Giving Something Back; My Equity, Free Margin and Profit Protection EA

Many people here on Forex Factory have been very kind to me with my occasional needs for coding help.

Attached is an EA I coded, which does need a Forex account that allows hedging for it to be useful. Putting it online here for others to use is simply to give something back to this forum and as a way to say thank you.

It is a "Trade Manager" type EA, not a trading strategy.

It works as follows:

For all 3 areas (Free Margin, Equity Profit and Equity Loss), when it starts up (or you restart MT4), it calculates the difference between sell and buy lots that are open as well as your opening equity and free margin levels.

At pre-set trigger points that you set in inputs, it will open a trade to balance lots.

Eg, With Equity Loss and Equity Profit, it makes the lots equal to lock in the profit or limit the loss. With free Margin, it opens an opposite order to leave 50% of the trade in favor of the direction you have.

The trigger points and lots info are shown on the chart so that you know where things are at.

Free Margin -

In inputs, you can select the % of Free Margin at which point the 50% balance trade gets opened. That is, "extern int FM = 0.3" means that when Free Margin gets down to 30%, it will open an opposite trade equal to 50% of the open lots. This leaves the majority of your open lots in favor of the direction you wanted, but prevents your account from any margin calls.

TakeProfitFM is the pips of profit this trade can be closed at.

Equity Loss -

In inputs, you can set the maximum loss of equity you will accept before an opposite order will balance your buy/sell lots. That is "extern double MaxLoss = 0.25" equals 25% loss of equity to my account will trigger a balancing trade that makes buy and sell lots equal.

When this trade is opened, it resets the MaxLoss level at the set % lower.

NOTE: This code tracks best price/equity. As your account improves equity/profit, it tracks and changes the MaxLoss tigger point according to the new/higher level.

TakeProfitML is the pips in profit this trade can be closed at.

Equity Profit -

In inputs, you can set the maximum increase of equity you will accept before an opposite order will balance your buy/sell lots. That is "extern double HeapsProfit = 0.25" equals 25% profit on equity to my account will trigger a balancing trade the makes buy and sell lots equal. This is to lock in a profit, which emotionally we often see disappear before our eyes before we take action.

When this trade is opened, it resets the HeapsProfit level at the set % higher.

TakeProfitHP is the pips in profit these trades can be closed at.

The way to use this EA is to attach it to any chart. It is not related to time frames. Any other EAs you use of course run on their own charts. That is, this is a "stand-alone EA" that I use not for the primary trades I open, but to cover my butt when things go good or bad.

Any comments welcome, but please don't think I'm interested in adding lots of functions - my coding skill is only a few rungs up the learning curve ladder.

Thanks a bunch! Was actually just looking for exactly this!
Cheers!

You're most welcome, we're all on the same side .

I find it will execute trades even when my MT4 reports it's too busy to process manual trades.

For what it's worth, I EXPECT my trade entry points to work out, so if my MaxLoss ever gets hit, I go for a walk for an hour or two, clear my head and then look to exit which ever trade is at its best place.

In any event, to those of you who only wish 2% account risk money management ideas, this works just as sweet as it does for the 25% guys like me.

Are you still using this EA? Are there any updated instructions? Not sure I 100% understand how it works.

Cheers!

It is fully functional as posted. Its primary functions are to close all trades when a target % equity growth is reached, OR to balance out all trades with a single hedge trade if a minimum equity position is reached.

No I do not use it. My personal trading style has evolved many iterations since I coded it. It is valid for people using the most complex trading systems where many trades can be open at the same time.

I've simplified my own trading systems since I coded this EA.

I personally see Stop Losses as the most singularly DUMBEST idea of Money Management (MM) concept I have ever heard of. Stop Losses have never MANAGED money. They in fact are a systemic LOSS Management system.

IF EVER I am so wrong with a trade entry, then I want that position locked up with an opposing hedge. And then I will deal with unlocking this hedged position by using my next trade entry setup to close one leg of my hedge (not opening a 3rd trade), and then using my trading system to later close the remaining leg of the hedge - ideally also in profit, but at least at a break even position.

The EA I have posted here was designed for more complex trading systems where you could see any number of open trades at the same time. It did the maths to say "OOPS, too hard" when a minimum level of remaining equity had been reached and it makes 1 trade to hedge the books out as balanced. That is, if the trigger you set gets hit, it makes 1 trade to balance all buys and sells out as equal.

Alternatively, it says "COOL, too easy", equity profit target reached, lets close all the lemon trades out and start again from our new, higher equity position.

Its history stems back to years ago of a trading strategy I developed with Fractals. That trading system I developed back then was based on some wisdom by an old timer named Bill Williams, who was a player before the Internet days and MT4.

