Forex Trading Expert Advisors (EA or automated trading system) and Custom Indicators (CI) for MetaTrader Platform.

Where Robots Are Born

According to the statistics, over 60 per cent of all transactions in financial markets are carried out using the trading robots, and only 30 to 35 percent are carried out manually. Indeed, it doesn’t surprise anyone as the trading robots allow traders not to spend hours in front of their monitors trying to guess the currencies movement but use this time for more pleasant activities. Besides, the use of trading robots diminishes psychological pressure on the trader as well as the risk of deviating from accepted trading rules under the emotional influence is minimized, as the trading robots cannot be stressed and act strictly according to the built-in algorithm.
Now that we know basic evident advantages of the use of the robots (or advisers) we will try to understand where one can get them.
It goes without saying that the main source of the trading robots is the web, specifically, e-shops, among which we would like to accentuate... the platforms MT4 and MT5. You will say that these platforms, which are the most popular in the world, are meant for a different thing - to be able to open and close positions, not for shopping, and you will be wrong. Open a trading terminal on your computer, it doesn’t matter MT4 or MT5, find the “Market”  bookmark in the bottom of the page, click on it, and you will see hundreds and thousands advisers, indicators, scripts, books and magazines on Forex, which you can buy straight away, not leaving from your monitor.
This is not a usual shop, it is a real hypermarket, created by the company MetaQuotes Software Corp. - the same company that developed the platforms MT4  and MT5  themselves, and this is a sure guarantee of the product quality! “Market” is one of the most reliable sources of advisers, as along with your purchase you receive a detailed description of each robot, its work monitoring results (often in real time mode), you can learn what other traders think about this robot and its author, and, which is significant, you can test it absolutely free of charge and assess its efficiency.
Apart from above, the MT4 and MT5 platforms provide another unique advantage to the trader - you can rent it, not buy, either for a month or a year or six months. And the most economy variant is to get a robot for free by opening the “Library” bookmark (Code Base ) of your personal trading terminal.
If you are an experienced trader and you have your own trading strategy, you can, rather than search for somebody else’s adviser, create your own robot and put it on sale. Even if you do not know the programming languages MetaQuotes Language 4 and 5 (MQL4 and MQL5), this is not a problem - you can place an order, and in just few days you will have your own adviser created by experienced programmers according to your algorithm.
As mentioned above, apart from hundreds and thousands robots, the fore mentioned bookmarks will help you find a great number of indicators and scripts as well as specialised books and magazines - that is, everything that should and could make your forex trading more comfortable and profitable. Just a few numbers to confirm these words - by the mid last year over 6.300 products had been sold in the “Market” costing in total over $522.000, and the service had been used by 520 sellers and 24.500 buyers.
Winding up this short review, we should mention one more great opportunity provided by the MT4 and MT5 platforms - the immediate access to one of the world largest trading signals copying services (bookmark “Signals” ), where you can set up a subscription for very reasonable money (average cost about $20 per month), after which all the transactions of more experienced colleagues whom you like will be copied in your trading account in fully automatic mode. You will not even have to turn on your computer as with the help of the terminal you may also use the service of virtual hosting (similar to VPS-service, but better ).
So, download the MT4 or MT5 terminals to your computer, press F1 on your keyboard and visit the MetaQuotes company, read, investigate, buy, sell, leave your comments on our forum. And if you make another useful discovery, do not forget to share it with your colleagues, we will only be grateful to you.

I like MT4 more. Firstly, it is convenient and understandable. And, secondly, as for me MT5 is more complicated to use and I have not noticed a lot of advantages, which would have forced me to choose it.

One can be sure that those who read this article now know very well (and if not, will learn learn soon) the advantages of social trading which makes it possible to automatically copy to your account the transactions of many more successful traders. It is especially convenient as it is very easy to use the service - it is built directly in the MT4 and MT5 trading terminals.

Those who prefer to sell itself, may not even suspect that the tab "Signals"  at the bottom of the terminal opens instant access to one of the world's largest social trading services. Though whom out of dozens of thousands signal providers to choose in order to have profit and not to lose your money is the main question.
This and further publications will try to identify specific mistakes of the subscribers and tell the readers how to avoid them in the future.Meanwhile we will share just five observations that the recent spring has brought.
To help the subscribers, the company MetaQuotes (the developer of the MT4 and MT5 platforms and the creator of the service "Signals" ) offers to us its own rating of the best and most reliable signals. Besides, visiting the mql5.com portal, signals may be ranked as far as their popularity among subscribers and other parameters are concerned.
And now, if you will, leaving behind the introductory part, let's move on to the observations which we announced above.
Observation №1 is that very often MetaQuotes ratings and those of the subscribers ...are not the same, and it is primarily due to the fact that the desire to obtain the greatest possible profit in the shortest possible time constantly prevails over subscribers. This, naturally, leads to a sharp increase in the chance of losing your entire deposit.
We do not in any way claim that the MetaQuotes rating is ideal, but at least it lacks such a factor as human greed and has dozens parameters adding to an objective assessment of the signal quality.
Observation №2, the results of which will not surprise anyone but which definitely confirm the fact that the higher the profit, the the greater the drawdown. For signals with a monthly increase of capital of 15-25% the drawdown usually ranges between 15 to 40 percent of the deposit. Further, with increasing returns, the drawdown begins to confidently steal up to 100%, and what happens when such falls happen - there is no need to explain.
Observation №3. The service created by MetaQuotes allows to rank the signals according to their life span as well. Yere the statistics vividly show that the signals with profitability of 100, 300 and more per cent a month do not usually live longer that 30 weeks. Those of them that have survived without the "plum" for more than 20 weeks are - alas! - on the tops of preferences of not only subscribers, but also in the forefront of other ratings. If you filter the signals according to their life span, you will see that the signals living for a year or more, on average, bring to investors not more than 5-10 percent per month. (Which, by the way, when compared with the interest on bank deposits, is not so bad. Or rather, is very good).
And now two more observations which for sure will be of use to the “Signals”  service users and to which we definitely would like to draw your attention.
Observation №4 is the difference between the graphs of the balance of the account and the funds. This is probably the most important and the most obvious indicator of what you can expect from a subscription. And if the balance is steadily going up, and the funds remain somewhere at the bottom, or frequently jumping up and down, it clearly demonstrates the riskiness of a subscription to the signal.
Observation №5 is the currency pairs on which the signal provider makes his transactions and their spreads. When studying very decent signals it may suddenly turn out that some providers, apart from major currencies, work with quite exotic pairs as well, such as CAD/JPY or NZD/CHF. For example, Chinese traders like to deal with pairs with Yuan which are not present in the arsenal of many brokers at all, and even if they are, the spreads on them may be really astronomic.
Five is a quite round figure so in order not to bore the readers, let's stop here for the time being. Here these five observations are listed in short, but in the nearest future we will try to parse them with specific examples and give tips that we hope will allow the traders to avoid associated pitfalls.
Besides, we will share observations 6,7,... and maybe even 9 and 10 with you. And you will share observations №11, 12 and ...20 with us.
What is the goal? It is very “simple”- to jointly create a system that will allow everyone to subscribe only to the signals that can indeed bring us real profits with the least risks. Probably this is what the term “Social Trading” means.
https://www.mql5.com/en/signals 

