DCA books
The strategies in the DCA folder don't go all-in or all-out. They hold a share of one pot in BTC (Bitcoin) and move that share up or down in steps.
Most strategies are a switch: fully in the market or fully in cash. A DCA book works more like a dial. It starts with one pot of 100 and keeps part of it in BTC and the rest in cash, turning the dial up when its rules think BTC is cheap or its trend turns up, and down when BTC looks expensive or its trend weakens. "Book" is just our word for one of these simulated accounts.
All five plans in the folder trade BTC: Renko Mayer Hybrid DCA, ESMA Snap Accumulator DCA, ESMA Step Accumulator DCA, VNC Momentum Hybrid DCA and HEVB Momentum Hybrid DCA. Their descriptions say what moves the dial. Renko Mayer Hybrid DCA, for example, moves one step whenever a Renko trend signal flips, and every two months also checks BTC against its long-term average, adding when it's cheap and trimming when it's rich. "Accumulator" plans lean towards building up a position.
Not the DCA you may know
In everyday use, dollar-cost averaging means putting in a fixed amount every month, whatever the price. These books borrow the spirit (buy gradually, buy more when it's cheap) but not the mechanics. No new money ever comes in: there's one pot from day one, and only the split between BTC and cash changes. That keeps them comparable with every other strategy, which also starts at 100 and never gets a top-up. And unlike a monthly plan, a DCA book can sell.
Here's a pot following a plan that moves in half steps, next to simply holding BTC:
| The plan does | BTC | In BTC | In cash | Pot | Simply holding | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Puts half in | 50 | 50 | 100 | 100 | |
| 2 | Holds | −20% | 40 | 50 | 90 | 80 |
| 3 | BTC looks cheap: puts the rest in | 90 | 0 | 90 | 80 | |
| 4 | Holds | +50% | 135 | 0 | 135 | 120 |
| 5 | BTC looks rich: trims to half | 67.5 | 67.5 | 135 | 120 | |
| 6 | Holds | −30% | 47.25 | 67.5 | 114.75 | 84 |
The half-invested stretches softened both falls. The price is that when BTC rallies while the plan is only partly in, it catches only part of the rise.
On the strategy page
A DCA book's price chart has a Weight line in its lower panel instead of votes. It shows the share of the pot in BTC, from 0 (all cash) to 1 (all in). Gold rings mark steps up, blue rings steps down, and on the card the pill reads Long whenever some of the pot is invested.
[The Weight line in the lower panel steps between 0, one half and 1: the share of the pot held in BTC.]
The equity chart works like any other: the pot starts at 100, drawn against BTC Buy & Hold. Expect a DCA line to fall less than BTC in a crash and to rise less in a rally.
[Over five years, the DCA pot (gold) dips less than Buy & Hold (blue) in the falls.]
The trades table looks different too. Each step in buys its own lot, each step out sells the oldest lots first, and every lot, or part of a lot, that gets sold is listed as its own trade. So you'll see several trades opening on the same date and trades that overlap in time. Renko Mayer Hybrid DCA, for instance, opens trades 1, 2 and 3 all on 1 Jan 2015 and closes them at different moments. Several Entry rows without an Exit at the bottom mean several steps are still invested.
The comparison is Buy & Hold, not a monthly savings plan. A monthly plan needs new money every month and a DCA book never gets any, so the fair question is: did moving the split in and out beat simply holding the same pot in BTC?
What to keep in mind
"Cheap" can get cheaper: buying in steps after a drop still loses money if the drop continues. A plan that trimmed because BTC looked rich will trail Buy & Hold for as long as BTC keeps climbing. And all of them depend on BTC alone, so they don't spread your risk across markets.
In portfolios, DCA books get a class of their own, DCA, next to Crypto, Stocks and Gold. The Bitcoin DCA [GPS] default portfolio combines several of them. See Default portfolios to explore.