One needs to define what is a trading system. Some systems provide entry only, some have risk management built in, some have amazing auto execution while others rely on manual submissions.

The idea of “why would some one sell a system?” is just a bit to negative and while it has a winning tone in an open forum, cant be applied across all systems.

Here are some additional questions I would ask:

In my honest opinion here are the question you should ask a system developers: 1) What is the amount of drawdown? 2) What is the capital required 3) The cost of execution 4) has it been tested in real time vs. hypothetical
4) Could it be traded in real time? 5) What platform is it executed on?

I hope this helps.

Mark – I’m not so cynical as that, but it’s a legitimate point because a lot of system developers have the belief that if they share their system they will ruin it. That’s not generally likely to be the case, but paranoia tends to win out.

The part that simply amazes me is that pepole expect an off-the-shelf system to make money.

These people have to use their brains for a moment: If you had a system that always made money, would you sell it for a few measly dollars? Of course not. No one would.