Probably the most famous line from Gounod’s "Faust" is the one that sounds in the aria of Mephistopheles "People dying for metal". In the previous publication, having shared some of observations on subscriptions to trading signals via the platform MT4 and MT5 (remember? Tab "Signals" at the bottom of the terminal), I suggested that subscribers often choose signals solely on their profitability, forgetting completely about the risks.
And then? Remember what Mephistopheles sang about?
To be fair, everything is not so tragic. First, selecting a signal for yourself, you can focus not only on the rating of popularity among subscribers, but also on the rating that the portal mql5.com offers. This rating is based on more than three dozen indicators, although the formula for its calculation is made secret by its creators and is hidden behind seven locks, which naturally causes dissatisfaction of certain sceptics, who do not want to trust someone's word, and are willing to find out all the detail on their own.
Well, let them do whatever they want - all the three dozen parameters of each signal separately are available to anyone on line. If you wish, you can work out your own formula or just study, analyse and subscribe.
Personally, I do not load myself with all these numbers and I am guided by only 4 parameters:
- Deposit growth, in per cent (here, I don't think I need to explain anything - the higher the percentage, the better)
- Maximum drawdown, again in percentage of the deposit (here everything is clear as well - the smaller the better)
- Lifetime of the signal,
- And stability of its work.
The lifetime is a very important parameter. If one ranks the signals presented by the mql5 presented as far as this parameter is concerned, it is clearly seen that the longer the signal lives, the less the average monthly income is. Thus, for signals with the lifetime of over 100 weeks, this figure is usually in the range from minus 10% to plus 10%. Of course, there are exceptions, but most often this is what happens.
On the other hand, it is possible to distinguish another group of signals, which shows phenomenal profits of hundreds or thousands per cent, the peak of life for which occurs in the 20th - the 40th week, and then again ... you can listen to the aria of Mephistopheles.
In order to prevent this, I suggest using the fourth of the proposed criteria, which I call stability. If someone likes more sonorous terms, you can call it a dispersion of returns, the essence will not change. And the essence is to make it clear for us what was the reason for the profit - just luck or a high-quality, well thought-out trading strategy.
Just one obvious example (in order not to be accused of any advertising or anti-advertising, the specific names of the signals will not be given). So:
At the time of this writing, the growth of the deposit for signal X was 2400 per cent, and that is just in 20 weeks! That is quite impressive. The drawdown at such yield does not inspire any fear either - it is only about 15 per cent only. But if you look at the monthly rate of return, here you will see the following picture: in January - plus 1,176 per cent, in February - plus 85 per cent, in March - plus 21 per cent, in April - minus 7 per cent, in May - minus 6 per cent.
I can't say for others, but I would not expect here a stable income - a deviation from the mathematical expectation in both directions in this case may be about 400 per cent, and it is virtually impossible to calculate the efficiency of such an investment.
For comparison, let us look at another signal. The lifetime is almost the same - 21 weeks, the maximum drawdown, as well as for the previous signal is 14 per cent, but the increase in the deposit is 10 times lower - 115 per cent "only". At the same time the monthly yield is as follows: January - plus 9 per cent, February - plus 15 per cent, March - plus 22 per cent, April - plus 20 per cent, May - plus 15 per cent. I think it can be seen without any further calculations that the subscriber can continue to count on the profits in the range of 10 to 20 per cent both in June and later on.
Some of us prefer risk and adrenaline, others prefer calm and stability. I'm not lazy and have made some simple calculations, using the mql5 statistics. It turned out that out of more than 7,000 subscribers who use this service, about two thirds can be attributed to the category of incorrigible optimists greedy for profit. And it is only one-third of subscribers who have carefully analysed the words of the aria of Mephistopheles.
In any case, good luck to both.

What is required:
- an indicator of levels of wave formations
- to complement an advisor for scalping in the stock markets,
- to collect statistics on currency pairs,
- to write an advisor for testing of graphical objects,
- to improve the indicator for the analysis of Japanese candles ...
These and thousands of other various tasks are given by traders to programmers in the "Freelance" section of the MQL5.community portal. (One can get to it either directly on the Internet address, or through a variety of services built into the terminal MT4 and MT5).
"Freelance" is a section worthy of separate consideration, since (as, indeed, other sections of the portal as well) it is a very useful resource for those who seek to automate their trading on Forex.
We will not go into the debate, what is better: to trade manually or automatically. We will just mention that the algo trading frees the trader from having to sit at the computer all days long, and also relieves the process of trading of such a harmful factor as human emotions. Whatever passions in the market, the adviser (or robot, whatever you like) will strictly follow the algorithm incorporated in it, 24 hours a day, 5 days a week.
Moreover, the algorithm inherent in an advisor can be tested in a few minutes. If the algorithm has not left the confines of the brain, one can wait for the test results forever.

Generally, in our case, the algorithm - is the keyword, which determines whether the algo trading will bring profits or losses.
Of course, you can not spare yourself of unnecessary problems and take advantage of (free or for money) a ready advisor, which is very easy - just press the tab "Market" at the bottom of the terminal MT4 and MT5, and you will encounter "many kilometres of shelves" filled with a wide range of products . But, when the brain is swelling from creative ideas, it is much more interesting to put them into practice by creating your own unique advisor - the "Holy Grail", which will bring to you (and only you!) fame, wealth and prosperity.

There is only one problem: you are a trader, not a programmer and you do not know the language MQL5, which is used for all programs for MT4 / MT5. Here help from the section "freelance" comes around.
Of course, there are lots of ads on the Internet by programmers who are ready for a reasonable price (and sometimes not very reasonable, meant for "dummies") to perform a job for you. But the advantage and fundamental difference of the "Freelance", is the fact that it is a labor exchange for programmers who are ready to fight for the right to execute your order.
It's like an auction: You place (absolutely for free!) an application with a description of what you want to get (see examples at the beginning) and denote the price you are willing to pay for this work. For example: "Needed a break-adviser on fractals for futures trading. The budget - no more than $30. " You can also specify the desired date for executing the work, for example, 3 days.
Then everything happens like when fishing - you throw a baited hook and watch whom of programmers you will get. Analysis of the statistics shows that the average of bites is from 15 to 25. At the same time, programmers may simply agree to your terms, or put forward their own. Moreover, they can be either better or worse than the primary terms - for example, not $ 30, but 20 or 50 and the deadline - not 3 days, but a week ... As evidenced by all the same statistics, the fastest of all jobs was executed ... in 1 minute!
Of course, such fast food is rather an exception, but the portal allows you to select a programmer not in blind, but having learnt his detailed "creative biography" - what work he has already done previously, at what price, in what time and what responses he received from customers.
And if we really do statistics, it should be said that most of the applications is performed, depending on the complexity, at the price from $15 to $100 in up to 5 days.

