No.18: Trade splitting with three trades
Description
You can find an example for the Expert Advisor Builder on this page. If you need to familiarize yourself with the MetaTrader strategy tester and the Expert Advisor Builder, please begin with the Getting Started article.
This example demonstrates the practice of dividing the risk of a trade, a common strategy in effective risk and money management. It shows how this is accomplished by using multiple trades to respond to the same signal. Long orders are initiated based on signals from a MACD oscillator. Signals are only produced when the slope of the MACD signal and MACD main lines is positive. As soon as the price changes favorably, a second trade is opened with the same lot size as the first, followed by a third trade with only 20% of the initial lot size.
Therefore, multiple trades can be open simultaneously, with one trade considered the master trade and two considered the slave trade. The master trade and the first slave trade (Slave A) were set up with take profits. In contrast, the second slave trade (Slave B) does not have a take profit, which means it can remain open for an extended period.
Please note that this is not a plug-and-play trading strategy. A trading strategy needs suitable adjustments, fine-tuning to the timeframe and symbol, and thorough backward and forward testing. Therefore, providing fully working trading strategies as read-to-use examples is impossible. However, this example could serve as a foundation for your trading strategy.
Reset of inputs
Locate the Expert Advisor Builder application in the dropdown menu of the strategy tester settings under FEA Trading\MT4\Expert Advisor Builder 2.0 if you're using a MetaTrader 4 instance or FEA Trading\MT5\Expert Advisor Builder 2.0 if you're using a MetaTrader 5 instance. You can replicate the entire example in minutes by following the steps outlined in this article. To begin, kindly reset the strategy tester input as indicated.
The default input parameters of the Expert Advisor Builder are designed to be highly functional. This implies that only some parameters must be adjusted when creating a new strategy. As a result, even with minimal reconfiguration, the output strategy can be significantly different.
Inputs configuration
Most examples can be executed in any timeframe and on any symbol. However, please set EURUSD as the symbol to be tested, M15 as the timeframe, select Open prices only (MT4) or 1 minute OHLC (MT5) as the model, and the previous four weeks as the test period. Finally, enable the visual testing mode.
Refer to the table below to set up the input parameters for the Expert Advisor Builder.
| Input variable within MetaTrader (Identifier in SET file) | Example value | User manual chapters |
|---|---|---|
| > (OUF) Idea output description (max 63 characters) (IN_strOufIdeaOutputDescription) | No.18: Trade splitting with three trades | Output Folder |
| > (ISL) Selection (IN_enmIslSelection) | RATE OF CHANGE | Initial Stop Loss |
| > (ISL) Rate of change (min value) (IN_dIslRateOfChange) | 0.002 | |
| > (SLT) A Type (IN_enmSltAType) | FIX | Stop Loss Trailing |
| > (TSP) A open volume (0 -> OFF) (IN_nTspAOpenVolume) | 100 | Trade Splitting |
| > (TSP) A open position (IN_nTspAOpenPosition) | 150 | |
| > (TSP) B open volume (0 -> OFF) (IN_nTspBOpenVolume) | 20 | |
| > (TSP) B open position (IN_nTspBOpenPosition) | 100 | |
| > (TSP) B close position (-1 -> No TP, 0 -> Master, >0 -> Pos.) (IN_nTspBClosePosition) | -1 | |
| > (OSA) CONF, Signal in use (IN_enmOsaSignalInUse) | ON | Configuration Available Oscillators and Default Values Example |
| > (OSA) COND, Relation 1 OSA1 to OSA2 (IN_enmOsaRelation1) | VALUE X CROSS VALUE X | |
| > (OSA1) CONF, Signal in use (IN_enmOsa1SignalInUse) | ON | |
| > (OSA1) COND, Angle limit condition (IN_enmOsa1AngleCondition) | GREATER LIMIT 1 | |
| > (OSA2) CONF, Signal in use (IN_enmOsa2SignalInUse) | ON | |
| > (OSA2) COND, Angle limit condition (IN_enmOsa2AngleCondition) | GREATER LIMIT 1 |
Confirm the inputs by pressing OK, and finally, start the test run with Start.
Chart example and SET file download
The underlying algorithm is highly optimized for execution speed. Generally, it only takes a few minutes until the entire test period is simulated. At the end, you will see a chart similar to the following.
To reproduce the chart from this example, you can download and use the SET file package eab_example_18_v_2_0.set.