papertrading

so ive created a simulated account with ib and would now like to paper trade my system.
how do i do this?

if i open tws in my simulated account and then try to get data from ib into mc, nothing happens.

i want to know all the steps that i need to take to paper trade, thank you.

I have attached the instructions for connecting IB to MC in Word format. This, along with instructions for other brokers, will be posted soon on the website.

im trying to paper trade, how do i trade my paper account while still receiving quotes from my real ib account?

What is the goal you are trying to achieve? You can receive data from the live and execute on the sim, if you like. However, let's think about it.

1. The data(and, therefore, prices) do not match on live and sim. In this case, your motivation would be to see the real prices. But, execution will depend, in this case, on 'incorrect' sim data. Market orders will be filled, but price orders may not be filled, since they are generated on live prices, and executed on sim prices. Basically, if sim prices are fake, and ES prices for sim are 1785, while in reality they are around 1338, your price order for 1342 will not be filled, since that does not match the sim prices.

2. The data and prices match on sim and live. In this case, what is the point of doing this at all? Just use your sim data and trade on sim.


In general, here is how you do it (if you decide you want to). MultiCharts can receive data from only ONE TWS, while you can launch several TWS' and login to them using different logins. Orders can be sent to SEVERAL TWS at the same time.

So, in your case, you would use the first one you launch for data (all the ports and IP addresses are setup by default). Log into that one using your Live login. Then, launch another TWS and log into that one using your Sim login. Now, you need to setup a broker profile to send orders to the Sim one instead of the default Live one.

You need to either modify the existing Interactive Brokers broker profile in MultiCharts, or create another one. You can do that through MultiCharts > File > Broker Profiles > and either New or Edit. Call it TWS SIM (optional). Then you need to open the SECOND Sim TWS, go into its properties and change the connection port number to something other than the default (to 7497 for instance). Then in the broker profile called TWS SIM, specify the new port number, so that it connect to Sim TWS instead of the default Live TWS. Then open a chart from IB (uses the data from first Live TWS) and make sure you connect the TWS SIM broker profile and try placing trades - to make sure you didn't mess anything up. Once you see trades appearing in the second TWS, you are good to go. Both TWS need to stay open, one to feed the data, and one to receive order.

yeah i figured it out eventually, i had to change the settings in quotemanager so that i was receiving data from my simulated account.

Great!