In conclusion, let me share another personal observation.
There is a common opinion that programmers are not engaged in forex trading, and they only embody the specific programs that traders tell them. My experience fully agrees with this. For an experiment, I placed an application in the "Freelance", according to which an Expert Advisor for opening "locks" was required. In two days I received about 30 offers from experts who were ready to undertake the work on my algorithm. After recognizing that there is no algorithm and I was prepared to pay for its development separately, the number of offers sharply reduced to ... zero.
The conclusion is the same: any trader, before ordering the work in "freelance" should clearly phrase not only what he wants to get in the long run, but also how it should be achieved. And the more competently and in detail all possible actions and situations will be considered in the algorithm, the more likely you are going to end up with exactly the adviser you wanted to receive.
And finally a few figures that are more likely to be of interest to programmers who know the language MQL5. A programmer who actively works in the "freelance"has performed an average of 500 to 1,000 orders at an average cost of about $ 50 each, earning thus from $25,000 to $50,000.
Should I go on? Or is everything clear?

Notes of a Stingy Trader

Many will definitely remember how Alice fell through the rabbit hole and found herself in a new world, full of new and hitherto unknown possibilities.
Talking about the possibilities of the MT4 and MT5 platforms, these platforms possess a whole host of such holes: one just has to look at the bookmarks at the bottom of the terminal. One of them is called ‘Market’, which perfectly reflects its function, since it leads to a shopping centre, in which the shelves are full of hundreds of products, all of which are very useful for those calling themselves “traders”.
To be more precise, the on line store on the mql5.com portal currently offers more than 5000 products, amongst which there are more than 700 indicators, 400 robot-advisers, scripts and other programs, as well as dozens of specialized books and journals on various financial topics.
The official opening of the MetaTrader Market occurred in the start of 2012 and by the middle of last year more than 6300 ‘products’ had already been sold on that market, with their cumulative value exceeding half a million dollars. The amount of sellers offering products on this market is approaching one thousand, whilst the number of buyers has already far exceeded 25000. In my opinion, these rather commanding figures make obvious that this hypermarket possesses truthfully useful and essential tools for any trader.
To be honest, I am not a big fan of paying money for anything, and prefer downloading various advisers free from the internet. On the other hand, I would like to stress that not even one – not one! - of my free advisers has delivered me so much as a penny of profit. Moreover, having seen two or three deposits go down the drain I realized that it is time to put a stop on experiments with my own wallet, and decided to take an introductory tour of the MetaQuotes ‘Market’.

Why did I like it?

1. Because it is quite easy to sort products by categories. For example, ‘MT4-advisers- popular, new, free, paid’ (notice, the market also offers free advisers!). Having gone through this chain of filters you can easily find what interests you personally.

2. Because there is a substantial amount of information on every product, which is not limited just to ‘sample’ fragments of statements or authors’ descriptions, but includes also full data on online-monitoring and comments from traders who have either already purchased or simply tested a given adviser or indicator. Such information is vastly more objective than promotional texts, which aim simply to praise the product of the seller.

3. Because prior to purchasing an advisor or an indicator you can test them absolutely for free. This also provides us with two numbers that enable us to evaluate the quality of a given product: the count of how many demo-versions have been downloaded as opposed to how many actual purchases have been made (activations). Let’s assume, for example, that 1000 demo-versions have been downloaded, after which 1000 actual purchases have been made we can safely say that the given product has satisfied the needs of traders by 100%, both in terms of quality and in terms of price. If, on the other hand there have been 0 purchases then one should definitely decide against acquiring this adviser or indicator.

4. As has already been mentioned, I am quite stingy (or greedy) and dislike throwing around my money. For this reason “Market” has become quite attractive to me since one can, instead of purchasing, can… rent the products offered for a month, half a year or a year. Rent-test-like-buy. Do not like-forget: the loss is not big at all!
5. One more relatively minor, but extremely pleasant feature is the ability to dispel myths. Amongst traders there exists a legend that if you buy an adviser priced at 10, 20 or 30 thousand dollars it will definitely end up being the ‘Holy Grail’ that will grant you multiple millions. Here it is apt to remember Alice and the Wonderland in which she found herself in at one point in her life. So that you do not find your mind wondering off to Wonderland and that it stays, instead, in reality ‘Market’ allows you to satisfy your curiosity by testing advisers priced at tens of thousands of dollars absolutely for free. I am not going to berate them, nor am I going to praise them. Simply test them and decide for yourself on whether they are worth your money or not.

Finally, allow me to poor a couple of spoons of tar into this barrel of honey (what can we do without them!)
Spoon #1: The average purchase price on “Market” is around 85 USD. This is, of course, not several hundred or even several thousand, but it is still a hefty sum. Therefore, prior to completing a purchase I strongly recommend making use of all the services ‘Market’ offers for the evaluation of a product’s quality.
Now, Spoon #2: As claim the makers of this service, the key concept in ‘Market’ is Activation. In other words, buying a product, you are not buying a product (with apologies for the mediocre rhyme) but instead you are (quote): “acquiring the right to use it an unlimited number of times, but on a limited number of computers (devices?). One activation means that you can use a product on one computer without any constraints. You will be unable to download a copy of the product onto another computer, and manually copying the file onto another machine will similarly result in it not opening.”
What can one say? I think that those who are familiar with the term ‘copyist’ can now give a sly smile. Especially since those ‘copyists’ can also be purchased on ‘Market’ without any problems whatsoever.
Believe me: I am not calling anyone to do anything. I am merely trying to compare the arguments ‘for’ and the arguments ‘against’ from the perspective of a stingy trader. The truth, as per usual, lies somewhere in the middle, and when we find it we certainly be able to save (and possibly earn) quite a large amount of money.

I guess the one who likes to trade with MT4 has much ore opportunities on the Forex market specially when choosing the broker, because the majority of the famous brokers works only with MT4 platform. For example, Fresh Forex and Insta Forex.

