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Hi Wawa,
Why is it that you think the BTC EA is trading XAU??
It looks to me that the BTC Ea just hasn’t made any trades yet which is highly likely on an H1 EA that has only been on demo for a couple of days.
IF you closed all your trades and chart and then ONLY had a single Chart open that was BTC with the BTC EA then I would believe it’s trading a different currency.
I am however very sure that is not what is happening.
Also it doesn’t matter what the EA says (ie wether it is for BTC or XAUUSD) it is the chart it is attached to that will be traded.
hi Alan,
Yes the EAs that he through the money Carlo are ascended to the collection. If 69 have passed the Monte Carlo but only 50 then likely you have automatically remove correlated EAs set on in the collection and some are being removed. If you click on the collection tab and scroll down then on the left had side there will be some stats to tell you why some have been removed from collection.
it could be that your collection size is set to 50 so check that but I expect it’s to do with correlated strategies being removed.
let me know if not and maybe send some screenshots
Hi Alan,
During generation all strategies that pass the acceptance criteria end up in the collection. If you click to collection tab you can view all the information about the strategy and then export is as an mt4 or mt5 expert advisor.
Or you can add several to the portfolio and see a combined equity curve and then export a portfolio expert advisor.
the same applies if you are using the validator instead of generator/reactor.
hope that helps?
Hey Tanya,
Good question re timeframe. It would depend on number of trades really, if your H1 is making 3 trades in a week on average then it’s fine but like you say if it’s only making 1 or two then two weeks would more appropriate for H1.
I tend to stay away from M5 and M1 personally, the lower timeframe the more of an impact noise is gonna have which is totally unpredictable so I stick to M15 and H1 mostly (H4 and Daily also).
For how often to add new EAs it would depend on how many on your demo account are still trading well generally (ie have a profit factor of 1.1 over the complete time on demo would be good ones to keep). In do tend to just put a complete new set of EAs up once a month but it’s not the only way.
Do you have FSB also? It is great but you don’t need it. In my opinion it’s best when you have a particular trading strategy that you are trying to create. Both EA studio and FSB pro have their strengths and weaknesses but I wouldn’t be overly concerned about rushing to learn FSB pro unless you want to do something that you can’t in EA studio.
Hey Tanya,
Sounds like a good plan. I wouldn’t be too rigid about the 12 EAs. I’d say aim for 10-20 EAs and stick with 0.1 lots size on your 10k account and you will get a feel for how much your balance will change over the course of a month.
It of course depends on the EAs you select as one EA may typically trade more often than another for example.
More important of course is to be moving your balance in the right direction but you will want to also get a feel for the risk you are taking on your account every month.
For example, if you have a trading plan for a month then you should be able to feel pretty sure that even if you have a really bad trading month that your balance is very unlikely to drop below a certain threshold.
As an example of you had 10 EAs trading then for each one you could get the average number of trades a month, win loss ratio and typical size of losing and winning trade. Then you could assume that the win loss ratio was halved to simulate a bad month and calculate what the loss would be for the month and scale your lot size accordingly.
I’m not saying that this is a good way as I just came up with it on the spot as a quick example but it would give you something tangible to estimate as a start and you can improve your calculation as you gain experience.
In a nutshell the point I am trying to make is just that you should have a reason for the lot size you are trading that is as much about the risk you are willing to take as it is about the profit target you are aiming for. But always aim to keep things as simple as they can be :-)
Hey Matt,
Well that’s definitely looking great then. The prop challenges are definitely tricky to get through but it sounds like you are getting close with your stable results.
It’s definitely the daily drawdown that is the trickiest to pass while making profit target as you are finding.
How many EAs are you trading? Diversifying further could help you achieve a better reward to risk ratio.
Hey Tanya,
Yeah good recap.
For selecting the EAs we are doing a couple of things when we trade them on demo. First is we are actually applying a final filter that removes strategies that MAY have been overfit and also then trying to catch the EAs in their profitable phase.
I think it’s important to wait the full month personally before moving anything onto mock demo with over 10 trades and good performance, also I like a week as a shorter filter too.
For the short filter I am happy with a few trades and a profit factor of 1.1. For the longer filter I like to see more trades and a profit factor of 1.1 along with a drawdown value that aligns with what was shown in the backtest.
