I know this might not be the best place to ask, but the cost of doing so is near nil, so here we go.
I put a certain amount of my salary on index funds every month. Since it's a process that I'll be doing many times it's worth optimising.
Usually I place a limit order with a bid price between the current bid and ask ones and it executes shortly afterwards.
I was wondering how can I lower my bid price to buy it cheaper but still ensure that the order is executed within the (ideally) day.
I thought of writing a program, get the historical data and do back testing, but that would be longer to write than this post.
Can you offer any input? How do you purchase your stocks to get them as cheap as you can without waiting for a crash that could take 10 years?
Thanks in advance.
On the one hand, you're smart enough to know that you should be constantly adding to your savings, and you're smart enough to do it through the best low-cost long-term investment vehicle in existence today.
On the other hand, you're dumb enough to think that shaving tenths of pennies off your ETF execution price by timing the market is going to improve your portfolio performance.
Pick a side, schitzo.
>>1279765
That's actually the best answer I could get. Still, let's use the thread to answer that question, even if it's just an hypothetical case, or an exercise if you will.
If you're able to come up with a measure of average daily price volatility, you could place a limit order for, say, 1% below open price. If the order doesn't get executed within the day, let it auto-buy at next day's open (market) price.
>>1280027
Yes. It shouldn't take long to take historical data and get a measure.
http://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/021015/what-best-measure-given-stocks-volatility.asp
Backtesting would take longer, but maybe I don't need it for now. Just the volatility measure to get a first guess of how can I deviate from a regular market/limit order without fucking up.
Index funds have been utter shit the past two years.
>>1280571
>the past two years.
And?
>>1281209
FUCKIN MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEMERS ALWAYS MEEEEEEEEMING
RRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEe
>>1281219
(You) outmemed >>1280571
Congrats, anon. Keep up the good job.
Sell puts like Buffet is by far the easiest way.
The Implied Volatilty is known. You look at the prices of at the money calls and puts. and see whats expected for that day. set buy targets their.
Its not full proof but watch for several standard deviation moves
You could simply short the thing and always buy the bottom like a boss.
