Each Day for the next month or so, I am going to cover one aspect of the inputs for Traders Gift EA and Strategy Optimizer and then I am going to cover Optimizations in depth, Money Management and finally a Battle Plan. At the end of the inputs, I will consolidate all the discussions into one PDF document and make it available at Post #1. Some discussions will provoke comment and I will incorporate all significant points in the final PDF. One point for sure I know will provoke comment is the Stop Loss Multiplier. That's about 1 week away. Continuous Straddle will be another interesting topic.
Lot Size
Risk Basis
Trade Closure Mode
Risk Percentage
Stop Loss
Stop Loss ATR Periods
Stop Loss Multiple
Use Trailing Stop Loss
Take Profit
Take Profit ATR Periods
Take Profit Multiple
Set Stop Loss to Break Even Pips
Min Pip Gain for Reset
Decrease Stop Loss Percentage
Other Inputs (1 one subject)
EMA Cross
Price EMA Cross/Position
RSI
MACD
STOC
Bollinger Bands
PSAR
Time and Day
Straddle
Continuous Straddle
CCI
ADX
ATR
Zig Zag
News
Pivots
Fibonacci
Support and Resistance
Divergence
Candlesticks
Volume
Setting up Optimizations
How to use Strategy Optimizer
Using a VPS
What to Optimize
How to Combine Strategies and Filters
How to Handle Money Management
Finally - A Battle Plan
Todays discussion -
Lot Size
Money management can be quite complicated if you take all the options presented and the option to nominate a fixed lot size gives you absolute simplicity in determining the relative values of strategies and filters in your back testing and trading. If you have been used to trading in small amounts such as .01 of a lot then fixing your lot size is the option you have with this input. This means that your Lot Size will remain fixed for every trade and Stop Loss Multiplier will have no effect.
Most MT4 brokers give you the option to trade in any of the major currencies so this means that the value of your profit is directly related to the size of your wager.
The rule of thumb is that a wager of 1 lot gives $10 (or 10 units of your own currency) per pip gained (a pip is .0001 except JPY .01, Gold .1, Silver .01). So a wager of .01 gives $1 per 10 pips.
If left at 0, your lot size will be determined by the size of your equity. I would recommend that you do leave this at 0 and use your equity as the determining factor because you are then taking the first step in a money management plan.
Lot Size
Risk Basis
Trade Closure Mode
Risk Percentage
Stop Loss
Stop Loss ATR Periods
Stop Loss Multiple
Use Trailing Stop Loss
Take Profit
Take Profit ATR Periods
Take Profit Multiple
Set Stop Loss to Break Even Pips
Min Pip Gain for Reset
Decrease Stop Loss Percentage
Other Inputs (1 one subject)
EMA Cross
Price EMA Cross/Position
RSI
MACD
STOC
Bollinger Bands
PSAR
Time and Day
Straddle
Continuous Straddle
CCI
ADX
ATR
Zig Zag
News
Pivots
Fibonacci
Support and Resistance
Divergence
Candlesticks
Volume
Setting up Optimizations
How to use Strategy Optimizer
Using a VPS
What to Optimize
How to Combine Strategies and Filters
How to Handle Money Management
Finally - A Battle Plan
Todays discussion -
Lot Size
Money management can be quite complicated if you take all the options presented and the option to nominate a fixed lot size gives you absolute simplicity in determining the relative values of strategies and filters in your back testing and trading. If you have been used to trading in small amounts such as .01 of a lot then fixing your lot size is the option you have with this input. This means that your Lot Size will remain fixed for every trade and Stop Loss Multiplier will have no effect.
Most MT4 brokers give you the option to trade in any of the major currencies so this means that the value of your profit is directly related to the size of your wager.
The rule of thumb is that a wager of 1 lot gives $10 (or 10 units of your own currency) per pip gained (a pip is .0001 except JPY .01, Gold .1, Silver .01). So a wager of .01 gives $1 per 10 pips.
If left at 0, your lot size will be determined by the size of your equity. I would recommend that you do leave this at 0 and use your equity as the determining factor because you are then taking the first step in a money management plan.