VIRTUAL “ME”
OR HOW I TAMED FOREX

I have been working with Forex for around seven years. I do not remember exactly when this virus infected me, but I surrendered to it quickly and, as it seems, for eternity. Nothing could help cure this illness: neither lost deposits, or a shattered nervous system, or sleepless nights, or fights with my wife. (By the way, if anyone could propose their own treatment options, my spouse would be very grateful).
As for myself, having understood that the disease cannot be beaten, I decided that… I would not take full control of it, as the ancients suggested, but at the very least I would saddle it and tame it slightly.
Therefore, the first thing I did was completely refuse to trade “by hand” and fully immerse myself into the world of advisers. Naturally, there were relapses, but these became rarer and rarer. Moreover, sound logic was on my side: since progress has given me a weapon as powerful as the computer, I convinced myself that it would be foolish not to use it.
As a result, I had much more free time and started sleeping at night, while the amount of money lost began to sharply decrease – this had a most positive impact on the atmosphere in my family.
I studied other people’s advisers, wrote my own algorithms, tested robot after robot… and kept on feeling that something was missing.
And here came the “eureka” moment. When, just five minutes before the life-changing speech of the chairman of Fed, there was a blackout in my area and my computer only came back to life once the markets had already gone through all possible scenarios, it hit me that I needed to seriously upgrade my workplace… and so I bought a UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supplies).
My happiness knew no bounds. However, after half a month, some workers on the street broke the phone cord and I was left stranded without internet.
Soon after I bought a mobile modem, the subject of my pride – my UPS, so heavy, imposing and seemingly infinitely reliable – passed away.
My next purchase was a laptop, onto which I loaded all my advisers and which was working 24/7.
It seemed as if life was getting better, but at some point, unfortunately (or fortunately?), I developed an interest in social trading, that is subscribing to someone else’s trading signals. I immediately realised what ping, delay and slippage are, seeing my wallet go thin – the deposit of the signaller grew steadily, but mine, in the best-case scenario, remained at zero.
The solution turned out to be surprisingly simple and efficient…
I forgot to mention that within social trading, having tried many different services, I finally settled on the mql5.com portal. First and foremost, the thing that caught my eye is that this service belongs to a “brand”, since it is owned by MetaQuotes – the company that developed the platforms MT4 and MT5. Secondly, I could not find such a variety of signals and such detailed information on each of them elsewhere. There was another advantage – mql5 did not tie itself to any single broker, and you could subscribe to signals (or, on the contrary, sell them) while having accounts in even a hundred different broker companies.
So, the solution was found behind the door with the sign “Virtual Hosting”. I think that everyone already knows what VPS is or how to store information in the “cloud” (whoever doesn’t, please check out Wikipedia), and so all I shall say is that virtual hosting from MetaQuotes is the same thing as a normal VPS, but better. It is better because it was developed specifically for MetaTrader and it is not just easy, but very easy to use – a few clicks of the mouse in the settings of your personal terminal on MT4 or MT5 and all your advisers, indicators, scripts and subscriptions to signals along with all your settings will be transferred to the virtual server. From this moment onwards you are provided with uninterrupted trading 24/7. You can now sleep peacefully – blackouts and internet problems will no longer reflect on your deals.
Add to this the minimal delay in the transmission of signals, because you can choose to rent the MetaQuotes server closest to the trading server of your broker.
I will not go into details about how to use virtual hosting (there are detailed instructions regarding this on the mql5 portal, and a whole series of videos on YouTube), and will just add a few words about something that, I believe, should interest every true trader – money. More precisely, the cost of renting a MetaQuotes virtual server. Today, this is only $10 per month (or, with a discount, $100 per year), which is much lower than the cost of renting a normal VPS.
There is a saying – “trust, but verify”. You can check everything I have mentioned absolutely free of charge: you do not pay for the first 24 hours of rent.

MY TONGUE IS MY PROFIT

“My tongue is my enemy”, the ancients once said. They could not have even imagined that after just two millennia, the meaning of this phrase would flip 180 degrees. Of course, if you only consider human language, everything has remained the same. “Silentium est aurum” (Silence is gold), “Silentium videtur confession” - we can endlessly recall proverbs and sayings about the need… to talk less. However, let us recall that not too long ago humans developed a need to communicate not just with their own kind, but also with computers, that have proven to be incredibly useful and essential in everyday life. As a result of this evolutionary process a new group of languages has arisen on Earth – programming languages, on which you can talk without even opening your mouth.

I have to admit – I am a complete ignoramus in programming. In the last-century early 80s, when I was studying in university, the portable “computer” in the department of higher mathematics was nothing but a board with holes (ie jacks). By connecting those with wires and plugs, we would force this technological wonder to solve problems such as 2 times 2 and would get really excited when the machine answered with the number 4.
In the lab where I started working once I graduated from university, everything turned out to be much fancier – the “Minsk-32” computer took up a whole room and as far as the number of shelves it occupied it could be compared to the wardrobe of the English Queen or Madonna herself.
This machine benefited us in one and only way – the person in charge of this monster used to be frequently given several litres of alcohol for degreasing the contacts, and, as you can imagine, this alcohol would then be quickly drunk by our friendly team (this was at the time when Gorbachev decided to wage war with drunkenness and no alcohol was to be seen on the shelves of shops across the whole of the USSR).
As time passed, progress was being made, and at one point our lab received the mini-computer “Electronics” that could fit on a desk and consisted of a keyboard and a conventional television that functioned as a screen, while the information carrier was your most common audio cassette. It was fantastic!

You have probably already understood in what circumstances I was introduced to the world of computing, and why I have yet to master even the basics of programming. However, regarding Forex, I have become a fervent supporter of algorithmic trading and I enjoy constantly producing my own advisers. This might surprise you, but some of them have been working for several years now on real accounts and are bringing me quite substantial profit.

At first I was convinced that everything genius is simple. As a result, my advisers were very simple, but, as it turned out, not quite genius. Now they have smartened up a bit – their settings include dozens of parameters and (now I’m bragging) they can even fight deposit drawdowns.

I have realised that in Forex, just like in real life, you should not try to grab the biggest piece of the pie. A collective effort is stronger than an individual one, and two minds are definitely better than one (mine).

By this logic, in the same manner as Henry Ford had developed the conveyer belt, I split the process of creating robots into two (!) whole steps: on the first step, I write up an algorithm, and on the second, a programmer brings my “genius” ideas to life.
It really is not difficult to write a detailed algorithm – you just need to clearly know what you want and not forget about Murphy’s law: if anything can go wrong, it will go wrong.
This law, in my opinion, is actually fundamental in Forex and so when, for example, you open a “sell” position, you can be certain that with a probability of 99.99% the price will move in the opposite direction. This axiom should lie in the foundation of every good working adviser.

