Nirvana Club Goals

Our Mission & Goals

A Historical Perspective

​Our Mission & Goals

​From the outset, our primary approach to the trading problem has been to create Knowledge Bases using factor and clue measurements over thousands of years of market data. Our goal for the first Knowledge Base was to demonstrable 70% Forward Test accuracy. On May 3, 1997, a newsletter was issued to all members which demonstrated that this accuracy level was being achieved in the first Knowledge Base, created over months of continual Genetic Algorithm processing on 12 fast machines at Nirvana. Several version of ARM2 were created from 1997 through 2003. Each version has used new methods which have provided improved performance, leading to ARM3.

The Ultimate Trading Machine Goal:

Trade From anywhere, or have the computer trade by itself.​

By refining the factors we are measuring and the techniques for measuring and searching the Knowledge Base, our expectation is that the accuracy of the system will steadily improve over time. The ultimate goal is to create a trading system which is so accurate, it can be turned loose on the markets with no human intervention. We define the Ultimate Trading Machine as a system that is 80% accurate, and whose trades have characteristics such that the stop-loss setting is 1/3 the target profit level, hence yielding a 3:1 Reward:Risk ratio. The evidence of repeatable patterns in markets indicates that this result is indeed possible.​

OmniTrader Mission:

Faster, Easier to Use Trading Tools.

As we get feedback from customers and experiment and trade ourselves, we continually get new ideas for ways to improve an already great program. As Club members, you will have the opportunity to beta test products as soon as we have them "out of the oven". This is valuable because you may find feature changes or additions that we have overlooked that will help you and others more in their use of the program. We want this feedback! The Ultimate Trading Machine will depend on OmniTrader's base technology improving, so that the interface is clean and easy to use. We welcome the Club's involvement in the process of making our program the best it can possibly be.

Community Mission:

Create a Trading Community for dedicated traders.

Trading is a solitary profession. Who can you talk to about your trading exploits who will really understand what you are talking about? Other traders! To me, a very important goal of the Nirvana Club is to provide a community and forum whereby dedicated traders can contact one another, share ideas, and help each other become more successful in their trading. I am pleased to see so many of our members regularly communicating with each other, and some great friendships have emerged. Let's keep talking to each other and sharing ideas. Remember - the market really is bigger than all of us put together, and there are plenty of trading profits to go around!


A Historical Perspective

​The Nirvana Club was officially launched on March 6, 1996, at the Nirvana Club launch event held in Austin, Texas. Research results were demonstrated, and Charter Members were able to meet.

June 1996

We released ARM2 Databases on our path to the Knowledge Bases. Past Nirvana Club newsletters have described the theory behind the databases and have also provided detailed instruction on their use. Many of our Club members have seen their trading results dramatically improve from these first attempts using the factor database approach. However, the databases are limited by their nature, since they only measure 6-8 combinations at a time.

February 1997

We completed the project to tie all of our computers at Nirvana together to perform the Genetic Algorithm process each night, as they look for a potentially unlimited number of profitable market factor combinations, as described in previous newsletters.

May 1997

We finished testing the first Knowledge Base, ARM2 for Stocks Beta Release 1, using what we learned from the experiments we conducted from February - November 1996. This Knowledge Base was based on one trading system (GAP Breakout). The research we did on GAP-B helped us refine our approach to move towards a commercial product.

October 1997

ARM2 for Stocks, Beta Release 2 was generated and released. Many club members reported good results in their trading using this Beta Version - on the order of 60% to 70% accuracy in real trading.

March 1998

We released ARM2 for Stocks and Futures, Beta Release 3. (The Knowledge Base was updated to support the new 3.5 Version). We saw greater than 65% signal accuracy on this release with a reasonable number of trades being found.

August 1998

We released ARM2, Release 1, and re-opened the Club to new members. The official release included a new interface to make it easier for users to make the tradeoff between "more signals" and "accurate signals".

June 1999

We released ARM2, Release 2, with demonstrated 70% accuracy for Stocks and Futures. We also held our first Nirvana Club Bash to discuss the product and work with members on hands-on demonstrations and application.

April 2000

We released ARM2, Release 3, using a Neural Network technology. Nirvana focused on research tasks related to pattern recognition, as well as improving OmniTrader.

November 2001

A significant development in 2001 was the addition of System Confirmation tools to OmniTrader, for OmniTrader 2002. These new tools enabled us to accelerate the development of ARM2 Release 4.

June 2002

We released significant new research findings on pattern recognition, and also launched our NEW Nirvana Club Forum. The Forum has been one of the greatest assets of the Club.

June 2003

ARM2 Release 4 released with Valid Trend Line support, resulting from our work on pattern recognition. The new product generated 75% to 80% accuracies and yielded the first 100% mechanical system, called M-1

November 2003

We released Strategy Builder in OmniTrader 2004. Strategy Builder set the stage for coming renewed work on Artificial Intelligence methods in the form of the NN Score and GA Signal components.

June 2004

Scheduled release of ARM3 Release 1, featuring the new Artificial Intelligence components. These products are exceeding 80% accuracy - a new level of performance, and are a clear precursor to the Ultimate Trading Machine Goal.

June 2005

Released ARM3 Release 3 with Artificial Intelligence on Chart Patterns.

February 2006

We Released OmniTrader Professional which provides the ability to completely automate Trading Systems and create TradeBots.

June 2006

RoboCon 1, the first Robotic Trading Contest.

June 2006

ARM3 release 4 Beta version.