4 points sqew in auto trading

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paul.robillard
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4 points sqew in auto trading

Postby paul.robillard » 04 May 2012

Here i have a simple code, based on what i gathered. It works ok (it's done to generate orders, not necessarely profit;) I hope to learn the basics of auto trading from it. So 3 bars up i buy, 3 bars down is short, stoploss & takeprofit @10 points. Nothing fancy.

Now when the order occurs i get a spread of 20 points between my profit and loss limit. That makes sense, since i set those to 10 points each. The problem is that i expected this to be set on entryprice. And it does not correspond, examples:

Entry price 69, TP75 * SL55. I would expect entryprice in the middle of TP-SL @ 65.
Entry price 77, TP83 * SL63. I would expect entryprice in the middle of TP-SL @ 73.
Entry price 83, TP97 * SL77. I would expect entryprice in the middle of TP-SL @ 87.
Entry price 80, TP94 * SL74. I would expect entryprice in the middle of TP-SL @ 84.
Entry price 56, TP42 * SL62. I would expect entryprice in the middle of TP-SL @ 52.
Entry price 38, TP24 * SL44. I would expect entryprice in the middle of TP-SL @ 34.


... etc ... There is allways that same 4 points sqew between the figures. Also, this 4 points sqew bring my stoploss 4 points closer and my takeprofit 4 points further. Can someone explain why ?

Code: Select all

variables:
TP(10) , {Points to Take Profit }
SL(10) {Points to Stop Loss }
;

[IntrabarOrderGeneration = True];

////////////////////////////////////
{entry Long }
if (marketposition = 0) and (high >= high[1]) and (high[1] >= high[2]) and (high[2] >= high[3])
and (low >= low[1]) and (low[1] >= low[2]) and (low[2] >= low[3]) then
begin
buy ("tiers1L") 1 contract next bar at market ;
end;

if (marketposition > 0) then
begin
// SetStopContract;
setstoploss(SL) ;
setprofittarget(TP) ;
end;

//////////////////////////////////////

{short }
if (marketposition = 0) and (low <= low[1]) and (low[1] <= low[2])and (low[2] <= low[3])
and (high <= high[1]) and (high[1] <= high[2]) and (high[2] <= high[3]) then
begin
sellshort ("tiers1C") 1 contract next bar at market;
end;
if marketposition < 0 then
begin
// setstopposition;
setstoploss(SL) ;
setprofittarget(TP) ;
end;

print(time," Entry: ", AvgEntryPrice_at_Broker_for_The_Strategy," ",entryprice," TP: ", TP," SL: ", SL);
Thank you !

evdl
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Re: 4 points sqew in auto trading

Postby evdl » 04 May 2012

Can it have something to do with the difference between the avgentryprice and the fill price. Where the difference is the broker transaction costs. (avgentryprice = fillprice -/- transactioncosts). There are some post about this on the forum I think.

paul.robillard
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Re: 4 points sqew in auto trading

Postby paul.robillard » 04 May 2012

I tough about that. The broker takes 2 euros commission not 2 points. 2 points is worth 20 euros. So no, i don't think it comes from there. Plus the trade cost should not influence the entry / exit levels ! should they ?! ...

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JoshM
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Re: 4 points sqew in auto trading

Postby JoshM » 04 May 2012

Plus the trade cost should not influence the entry / exit levels ! should they ?! ...
Like Evdl said, SetProfitTarget and SetStopLoss use the commission and slippage settings from the strategy settings (if I'm not mistaken).

Try adding the Commission and Slippage words to your output to see where the difference might come from. Otherwise, follow Evdl's suggestion about searching on the forum.

paul.robillard
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Re: 4 points sqew in auto trading

Postby paul.robillard » 04 May 2012

ok, i just did that and 2 comes out under commisison. Does that mean i should take that commision out of the properties of the signal ?

My solution was to ajust the SL & TP accordingly, altrough i don't actually find this being the right thing to do. But it works !


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