So, we have sorted out the algorithms. Now it is step number two – writing the programme. There is no need to mention that the majority of indicators, scripts and advisers are written in the MQL languages for working on the MT4 and MT5 platforms. In my opinion, these are the very best and the simplest trading platforms, which are convenient and well harnessed for Forex languages (and this now is the opinion of professionals).
Since both the platforms and the languages are the babies of the same artisans from MetaQuotes, it is pretty easy to take full advantage of them.
Firstly, by opening the “Help” tab at the top of your private terminal, not only do you get instant access to the mega-portal mql5, but also textbooks on programming on both the MQL4 and MQL5 languages.
(By the way, a very close friend of mine, having lost his job, quickly mastered the intricacies of programming and is now working for one of the respected broker companies).
Furthermore, in the Code Base section of the mql5 portal you can find a multitude of ready programmes for the MetaTrader client terminal – take these as examples and they will help you in the creation of your own indicators and advisers.
By following this route, you will have to spend a certain amount of time studying the intricacies of programming, but you will save the money you would have spent on hiring programmers. Then, before you know it, you yourselves will be able to make certain profit by sculpting programmes for “dummies” like me.

“We’ll take the roads less travelled”, Lenin once said. So I decided that you “better go about than fall into a ditch”, and, bypassing other sections of the portal, I reached the absolutely wonderful section "Freelance". This is a real auction, a heaven for the client, where anyone can order practically any programme for MetaTrader – on very favourable terms at that, since 400 programmers (just think about this number!) compete with each other to fulfil your order.
This really is a cool tender! I was not just pleasantly surprised – I was literally shocked, when, having published my first order, I got almost 20 offers from programmers willing to fulfil my order the same day. Moreover, I specified in the comments that I was willing to pay up to 100 dollars for the work under the condition that it is completed within a week. In the end, I got my “money-making machine” not in seven days, but in three, and not for 100, but for 55 dollars.

For those who have decided to independently master this fantastic means of communication between human and computer, the MQL language textbooks can be freely downloaded on the portal of MetaQuotes, available in nine different languages. And what next? Next, we will recall the words of the Nobel prize winner and member of the Académie Française Anatole France:
« In order to digest the knowledge it is necessary to absorb it with gusto».
Bon appétit, ladies and gentlemen!

Can you earn money on Forex?
Surprisingly, any answer to this question is correct. Whatever it is – a lot, a little, nothing, a million or two, you can lose everything – every one of these options can become reality. For each individual trader, this reality depends, above all, on his or her knowledge and skills; and on the ability to use at least 50% (or better all 100%) of the opportunities provided by the MT4 and MT5 trading platforms.
At this point – I am sure! – most of the readers exclaim: “What’s hard about that? Just some graphs, indicators, advisers, a tester. Open a deal, close it and…”. And… look above for the possible options. Surveys clearly indicate that a significant number of users of these platforms cannot even imagine that through them you can earn a good amount of money… without even making any trades on Forex, in other words without risking anything.
A host of bookmarks on the terminals MT4 and MT5 («Help-Community», «Help», «Market», «Signals», «Code Base») will bring you to the portal mql5.com, on which you can:
- sell your own indicators and advisers on the “Market”,
- fulfil orders as programmer in the “Freelance” section,
- become a provider of trading signals, registering them in the section of the same name,
- become a participant of the partner programme, advertising the products of other developers and traders,
- and, finally, publish your own articles, blog, comment and socialise on the forum,
and for all of that earn real money!
If you allow, let us quickly go over each of the aforementioned ways of earning money.
1. The "Market" section is good in that thousands of buyers visit it daily, because it is that easy – just click on the corresponding bookmark at the bottom of your terminal, and you are there. Thus, as a seller, you can rest assured that you have received a very good market place free of charge. As a confirmation of this, we will just say that by the middle of last year over 6,300 products were sold on “Market” with a total worth of over $522,000, and over 24,500 buyers had used this service.
Of course, the success of your trading depends, above all, on the quality and the price of the goods you are selling – the script, the indicator or the adviser. Note that not only can you sell, you can also rent your products for very different periods of time. To make it easier for you to choose the right price, we advise you to not only study the price tags of other sellers, but also the number of sales of each of their products (the “Activations” indicator).
2. The "Freelance" section – this is a job market of sorts for programmers. It is widely known that among millions of traders, only a few are fluent in the programming languages of MQL4 and MQL5, but many want to either create their own robots, or modernise the robots of others. Such a person, who has come up with an algorithm for the automation of their own trading, posts an announcement indicating what, for what money and in what timeframe they would like to get. You then answer them by offering your services as a programmer for fulfilling the specified task.
Statistics show that the majority of such requests are fulfilled, depending on difficulty, for the price of $15 to $100 within 5 days, and a programmer working actively in “Freelance” can fulfil on average 500 to 1000 orders, and so earn $50,000 and $100,000.
3. "Signals". Becoming a provider of your own (one or several) signals is quite easy – all you need to do is to register your trading account in the corresponding section. Note that you do not need to open a new account at some or other specific broker. You can continue working on the same account as you worked on previously, and all the information on your trading (including your trading history) will be automatically fed to your page in this section and will be available to potential subscribers.
Usually the price of a subscription is $20 per month, so, for example, if 100 people copy your signals, your monthly revenue will be $2,000 (although you would have to give 20% to the portal as commission). We just need to note that the best signal providers can have more than 500 subscribers.
4. Things are quite simple with the partners programme too – in the “Market”, choose one or several products and post links to them, for example, on your website. The same applies for subscriptions to signals. The size of your commission reward can be 10%, 20%, or sometimes even more.
5. And, finally, the monetisation of your activities as an author of articles, a blogger or simply an active person who likes commenting on other peoples’ ideas, voicing your own ideas or socialising on the forum. You may think of it as a big brother, but these and all your other actions on the mql5 portal will be strictly recorded online in the “Achievements” section, and each step will bring you bonus points, which will then add up to a very precise amount of $1 for every 50 points. Personally, I have only been able to earn a bit so far – around $40 – but it is still pleasing. And what is doubly pleasing, is that in order to withdraw this money you do not need to trade for half a year to gain a certain number of trades, as is sometimes required by other brokers.
The only slight issue, in my opinion, is that it would have been nice to have a wider range of payment systems available, but the developer of the portal – the company MetaQuotes – has promised to resolve this (admittedly not really significant) concern.

It is well known that the MT4 and MT5 terminals contain quite a lot of useful functions, and one of those is acting as a bridge between a trader wishing to develop their own advisor and a programmer who is able to do just that. All you need to do is press the “Help” tab in the top part of the terminal, then “MQL5 community” and “MQL5 Jobs”, after which you will be redirected to a world called "Freelance", which is inhabited by approximately 500 programmers, who are specialists in the automation of trade on financial markets.

