control my emotions while trading, I'm exploring whether I can build systems that reduce the number of decisions I need to make in the first place.
The computer doesn't care about the previous loss.
It doesn't increase position size because the next setup looks incredible.
It doesn't need to make the money back before the end of the day.
It simply executes the rules it's been given.
That's the part of automated futures trading I want to explore.
Follow the Experiment
Bottom Line Cents is becoming a public record of this journey.
I'll share what I'm building, what I'm testing, the numbers behind the experiments and what I'm learning about the intersection between automated futures trading, systematic trading and trading psychology.
There will be successes.
There will almost certainly be failures.
Both are useful.
Ultimately, I'm trying to answer one question:
What happens when a trader who struggles to let go of the outcome finally gives up control of the execution?
I don't know where this experiment ends.
And that's exactly why I'm documenting it.
