Trading Initial Balances and EA

What Are Initial Balances?
Initial balances refer to a specific time frame at the beginning of a trading session, typically the first few minutes or hours when a market opens. During this period, traders closely observe price movements and volume to gauge market sentiment and establish trading strategies for the rest of the session.

How Initial Balance Trading Works
The concept of initial balance trading is rooted in the idea that the price and volume behavior during the initial balance period can provide valuable insights into the day's trading potential. Here's how it works:

1. Observation: Traders closely watch the price action and volume during the initial balance period, which often includes the first 30 minutes to one hour of a trading session. This is a critical phase for assessing market dynamics.

2. Key Levels: Traders identify key price levels during the initial balance period, such as the high and low points. These levels can serve as significant reference points for the day's trading activities.

3. Breakouts: Breakouts above or below the initial balance range can signal potential trading opportunities. A breakout above the initial balance high may suggest bullish momentum, while a breakout below it may indicate bearish sentiment.

The Expert Advisor

So with the EA I've created you trade the initial balance of the currency or index. So say you're trading the NY session. The initial balance would be from 9:30am EST to 10:30am EST. The EA will take the high and low of that time, and if price trades above the high it buys and if price trades below the low it sells.



Trading_Time_Start: What time the EA should start trading. For example if you're trading NY session you want it to trade AFTER the IB is established so for example at 10:31am EST. (You would have to convert to your server time)
Trading_Time_End: Time the EA should top trading. Default is 23:55 server time.
Initial_Balance_Start: From what time you want the EA to start calculating the IB (convert to your server time and what session you want to trade)
Initial_Balance_End: From what time you want the EA to stop calculating the IB (convert to your server time and what session you want to trade)
Lot_Size: Pretty straight forward, this is the lot size you want to trade.
Take_Profit_Percent: The take profit is by default 2x the size of the SL, you can edit this.
SL_IB_Start: The SL is set at the opposite side of the IB. So, if a buy position is opened the SL is set at the low of the IB. If a sell position is opened, the SL is placed a the high of the IB. So this variable is for you to indicate the start of the IB.
SL_IB_End: This variable is for you to indicate the end of the IB so it can calculate where to set the SL when a position is opened.
Percent_Away: This variable is for the trailing stop. When your position is say 50% or 80% into profit it will send the signal to the trailing stop to start.
Percent_For_Trailing_Stop: When your position is say 50% or 80% into profit it will send the signal to the trailing stop to start. This percentage is used as a way to determine how far away you want the SL to trail price.

Here's an example of the EA working on S&P futures today.

When price broke out below IB a short was taken, then hit SL when price broke above IB and immediately took a long position which eventually hit TP.

Well done. Do you mainly trade indices or gold too?

So I tested this on Nasdaq and Nikkei but it does better on S&P500. I tried on WTI, not bad but needs a lot of over sight. I use it now on GBPUSD, but I also like to combine it with Market Profile.

Thanks! I appreciate your feedback.

Here's trading today's GBPUSD initial balance on the NY session. U.S. CPI news brought the price down below yesterday's low of 1.22672 and I manually entered a short position at IB low with target around 1.22000.

Today's S&P 500 Futures short after breaking out of IB. Trailing stop closed it early, but still pretty good profits made on this trade. Done for the week!

Nice thread. Going further into auction market theory what can help forecast the days trading range/direction is if todays IB is within or out of yesterdays/last weeks value area etc. From this you can determine if you can expect responsive or initiative activity that day/week etc and trade accordingly.

Thanks makingmoves! Yeah I was actually reading earlier this week about the Volume in the IB and how that will signal in a way if the day will range or trend. The difficult part is creating an expert advisor around a market profile indicator.

Absolutely tis the the problem when trying to be 100% objective, I myself trade manually but as robot like as possible (90% objective maybe) but the subjectivity is still there and plays a role. However ill be interested to see what you could do especially including value/fair value, ill be following the thread

Today's S&P500 futures trade. Trailing stop loss triggered, trailed and stopped out.

Hi ,
Fortyfve20 .

Nice to see this ea .
if you dont mind Can shear template of opened chart .

Thanks bro

Sure, what exactly do you need?

The Template of chart

Hmmm so it's a few indicators and then personal preferences. So I'll leave links instead:

Initial Balances Indicator:
https://www.forexfactory.com/thread/...07#post7832007

Set to your time zone and market preference. You can choose Asia, Europe and US sessions.

Market Sessions:
https://www.forexfactory.com/thread/...22#post6983422

Again set to your time zone and market preference. You can choose Asia, Europe and US sessions.

Grid Round Numbers:
https://www.mql5.com/en/code/downloa...zontalgrid.mq4

Set to your preference

Multi-Timeframe High/Low:
https://fxssi.com/mtf-high-low

This one is pretty cool because you can choose A LOT of options for high and lows of many time periods and even custom time periods.

That's basically it man. And of course download the EA in this thread which by the way, I made it so it draws a rectangle for the IB that you choose. Hope it helps!

Another good day for the EA on the S&P500. I closed manually early in the morning but there was more money to be made.

S&P 500 and S&P500 futures keep trading lower. IB EA took a short today, that almost got taken out (SL is set at IB high) but I got stopped out with trailing stop. Done for the day.

S&P 500 and S&P 500 futures a bit choppy today at the beginning. The EA took a short position first, then stopped out and opened a long position right away as price briefly traded above the IB. That long was stopped out.

The EA is programed to take only 1 trade, per signal, per day. So I set a pending order at the bottom of the IB if the long position was stopped out. I managed to cover losses.

Do you maintain position to hit sl or tp or close it every day?

Personally, I let the SL, trailing SL or TP take care of themselves. Today, the position was left open because neither the SL, trailing SL or TP were hit. But you can try it out as you wish and see what works for you.