“Freelance” is essential a labour exchange for programmers competing for the right to bring a trader’s wishes to life. All you need to do is post your order with a description of what you want to get and specify an approximate price and timeframe. As an example: “An advisor that trades based on the “Alligator” and MACD signals with a resizable lot needed. Price – from $40 to $50. To be completed within 10 days”. After this, you just observe how the list of programmers willing to take on this job grows and choose the one who will write the code for your “grail”.
It must be noted that, when applying to complete your order, programmers may simply accept your terms or offer their own. These can even be better than the initial terms – for example $30 instead of $40. And the time frame – not ten days, but a week.
“But cheap and quick does not always mean well-done and of good quality!” a hard-headed trader would rightly claim. So how should a novice customer who knows nothing about programming choose a qualified specialist capable of completing the set task in a professional manner?
Here you just want to exclaim: “MetaQuotes, you think about us!”, because the employees of this company have already offered traders a whole set of instruments that can help make the correct decision.
Thus, having studied all the applications, you already have three criteria for selecting a programmer: the price, time frame and… language. To be clear, “Freelance” works on five languages (English, Russian, Chinese, Spanish and Portuguese) and, naturally, it is very important that there is a mutual understanding between you and the programmer.
Moving on. There is a detailed dossier on each programmer, in which all their completed works are listed, as well as reviews of customers and their ratings. For example, we can see that programmer A has completed 155 projects, of which 148 were “excellent”, 7 were “good” and 0 were “unsatisfactory”. Then we read the reviews of the customers: “Excellent work!”, “Good quality, fast, patient – definitely recommend!”, “Very thoughtful approach, helped compile TOR, completed in time!”, and a few dozen similar reviews, after which you decide that you can trust this specialist, and… you move on to the next dossier – programmer B, from which you can see that he has only completed 3 projects so far – 2 were “good” and 1 “unsatisfactory”. I think that you do not need to be a rocket scientist to realise that you should refrain from working with this person, even if he is willing to do the job practically for free.
If after such a casting not one, but two, three or even more contenders make it to the final, you can make the ultimate choice by, for example, the most time-tested method – write down all the names on pieces of paper, mix those in a hat and, with closed eyes, pull one out. The objectivity of this method is beyond any doubt.
Apart from the aforementioned way of posting your order, you can approach a specific programmer and discuss with them personally whether they will take on your task and under what terms. For this purpose, there is information available about all the programmers in “Freelance”, as well as a TOP-10 rating compiled by the MetaQuotes company.

An important point: the money for paying for the order are set aside on your private account in MQL5 community and are transferred to the programmer only (!) in the case that you accept their work.

So you posted your order, chose a programmer and received a ready advisor. Then you tested its work in a tester of a trading terminal (not forgetting about visualisation), on a demo account, in reality and made sure that everything is working the way it was described in the TOR. In this case, you give an excellent rating to the programmer and leave a laudatory review. The programmer then receives the promised reward and deep moral satisfaction from your praise.
However, if you are not happy with the result, apart from low ratings and angry reviews you have every right to file a complaint, and the MetaQuotes company will act as an independent arbitrator, and will also involve external experts if necessary. This is why I suggest you adhere strictly to the rules and procedures of “Freelance” – they are indeed really well thought out, and will not only protect your money, but also in case of disagreement, will allow for a maximally fair hearing.

MT4 was updated  and I really like this new improved version! Especially I appreciate that launching of new options fro trading and saving our time with new format of paying without extra clicks.

Service "Freelance" at the MQL5.com portal provides a unique opportunity: by selecting one of the 500 (!) programmers, the trader can use him to create his own trading robot. But for the robot to be successful, high quality Terms of Reference are required.
So how do you make up such Terms of Reference?

There is no need to prove that trading in financial markets, thanks to the development of computer technology and the Internet in recent years, has become a high-tech process. Of course, there is no unanimity as far as automated trading is concerned, but it is obvious that, according to statistics, over 60% of all trading transactions are now carried out using trading robots. And we are talking not only about the private traders, but also large, once very conservative, financial institutions, banks and funds. I don't think I will be wrong if I assume that just in couple of years the called 60% will turn into 80, and then to 99%.
The sixth human feeling called intuition sometimes might help, but in conjunction with a strained nervous system it often interferes with a sober analysis and leads to disastrous results. As far as advisers (robots) for automated trading are concerned, they are able to work tirelessly 24 hours a day all 5 working days a week, devoid of any emotion, and make decisions in a split second according to their inherent algorithm.

And here arises a very important question: how to make the program under which the adviser matches exactly what its creator wanted it to be? We do not mean a higher power by the creator, but the trader who developed the trading system, and the programmer who shifted the system to the MQL5 language .
It is great when the trader is the same person as the programmer. In this case it is quite probable that they will find a common language.
But what if they are two different people? And one of them (the trader) knows absolutely nothing about programming? What is to be done in such a situation?
As practice shows, the only means of communication in this case is the Terms of Reference (TOR), in which the trader (the customer) should be clear and easy to understand as much as possible to describe what he wants to see cast in lines of a computer code.

As they say, as many people, so many opinions. But in our case it is not true. This author has analysed about fifty variants of the requirements that programmers impose to the structure and content of the TOR, and realized that at least four fifths of them are all the same. But the remaining 20% allow - though indirectly - to judge how competent the programmer is and what complicated advisers he can create.
If we talk about the averagely tricked advisers (we do not talk at all about neural network advisers), the requirements for the TOR would look like this:
1. The trading platform, where the adviser will work;
2. Currency pairs and time frames;
3. Indicators used (if non-standard, apply);
4. Full description of the system parameters (optimized and not);
5. The rules of work with the trading system (entries, exits, support positions. Here it is better to make clarifying screen shots);
6. Types of orders: market, deferred. Presence of StopLoss, TakeProfit, TrailingStop and NoLoss (if required);
7. The rules for managing capital (fixed lot or the formula for calculating its size, percentage of deposit, etc.)

There are about 500 experienced programmers in the "Freelance" department at the portal mql5.com (MT4 and MT5 terminal menu tab "Help - MQL5 community - MQL5 Jobs") with the help of which one can fairly quickly, cheaply and, most importantly, with high quality put this technical reference into life, receiving as a result an adviser ready to work.
Here are some useful tips on compiling the TOR:
- remember that the programmer is not responsible for the profitability of the strategy. Therefore, before you begin working with the adviser, test the profitability of trading on a demo or real cent account yourself;
- to avoid misunderstandings, check with the programmer all necessary terms and definitions;
- and know that the program debugging and error detection is always the responsibility of the customer. It is not excluded that after testing the adviser you will have to communicate with the programmer a number of times to make the robot as good as you want it to be.

