Robert Carver maintains an active online presence where he continues to discuss the concepts from his book:
Elias Thorne sat staring at his monitor. His trading account, once a testament to his intuition and gut instinct, was bleeding out. He was a discretionary trader—a dinosaur in the age of algorithms. He had ridden the volatility wave of the previous year, but the market had shifted, as it always does, and his instincts were now liabilities. He was one bad trade away from a margin call.
Advanced Futures Trading Strategies: A Comprehensive Guide to Robert Carver’s Framework
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: Data on past behavior, risks, and performance across different asset classes.
By employing a mix of the 30 strategies, traders can reduce dependency on any single market condition.
If you are looking to build a resilient, long-term futures trading operation, shifting your focus away from "perfect entries" and toward Carver's systematic architecture—dynamic volatility sizing, multi-horizon forecasting, and rigorous cost control—is the most sustainable path forward. Robert Carver maintains an active online presence where
In his various PDF guides and technical appendices, Carver delineates the difference between a "trader" and a "systematic investor." An advanced strategy, in his view, is one that is fully codified. This allows for backtesting—a simulation of how a strategy would have performed historically. Carver argues that without the ability to backtest, a trader is flying blind. Advanced trading, therefore, is not about predicting the future, but about understanding the statistical distribution of potential outcomes based on past data.
When rolling a long position to the next contract month, if the next month is more expensive (Contango), you incur a rolling cost. If it is cheaper (Backwardation), you gain a rolling profit.
The book’s strategies can be coded in Python, R, or any quantitative programming language. Platforms like QuantConnect already have recreations of Carver’s strategies available, providing a starting point for your own implementation. You can then run back‑tests, optimise parameters (carefully), and eventually deploy the system live. Carver himself runs a fully automated system that handles futures rollovers, monitors price data for anomalies, and makes decisions without constant human interference. He had ridden the volatility wave of the
Carver’s approach is relentlessly empirical. He believes that the most overlooked characteristic of a trading strategy is the expected skew of its returns—a concept he discusses in his earlier book Systematic Trading and carries forward here. Positive skew strategies (like trend following) feature many small losses and occasional large wins; negative skew strategies (like selling options) offer frequent small gains but occasional catastrophic losses. Understanding skew is essential for proper risk management and portfolio construction.
Advanced Futures Trading Strategies is not a beginner’s introduction to futures. It is a dense, practical guide written for traders who already understand the basics but want to move beyond simplistic buy‑and‑hold or single‑strategy approaches. The book provides 30 fully tested trading strategies specifically designed for futures markets. These strategies cover more than 100 tradable instruments and are based on over 50 years of historical data. Importantly, the strategies are suitable for both discretionary traders (those who make judgment‑based decisions) and systematic traders (those who rely on rule‑based, often automated systems).
An advanced systematic futures portfolio should span across: S&P 500, Euro Stoxx 50, Nikkei 225 Fixed Income: 10-Year US Treasuries, Euro Bunds, JGBs Commodities: Crude Oil, Gold, Copper, Corn, Soybeans Currencies: EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD 5. Execution, Costs, and Roll Yield Mechanics
When trading multiple futures contracts, you cannot simply allocate equal capital to all of them. Markets move together, and correlations change.