This system I was working with way back then was to do with any Fractal level that was breached was a (pending stop) trade worth taking. And from visual back testing, it seemed that every breached Fractal sooner or later made profits.

Later I learned that brokers have their own limits on how many open trades you can have at the same time, and I soon abandoned this line of strategic design.

Oddly enough, I have recently mentioned to a Forex student I am mentoring how I will be revisiting Fractals some time soon for the value they can offer in trade set-ups.

In any event, long after I did abandon my Fractals project, I did code the EA you are talking about to lock up a complex bunch of trades with one single hedge trade if a low-equity trigger point was reached. And I also coded this EA to close all trades if a target % equity growth point was reached.

Anyway, this EA reflects my deepest belief in hedging rather than stop losses.

In complex trading systems, this EA reflects my belief in closing all trades when you have made your target equity %.

But my trading system these days is not complex, and so I do not use this EA.

Phil

thanks for the thoughtful response. the reason i was looking at this EA was simple for the hedging functionality. i too have a very simple style and was looking for some way to hedge my positions (usually only one) in those rare instances when exhaustion selling/buying pushes the market further than I expect.

Do you currently automate your hedging or do you do it manually?

You could search for MPTM, an EA by Steve Hopwood.

His Multi Purpose Trade Manager is probably the ugliest code you will ever find, but its bare bones hedging functions do work. I vouch for none of the rest of it.

NEVER have "hedge the hedge" set to true or you are in for a world of hurt.

ALWAYS have MetaEditor open if you feel you might want to change a setting in his MPTM. I say this because you can never open MPTM to access its settings after it has been attached to a chart. If you need to make a change, then you must remove it, and change the setting as you reattach it, or make the change in MetaEditor and re-complile it while it is attached.

I do use it. It's limitations are known to me. It has its perils.

Hi, i was wondering if you can made for me a special edition with a little modification: instead of "closing all trades when a target % equity growth is reached, OR to balance out ..." send an email as alert.

Thank you.

I recently re-stubled on this page today... I finally downloaded the EA and will be giving it at test run. I agree with you dancingphil about hedging your way out of positions - I was doing it manually to great success until I fell asleep with several un-hedged open trades a few weeks ago... when I woken from my peaceful slumber I immediately tried to hedge but did not have enough equity left to do so.... an EA like this would have come in handy...

Hi Phil.
First of all thanks for sharing.
Have been looking for something like this for a while. I would like to trade with bigger lot size and hedge quite early if things go "the wrong way".

I actually downloaded your EA and paid a programmer to update it to MT4 +600 build.

So I am mostly interested in the funktion "equity loss" where I can balance out a trade gone bad.

But there are some issues i think have to do with the update (reprograming). Tried it out on demo but it did not trigger any trade when the equity dropped.

Doesn't the EA manage all open trades? Trades I have opened manually to or do I have to open manual trades with a script in order to get a magic number?

Hope you still are reading this thread. Is it possible to get in contact with you. Tried to send you a message but that option was blocked.

Could you please email me: [email protected] . Have a questions about your other thread to. Seems like you trade the way I would like to.

Feel like I am standing on the bottom of a stair that you have already climbed...

Knr Rikard

Hi Phil, First off thanks for sharing your EA, and explaining how you trade.

I have taken the time to read most of your posts regarding your method and have found it most en lighting.

Your opinions are very much similar to mine especially regarding the USA.

I currently use hedges and appreciate the value of your method.

Would you explain your method in deciding when to either close your hedge or your main trade?

Do you automaticly place a pending order in your hedge position when opening a trade or do you wait, monitor and then place one manually?

If after placing a Hedge that has been activated (either manually or automaticly) and the price retraces and starts moving in your intended trade direction, when do you remove your hedge and take a loss on that leg. ie - 5 pips

I use seat of the pants, gut feeling of price action, but would like to get away from the emotional impact this has.

Brian

If some grid ea already running then how the trade manager ea behaves?

It woud be a great blessing to the forum if a latest version of trade manager ea is provided for the current mt4 build up as the ea neither showing any open buy and sell lots on chart nor opening hedging/balancing trades.

I'm testing a grid and this EA to buffer the occasional drawdown. Problem is, there is no stop loss for equity hedge trade. It frustrated me today, so i have no idea how to ask for someone to simply code a stoploss. It would make all the difference in the world. Any coder?

Hi guys,
I am so disappointed that I found this trade so late.
I hope it's not to late!
Is Ther anyone with a working version?
Is There somebody how can make tus work again
Is there something out that do something like that?

Thanks a lot

Please make my dayI nearly get stopped out last week

We miss you Phil