Live Trading Questions, code related but not specific to strategy
1, What is a roughly reasonable time to leave between order modifications, so as not to appear to intentionally scalp or overly aggravate brokers with continued modifications. I can adjust my risk level management to match any mean time quite easily now, I am thinking about trailing stops in part here.
Where relevant, I move the stop every full pip (not sub-pip!), brokers XXX, YYYYYY, and ZZZZ dont mind
2, What is the maximum lag for a tick you have ever received when live trading? Please if you will, no broker names here, just to keep within the bounds of general advice to all.
Outside of market hours, you can wait many minutes for a tick - is not brokers fault, just no action in the market
3, What is the average lag you deal with per tick when live trading?
Depends very much on time of day for the pair in question...
Whatever it is, its not as big a problem as 'server busy' - you should handle failures in OrderSend with one of many 'reliable order' routines
4, Have you found a slippage of more than 3 ever useful practically?
Yes
5, A definition of what scalping is from your point of view, would be exceedingly helpful, as to my mind several contradictions exist when people define it.
Going for less than n pips as a regular or frequent thing, either by close TakeProfit targets or doing an OrderClose for n pips
Values for n vary between brokers, but it is not hard and fast as frequent use of large lots on small pip targets will get their attention
6, No idea :)
> I have been demo trading now for about a month and using back data for long before that, from a coding point of view I am almost ready to go ahead.
This is the biggest area for potential surprises :(
Some systems do not survive transfer to 'live' for all sorts of reasons, see here
Good Luck
-BB-
Bless me!
Seems people actually read this stuff!
Have had quite a few PMs....
If you want a follow-on question looking at, post it here if its on topic or start a new thread :)
Then PM me the link (e.g. https://forum.mql4.com/20047) and I'll look at it if possible
-BB-
Thanks for helping to clarify from a point of view of personal experience, if anyone else wants offer general advice on live trading, then by all means please also contribute. This information should save me wasting my initial testing account balance and I do appreciate it.
I will PM you myself, if you have time, to follow up on a few points.
- Free trading apps
- Over 8,000 signals for copying
- Economic news for exploring financial markets
You agree to website policy and terms of use
I have been demo trading now for about a month and using back data for long before that, from a coding point of view I am almost ready to go ahead.
Yet I have some lingering questions in my mind that I and perhaps others could use clearing up from a few live traders, these are unrelated to specific code so you will not be giving away trade secrets by any means, I would appreciate it though if we could leave named brokers out of this general advice. If you feel like answering one question rather than all feel free.
1, What is a roughly reasonable time to leave between order modifications, so as not to appear to intentionally scalp or overly aggravate brokers with continued modifications. I can adjust my risk level management to match any mean time quite easily now, I am thinking about trailing stops in part here.
2, What is the maximum lag for a tick you have ever received when live trading? Please if you will, no broker names here, just to keep within the bounds of general advice to all.
3, What is the average lag you deal with per tick when live trading?
4, Have you found a slippage of more than 3 ever useful practically?
5, A definition of what scalping is from your point of view, would be exceedingly helpful, as to my mind several contradictions exist when people define it.
6, My mind is on lot size when I ask this next question and my own investment on each trade. Why do most brokers, generally, offer less leverage on accounts which require less money to start with, what is the logic behind that thinking? Is this because overall when trading, most trades made with a greater volume, are less frivolous for the parties involved?
Thank you for your time and any answers people can give.