And here, if you do not mind, the author will give you some additional tips based on his own experience.
I. Warn the programmer in advance that your adviser is a Christmas tree which you will decorate later with more and more toys. The toys will be additional indicators and filters that specify terms of entry into a position and exit from it, connecting to the time of different trading sessions, various options for calculating the lot size, the procedure for opening hedging positions ... You never know what other ideas come to mind during the operation and improvement of the adviser!
If you do not provide for the possibility of such modifications in advance, you will have to pay for the new adviser each time (from my experience $50 - $100). If you do, you just pay for its modification, that is about $10 - $15. As they say, feel the difference.
II. This point comes out from p.I. You can never be 100% sure in the beginning which of the Christmas decorations will be of use and which will be useless and even harmful. Therefore, I strongly recommend that you provide a possibility to disable each (!) function in the settings of the adviser (on/off button). This will facilitate the process of optimising the operational parameters of the adviser in the MT4 and MT5 terminals tester.
A simple example: you originally envisaged closing position at TP, and then decided to add the possibility of closing at the crossing of MA as well. As a result, we have four options: closing only at TP, closing only at the MA, closing at the first onset of these events and closing at the onset of both events. The buttons on/off TP and on/off MA are required in order to figure out which one is the best.
III. Finally p.III which supplements the previous two. Do not hesitate to load the programmer and provide a possibility of optimization for every parameter of the adviser. I must say that this wonderful feature built in MT4 and MT5 sometimes gives the most amazing and very unexpected results. And the process of optimization is so fascinating that could replace any life-long hobby of yours.
As for trading in real accounts, I strongly advise against treating it as a hobby: money is a serious thing. Making up proper Terms of Reference is one of the components of the business process.

Anyone who has read my articles knows that the purpose of these publications is to share extra options provided to traders by MT4 and MT5 platforms. We say extra, as we talk not about transactions, but about access to useful services that allow you to make these transactions more profitable.
Today, I would like to elaborate on just one of these services, as this service is not only useful, but also quite unique among Forex trading services.
We are talking about the service "Market" - a huge shop, in which you can, on the spot, i.e., from the monitor, buy indicators, scripts or advisers (experts), of which there are plenty in the "Market" tab - hundreds, or even thousands. Embarrassment of riches! And for the visitor to be able to lift up his head, the developer offers a number of ways, the most attractive of which should be called "Trust, but verify!". But before you do this test, you must first get to the store.

Access is allowed!
It is very easy to do this - either through the tab at the top of the terminal - "Help - MQL5 Community - MQL5 Market", or through the tab "Market" in the bottom.
Personally, I prefer the second option, simply because this way is shorter. The only small inconvenience in this case is that at least a few charts of currency pairs, a navigator, and perhaps also a strategy tester are normally open in the terminal at the same time, so there is not much space for the "Market" window, and you should clear some. But, as you know, this operation takes only a few seconds, and then there is nothing to stop you to examine the proposed product in a relaxed environment without distracting to quotes and orders.
By clicking on the icon of the proposed product, you can get acquainted with its description, and decide whether to buy the product you liked, or to rent it for a certain period, for example, for a month (which is, of course, cheaper), or .. . to test it absolutely for free!

Trust, but verify!
Selling their products through the "Market", owners and creators themselves set up a price (the trading marketplace will charge a small fee) and for the products to sell better, sellers attach a detailed description, as mentioned above.
Well, who would write anything bad about their own product! Therefore, you will hardly find a list of shortcomings in these descriptions, although there are some for sure. And in order to obtain an objective assessment of the quality of the acquired product, that is an indicator or an advisor, visitors are offered to carry out their own testing for free. And if you wish, you can carry out optimization as well.
So you either buy the products immediately, or rent them, or test them first. To do this, simply click on the "Download Demo", and literally in the blink of an eye there appears a folder "Market" in the Navigator on your terminal, see "Advisors", which will automatically collect all your selected experts.
I should say, you will not be able to see how their paid versions work on demo or real accounts (this does not rely to free advisors - there are plenty of those in the "market"). But you can test and optimize both of them in the strategy tester as much as you want. At the same time you can compare advisors worth $ 5,000 to those that are offered for nothing. Those who know say that the price is not the only difference...

Meta Trader: Golden Carriage for Binary Options

Binary options (BO) trade is a relatively new service in the market of on line services, it appeared only a few years ago, and immediately caused a lively debate. Someone finds them amusing entertainment, such as computer games, someone calls them casino and scams, and someone sees them as an opportunity to significantly improve their financial situation. The discussion in this material will be for the latter and about the latter.
But first of all I should say that, as a form of income, BO are absolutely transparent - you bet $ 100, make a forecast that, say, in five minutes, the Euro will grow against the dollar, and you can go for a smoke break (although better not, smoking is harmful). And after these few minutes, if the rate has really grown up, your $100, as if by magic, turn into $175. Isn't it great? Absolutely, except for the fact that your prediction may be wrong, and then the end will be sadder than even in the Cinderella fairy tale. It is in the fairy tale that at the appointed time (when trading BO it is called expiration time) the carriage turned into a pumpkin, here your hundred will just evaporate without a trace. But, in any case, everything is fair - you know in advance what the prize will be in case of winning, and the correctness of quotes can be easily verified by consulting with quotes from other brokers.
Although all of it looks pretty much the same as a roulette table - red or black, even or odd, with only one, but very serious, exception - all the methods of technical and fundamental analysis are applicable to the BO trade, which strongly unites it with Forex.
Just as is the case with Forex, a lot of different trading platforms are designed for binary options. And now, according to the rumours that I heard, the company MetaQuotes, which has produced the most popular platform Meta Trader, is thinking about enriching their favourite child - the MT5 platform with a function that will allow to trade binary options!
I would not like to do any advertising for anyone, so I'll just focus on the benefits of MT5 (observable and unobservable), which - in my opinion only! - turn the platform into an effective tool for earnings using BO.
The first of them - is the fact that the platform not only allows the use of everything that has been developed in MQL5 language for technical analysis, but also a transfer of binary options trade to a fully automatic mode with the help of robots-advisers, signals copying systems and other joys that have been brought to us by scientific and technical progress.
I heard some criticisms, such as (I quote): «Meta Trader is not well suited for working with binary options, as it was not designed to do this: the quotes there look very much global (large-scaled and stretched over time). And it is a strictly limited time expiration that is important for binary options."
What can I say? Yes, that everything is the same as with Forex. Expiration time (option execution) usually starts from 1 minute, and then 5, 15, 30, 1 hour, 4 hours ... Doesn't this resemble anything to you? These are standard time frames! Therefore the BO trading strategies often resemble the Forex ones from scalping on minutes to thoughtful four-hour chart analysis. And for those who love super-delights and super-precision, MT5 offers about 20 different time frames. There are M2 and M3, M4 and M6, M12, H2, H3, H6 ... I do not know why and who needs it, but if someone does, MT5 has it!
Returning to BO, I can say that, regardless of the time frame, it is possible to make money here times faster than in the Forex market - because your income does not depend on how many points the price will pass,1or 100, its any tiny step brings you a fixed income. The only thing I would not recommend to anyone, is to get involved with super-scalping but to take advantage of technical analysis at intervals of 5 minutes and higher, it will be a winning strategy for binary options .
Another objection to the use of Meta Trader for BO trading, which I had a chance to hear, was the fact that tools list for binary options trading is much broader than the classic set of currencies in these platforms. Indeed, I personally have not seen price quotes for cocoa beans. rubber or tobacco in this platform, but, in all honesty, do you need them? Are not a few dozen other tools sufficient? Moreover, according to statistics, in real life an experienced trader uses a maximum of 4-5 trading tools. The MT5 platform, remember, allows you to trade on multiple markets from a single account: Forex, stock market, deals in futures and contracts for difference. And if the rumours are true, all this will soon be joined by BO!
Now, having discussed criticisms and being a fanatical supporter of algo trading, I would like to remind you of two useful functions that Meta Trader contains:
- Opening the tab "Market" at the bottom of your trading terminal, you get the opportunity to buy or download free advisors and indicators not only for Forex, but for binary options trading;
- And through the window "Help - MQL5 community - MQL5 Jobs" traders who wish to cast their trading ideas and strategies into ready indicators and experts, open the way to more than 500 professional programmers, they will help you quickly and accurately translate these ideas into reality.
If we add about 80 technical analysis tools to the above, I am sure that such arguments will convince most sceptics, and even they will agree that using the Meta Trader is possible to make the golden carriage never turn into a pumpkin, no matter what expiration time is.
In the meantime ...there are still two monitors in front of me. One shows a terminal for BO trading. The other has MT5, giving me signals for opening transactions. What can I say? It is working!