A longer filter would also be smart in my opinion (say 3 months) but it’s a balance between managing all the accounts also so I like 1 month and 1 week for simplicity.
I would suggest that you think of a few things you would like to try and then have three mock demo accounts and compare the results over a few months to see what works best (remember and record everything in a spreadsheet).
Of course you have to find the balance with time and effort that works for you. I don’t have a lot of free time so I adjust my systems to suit.
Oh also for number of strategies, it’s much better to have more in the collection than less as you can use the performance filter to trim things.
It sucks when nothing goes in after 10hrs but I also don’t like it when too many are going in too fast. If I get 50-150 overnight then I am happy and I’ll trim those collections down to a portfolio of 10-30.
Hey Tanya,
I think a stop loss should always be used so it’s really only trailing or fixed to choose between.
It’s kind of just a habit that I choose fixed to be honest so definitely feel free to try trailing also and see what gives you the best strategies. You could set two identical reactors running with only difference being one uses fixed and one uses trailing and compare that way to see what’s generally giving you the best looking strategies. Or just set fixed or trailing in the generator so it can choose between the two, both options are all good.
For the portfolios I would definitely recommend working with portfolios rather than individual EAs but I would also recommend not having overly large portfolios unless they are very uncorrelated (which is not easy for same symbol and timeframe).
I would stick to portfolios of about 30 personally, just a preference to limit too many positions being opened at the same time but this really isn’t a big deal unless doing scalping that requires super quick executions. Opening too many positions at once can cause several seconds delay on execution which you will be able to see in MT4.
It’s fine having lots of portfolios on different timeframes and symbols (say 10 portfolios of 30 EAs) as it’s unlikely that for different symbols and timeframes trades will open at the exact same time. But again it’s really not big deal just what I do.
Good plan Tanya,
I personally keep things simple and always use a take profit and stop loss. I just use a fixed stop loss also.
For M15 I think a good range is 20-120, but I would increase the upper range a bit for higher timeframes (say 150 for H1 and 200 for H4).
If you are getting plenty strategies coming through using those ranges over approximately 5 years of data then all good :-)
If I run my reactor and get about 50 EAs overnight on a pair and timeframe then I am pretty happy. If a pair has too much more than this then I’ll make a note that can change the settings a bit for that pair and if too few then likewise I will need to relax the settings.
You are welcome Tanya :-)
The above is all pretty sensible which is great, although ballpark I would probably be aiming for about 12 EA’s with a 0.1 lot size on a 10k demo account. If only trading 6 then could increase to 0.2 and likewise if trading 24 EAs then trade 0.05 lots per EA.
You will get a feel for the kind of profits and drawdowns with a bit more experience and can tune how you want but this is just a recommendation to start out.
Also M15 and H1 timeframes tend to combine well so you could also try including some H1 in your portfolio for the same assets.
Other than that I would say be very clear in your tracking of what you are doing and the results you are getting. That way over the course of a few months you will build valuable data for moving forward.
Excellent glad that all makes sense :-)
Profits won’t come straight away, it takes time and practice to improve and work out the nuances.
I have a few questions:
What EAs are your running?
How many are you allowing to trade on your mock demo account?
What is the balance between symbols an timeframes on your mock demo account?
Also what is the size of your mock demo account and what Lot size are you trading?
Hi Tanya,
I would stick with just using the Monte Carlo. If you want to make it more stringent you can try increasing the number of tests and passing percentage or make the validation acceptance criteria better. I’ve found 20 and 80 works well though.
The walk forward is a more advanced tool(but that doesn’t mean better!). I have used it in the past but I no longer do.
For robust strategies I would recommend the combination of a good amount of data with plenty trades, OOS and Monte Carlo.
I only trade M15, H1 and H4 and I typically like the use 5 years data for M15 and H1 and about 10 years for H4. Can use more but I wouldn’t use less.
Sound like it’s to do with the Lot size you are trading not being available. What lot size are you using?
See if increasing it works in the backtester. I would expect 0.1 to work
Yes that is my recommendation.
So each set of robots would run for two months total. Month 1 is purely trading on demo to get her statistics and then the second month is moving trades from that demo account to your live account (or mock demo).
If you have two demo accounts then you will always have a demo account that’s got a months worth of stats before you trade.
Hope that makes sense?