Welcome back Zulutraders and Forex fans.Its no secret that the MetaTrader platform is taking the forex world by storm. Even forex giant FXCM caved recently and started offering their own customized version of MetaTrader. And a growing number of Zulutrade providers are now using MT4, even if just to trade their signals manually.
Meta-trader is definitely the future of Forex trading and here's why:
- Contains full-featured charting and free real-time data provided by the broker
- Open demo accounts of any size with the click of a button
- Integrated reporting, news, Alerts, Broker mailbox and best of all ..
- Integrated automated trading through "Expert Advisors" - computer programs that trade your account 24x5, around the clock, tick-by-tick without you having to watch every hour of the day and night.
This last one is huge because (due to the 24 hour nature of forex) you can only be up and paying attention to the markets at best half of the trading day before you have to spend some time with the family or go to bed. Plus with features like automated trailing stops, you can have the technology edge you need to make money in this ultra-competitive arena.
Also, there's a growing industry of expert advisor programs competing for your trading dollar. Most of them have a one-time upfront charge for unlimited ongoing usage. Its become a war of technology between the EA developers and in some cases the Forex brokers themselves who stand to loose money when a really good robot stats chipping away at their dealing desk.
Realizing that this information is old news to some of you, this post is to get the rest of you folks up to speed. For those of you not already running MetaTrader, do this.
To Do List
1) Download MetaTrader from your favorite broker. Here are a few links to get you started:
FXCM UK-based MT4 page
FXDD MT4 page
Forex.com MT4 page
Alpari UK MT4 page
2) Get familiar with the major parts of the platform, charting, order entry, etc.
There are some excellent videos on Youtube to walk you though at:
Metatrader videos
Take your time to get to know the platform, there's a lot to it.
3) Learn how to setup Expert Advisors by going through the above videos.
4) Finally download some EA's and play around with them in demo accounts.
To find some free EA's, go to Google and search for "free expert advisor download"
Eventually, I would like to program my own Expert Advisors, and i'm now heading in this direction.
Also, if any of you have been using a particular EA and having some success, please share that with us and we'll demo them along with you.
Okay, get busy and check back later for updates and good trading,
Tcxmon
Good post.
ReplyDeleteI am one of those that does not use MT4. I have played a little with the software but have not really got into it.
I suppose my problem is I can't get it to work at my workplace. The internet proxy does not work and I don't want to ask IT about it, looking like I don't work and just play all day with currency. I have listened to a few of the YouTube videos you posted. Not too bad.
Looking for a profitable EA is a frustrating experience. You will find many with claims that go way beyond the wildest dreams of avarice but virtually all of these prove to be money losers. Backtesting is generally a flawed method of proof of profitability because of interpolation errors as to where a trade actually took place on the one minute scale. Scalping EA's (< 10 pips per trade) are especially vulnerable to showing success in backtesting but then complete failure in live testing. Martingale EA's (where open trades accumulate based on increasing the lot size until profitability or huge loss for that series of trades), can work for some periods but eventually come to ruin unless monitored and modified manually. But that defeats the purpose of the EA, doesn't it. Grid traders such as RoboMiner and EquityBuilder may work for lengthy periods but eventually come to ruin as secular changes in highly correlated currencies occur. To me, the best prospects are EA's with large T/P targets and small S/L protections. For these, high win percentages are not important; what matters is taking large profits and keeping losses small.
ReplyDeleteMy faint hope in this area is for an EA called Forex Godfather which seems to have the elements described above. It doesn't trade often, which is probably a requirement for these type of EA's, so patience is needed.
EA testing results can be found at ForexPeaceArmy.com.
Daniel Fernandez at fxreviews.blogspot.com does a great job of debunking EA's on a daily basis, and offers, thru his monthly newsletter and E-Book some EA's that actually work. He's a programmer too, and is able to create and test his own EA's.
Also, the member 'funyoo' at tradingsystemforex.com, in the Elite section of the website, can quickly create EA's for testing member's ideas, as well as providing several EA's for Elite members that actually work over extended periods. I am coming to believe that those wanting to trade an EA will either have to buy/use some of the profitable EA's (which don't trade that frequently, hence they are not in great demand) or develop their own EA, perhaps starting with an existing free/open coded EA and then modifying and testing to attain profitability using an approach (T/P, S/L, frequency of trading) that suits the needs of that trader. You can find MT4 coder's on the net who charge very reasonable rates to modify existing EA's. I've used such a service and have been pleased with the results and the price.
That's all I know.
Redford-
ReplyDeleteWow, that's a lot of great information. Seems like you have a lot of experience with EA's and we appreciate all your insights.
I suppose its unreasonable to think you can spend $97 on an EA and its going to crank out the cash month after month without so much as a care from the user. It's a case where we want to believe its possible where in reality we should know better.
I am encouraged though that using EA's you can test a lot of ideas and other people systems before you risk your first $. I'm also encouraged that with micro accounts, you can trade multiple pairs and multiple positions (possible long and short same pair at different amounts and timeframes) for not a lot of money.
All of the playing around i've done so far is based on a $1000 starting account which at 200-1 margin controls up to 200K worth of underlying currency. That's a lot of buying power for not a lot of downside. I'm done with throwing $10,000 at one idea when I can throw $4000 at 4 different ideas once they've been established in live testing in a demo account. And i'm not quite ready for that yet.
Understood what you mean about Godfather, if it doesn't trade often, you have to wait a period of time to learn anything about its behavior. That makes the case for writing your own EA (or having someone else write it). Since you understand the underlying logic you understand what it does and way.
So all that sounds good, but will it result in profitable trading? We'll see.
Thanks again for reading and for the great comments.
Chris
Redford-
ReplyDeletehttp://fxreviews.blogspot.com/ is an awesome resource in and of itself. I'll be spending hours over there.
Thanks very much once again,
Crhis