As an accounting professor, my view of the job of a management accountant is to provide information to help managers make better decisions. It is the job of the management accountant to advise the managers regarding alternatives. It is the job of the managers to manage. That is, it is their responsibility to ultimately make the decision.

That view is reflected in FastWays---it provides information to help you make the decision. And if you choose to use the maximizing parameters, that information is provided. However, it also provides information about all the parameters being considered and helps you decide which to use, if not the maximizing ones. In my view, providing only the maximizing parameters is a lot like making the decision for you, and that is not my job—that's your job. You can use FastWays as an optimizer, but you can do more with it too. This philosophy gives control to you, the one with the money on the line.

Features of FastWays Include--

• Finding the Best Parameters
  The first purpose FastWays served was to answer that haunting question of which parameters were the best to use---it continues to serve that purpose. Note carefully that the term best is used instead of optimum. An optimizer typically provides the parameters that provide the highest return, regardless of the risk. FastWays could be used this way, but it allows the user to apply judgment in selecting the best parameters. The Windows version enhances the DOS analysis by using  Two Dimensional and Three Dimensional analysis screens that provide much more information. 
  
  
• Surrogate Analysis
  It is often helpful to use an index to determine a signal, even though you cannot directly trade the index. For example, you may want to use the DJ-15 to determine a strategy to trade Fidelity Select Utilities. That can now be done directly in FastWays. 
  
  Those of you who followed the Prodigy discussions know Rod Romero and his excellent strategies. In fact, some of you may recall that Rod was instrumental in reactivating the Prodigy board way back in 1994. One of Rod's many useful ideas was to use one pair of funds to determine signals for trading another pair of funds. [NOTE: The term funds is used for simplicity, but FastWays also uses the Stocks data base.]  Rod's DJ-20/DJ-30 strategy was the topic of discussion for several months—FastWays allows you to easily develop custom parameters for this strategy to trade any pair of funds. In fact, you can use any pair of funds to develop a strategy to trade any other pair of funds!
  
  
• Quick Family Analysis
  FastWays allows you to quickly search a family of funds for further analysis. You can easily apply any indicator settings to all members of a family, you can use surrogate signals on a family, and you can use signal files on whole families. These families can be those found in FastTrack or those created for FastWays.
  
  
• Composite Family Analysis
  It is rare that you would choose to trade all members in a family with any particular index.  For example, the index to trade against a health fund would hardly be the same as one used with a technology fund but you may want to carefully watch both funds. FastWays allows you to have unique settings for each member of a family, and to view the composite position of the family members. 
  
  With FastWays you can not only set the trading index for each member, but you can specify unique indicators/parameter settings to use with each family member. For one family member you may want to use the DJ-15 as an index to help determine when to trade a fund but want to trade to the Fidelity Select Utilities fund. For another you may want to use DJ-30 but trade Fidelity Select Industrial Materials. Each of these family members would use the appropriate index and the indicators/parameter settings you choose for THAT family member. 
  
  Some FastWays users wanted to be able to set different parameters for buying into a fund versus selling the fund, and that has been incorporated. You don't even have to use the same indicators for buy and sell decisions on a FastWays family member! Once you become familiar with this analysis, it will be something you will check every day.
  
  
• Trading Reports
  Each signal, whether generated by a fund/index/indicator combination or by a signal file, generates a transaction (buy or sell decision). This analysis shows the results of every transaction and whether the better choice between the fund and index was selected. Note carefully that the better decision may not be the best decision because the best decision may have been to be in a money market fund. The mechanism of FastTrack, however, is to choose between the fund and the index or the fund and a money market fund, not to select the best of the three. The summary analysis shows the percentage of better decisions and other useful information, such as the maximum gain obtained and the maximum loss incurred. This analysis is useful in helping decide if a particular strategy is best for you.
  
  
• Ulcer Index and Ulcer Performance Index
  The ulcer index and ulcer performance index became popular through the Prodigy bulletin board, and FastWays now incorporates variations of them. FastWays modifies the strict definition by allowing you to choose the fund to use in the risk-free rate of return calculations and it calculates the rate only over the period under analysis.
  
  
• Maximum Draw Down 
  The draw down is the amount that a fund decreases in value from its highest position before it is traded. FastWays calculates the draw down associated with any strategy and allows you to specify the maximum that you can tolerate in selecting parameters.
  
  
• Maximization Options
  FastWays allows you to maximize the annualized return measures (AnnRa, AnnMr, or AnnTr) or to maximize the UPI.  In selecting the best parameters, you can set maximums for switches per year, the ulcer index, and draw down, or you can choose a minimum ulcer performance index.  FastWays helps you easily select parameters that meet your style of trading.
  

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