Trading From The Chart

Trading from a chart is one of the most popular approaches by discretionary traders - for good reason. You can see price movements along with your indicators, and recognize where appropriate levels will be for price action.

Visual chart trading keeps pace with your needs and you can intuitively drag and drop order onto your chart – no need to calculate the necessary price and type it in. An order can always be moved to another level if desired. Entire entry and/or exit strategies, like single orders, may also be dropped into a chart. For technical information on this feature look at the related Wiki page.

Context-sensitive charts

No more remembering prices to type them in later - surface of each chart tracks movements of your mouse and you can place orders at the exact levels you click on. Simply hover your mouse over the appropriate price, right-click and choose the order type and quantity.

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Context sensitive menus and orders
Nearly everything in MultiCharts is context-sensitive, not just the chart surface. Try right-clicking on various objects and only the relevant options will appear. For example, the Place Order menu option only appears when connected to a broker. Click above the price and see Sell Limit and Buy Stop options, but if clicking below the price see Buy Limit and Sell Stop options. Different controls only become active if they are appropriate.

Quickly drag-and-drop orders

Visual trading is essential because most traders spot important points with their eyes – where a pivot will occur, or a breakout might happen. You can easily and precisely drag and drop orders.

Easily adjust price levels

To change where orders are located, simply drag them up or down. Don’t like the new location of an order? Simply press Escape and the order will return to its original position.

Convenient Trade Panel

Apply any order or change any position quickly and easily using this carefully designed panel. An intuitive interface and color-coded buttons make things easy to locate.

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Placing orders from the Trade Panel
Place orders by right-clicking on the chart, typing in the price and pressing the Buy/Sell buttons, or drag-and-drop orders onto the chart. MultiCharts supports market, limit, stop, and stop-limit single order types.

Stop, limit, and stop limit orders are shown as small icons with appropriate names, and they can dragged to price levels since they are price orders. Market orders can only be entered using the red and blue Buy and Sell buttons.

To enter and exit positions you can also use One-Cancel-Other (OCO) order groups, which consist of combinations of limit and/or stop orders, and if one is filled the other one is cancelled. These are also shown as icons, and will be discussed in more detail in the Entry and Exit Automation section.

Setting Order Quantity
So you know what to buy and when – just specify how much. Enter the number of contracts by hand or use a convenient calculator tool. The trader’s calculator automatically stores the last amounts used and allows quickly picking them from a menu. It is also easy to add a certain number of contracts to the amount already owned. Every time the calculator is opened the quantity goes up by +1, this is because the program assumes the calculator was opened to change the quantity of contracts by at least one.

Time in Force
How long do you want your order to remain active? There are several options - DAY (good for the rest of the day), GTC (good till cancelled), GTD (good till date), IOC (instant or cancel). You should note that these options are not always enabled, it depends on the order that you are placing.

Account Selector
All available accounts are automatically listed in the Accounts drop-down list. Simply click on it and choose the account you want to trade.

Easily apply entry and exit strategies

Staying protected in a fast moving market is a must for all traders. Drag-and-drop entire strategies onto a chart – you can apply strategies to existing orders and/or to entire positions.

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Basics of entry strategies
Entry strategies are pre-designed One-Cancel-Other (OCO) order groups to enter positions. They consist of combinations of limit and/or stop orders, and if one is filled the other one is cancelled. They are shown as icons in the Trade Panel, and can be dragged onto the chart to apply them.

There are currently four entry strategies – Breakout, Fade, Breakout Up/Fade, and Breakout Down/Fade. To learn more about them read the Automation of Entries and Exits section.

Exit strategies are essential
Exit strategies were designed to protect against sudden market movements and to exit a position in a structured and organized fashion. They allow managing risk, scaling into and out of positions, and leaving the computer while trades are in place. Just like entry strategies, these exits are OCO groups consisting of limit and/or stop orders. Drag-and-drop exit strategies to existing orders, apply them with a right-click, or auto-apply them to every new order. Learn more about them in the Automation of Entries and Exits section.

Trade through any broker

Trade through any supported broker from any chart – just pick the appropriate one from the drop-down list. Have several accounts? There is a drop-down list for that as well.

Symbol Mapping

Sometimes data feeds and brokers have different names for the same symbol – and orders can get rejected for incorrect symbol reference. MultiCharts defines how an order will appear to a broker, so it is possible to use any combination of data feeds and brokers.

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Essence of symbol mapping
For example, if trading the E-mini futures, the broker may not provide the continuous futures symbol. However, it’s possible to find a data feed that provides a continuous symbol. You can mix different data providers and brokers in MultiCharts, but that can sometimes creates a discrepancy. The data feed may call the symbol ‘@ES’ or ‘ES #F’ while the broker is expecting an order for the ‘ESU1’ contract. Without symbol mapping traders would be limited to only using data from the broker being used to execute the trades.

Symbol mapping is a ‘translation’ tool that defines how an order will appear to the broker – even if @ES is the symbol on the chart, MultiCharts can make it appear as ESU1 (or anything else) to the broker. If the symbol on the chart matches the symbol used by the broker then this tool is unnecessary. Symbol mapping, though, is essential if using different data providers or brokers.

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Risk Warning:
Trading financial instruments, including foreign exchange on margin, carries a high level of risk and is not suitable for all investors. The high degree of leverage can work against you as well as for you. Before deciding to invest in financial instruments or foreign exchange you should carefully consider your investment objectives, level of experience, and risk appetite. The possibility exists that you could sustain a loss of some or all of your initial investment and therefore you should not invest money that you cannot afford to lose. You should be aware of all the risks associated with trading and seek advice from an independent financial advisor if you have any doubts.