Testing Advisers:
Measure Thrice and Cut Once

The wisdom of our ancestors is limitless. It would be just silly to discard the experience acquired over the centuries and millennia, especially when money is involved. Suffice to recall the stone Rai coins that were in circulation in Micronesia. Their weight reached 5 tons, diameter - 4 meters. And imagine how hard it was for Aboriginals to split off at least one such coin from the cliff! You batter for a year, for another, and then it turns out that you have missed the calculations, and instead of providing for your whole life, you own an absolutely non-convertible cobblestone.
Anyhow, life progresses, and now we it is not an archaic axe that we use for trading but computers fitted with the MT4 and MT5, but the basic principles of currency transactions have not been cancelled, and they continue to operate until now, including the one we mentioned in the header.
In order not to dwell any longer on the history of Forex, I propose we finish with Rai and continue the discussion of how to take advantage of advisers that lie behind the tab "Market", located in the lower part of the terminal MT4 and MT5.
It seems that everyone knows (and those who do not know will learn now know) that the "Market" makes it possible to buy the right indicator, script or adviser (expert) just in a few mouse clicks, choosing it from many hundreds of others that are presented in the window of this service.
The keyword is "right". Indeed, how can you understand what you need exactly this trading adviser, and that it will bring you not expenses but quite real profit?
Of course, you can flip a coin, but, alternatively, I can offer three not so difficult, but much more efficient methods of choice. More precisely, we talk about three steps, because together they will help you buy not a pig in a poke, but exactly what you need, and for the money that it is really worth.
Step 1. First, having identified what you need and for what task, you start studying showcases of the "Market". Focusing on the description of goods and responses of consumers, you select variants for purchase.
Step 2. Download a free demo version of the advisor, use it in the "sweat of the brow" in the strategy tester, and if the test and optimization results at least agree with what the seller wrote in the description of the goods, go to step 3.
Step 3. The opportunity provided by this stage is rare in the world of Forex and is called "rent".
We are used to renting a car, for example, but to rent a robot that will make money for you? It is very rare that you hear about things like that. You won't argue that it sounds tempting, but it is not so simple.
I would like to remind you that all the prices - both for sale and rental - are determined by the seller (developer). (MetaQuotes only charges a small percentage for the provision of trading "square" in the "Market"), and that these prices can be very, very different.
For me personally it is quite annoying to see an advisor worth several hundred dollars without possibility to rent. In this case, I start to suspect that they want to sell me that very pig mentioned above. (Although, this is purely my feeling, and I do not rule out that this "modest" amount can make me an owner of the "Holy Grail", which will in a few years transform into a yacht and a small island with a cosy palace with forty or fifty rooms).
I do not really like the second option of prices, which can be found in the window "Market". This is when the purchase price and the price of rent is almost the same. For example, I met across cases when the purchase with the right of perpetual use was $ 88, and the price for 1 month rent was $ 66. Well, I can not understand the logic of this pricing!
But what definitely warms my heart and soul, is the third option (there are a lot of these in the "Market"), where the purchase price and the cost of rent differ significantly. I personally can not afford to pay straight $ 2559 for a super-fancy advisor, but I can easily pay $ 58 rent.
If you divide 2559 by 58 we get 44 - that's really a fair balance! You rent it for a month, earn $ 116, reinvest $ 58 for rent, and put the remaining $ 58 to your deposit. Now do the maths and calculate how much you can earn this way over 44 months, that is almost four years!
It is quite natural that sceptics will say, "Hey, what if the advisor only loses the deposit?" But, gentlemen, do not forget that I had already performed the first two steps before I rented the advisor:
- Firstly, I studied not only with the product description (which may not be entirely correct), but also its reviews of fellow traders. And if a few dozen people write that the adviser does work, why should I not to believe them?
- And secondly, I tested this advisor for free on different currency pairs, different time frames and different history segments, with different settings, and made sure that the beautiful chart drawn by the seller was not a marketing ploy;
- And it is only after that I would venture to lay out... no, not $ 2,559, but only $ 58 to finally be sure that it is the product that I really need.
By the way, if fifty dollars seem unaffordable sum for somebody, I would say that not all advisers in the "market" cost $3000, there are those priced at $ 199 (which can be rented for only $ 18 / month), there are advisers at 15 and 10 dollars apiece, as well as there are those that can be downloaded for nothing ...
In general, gentlemen, do try, experiment, and most importantly - do not stand still and do not worry if you have very little money in your deposit. Looking at the balance of the account, remember Benjamin Franklin's words - "Remember that money have the ability to reproduce." Maybe, just like his, it will be your portrait that will adorn a hundred dollar note:)

Three Caveats of the "Signals" Service

How to make a profitable subscription to trading signals in MT4 and MT5

We are confident that the vast majority of traders are already familiar with the "Signals" service from the company MetaQuotes,which allows you to copy trading signals on line. Many thousands of these traders have become providers of signals and thousands of others - consumers of the product, in other words, subscribers to them. AND...
And having examined carefully the signals shopping window, having analysed the basic monitoring data and having made a subscription, the trader is all of a sudden surprised to notice that the results in his account and in the provider's account vary greatly, and while the supplier has a stable income, the trader loses steadily his deposit.
Why is this happening? Let's look at some nuances that are not very noticeable at first glance but can have a strong impact on the copying results.
Among the obvious advantages of service "Signals" are:
● embeddedness into MT4 and MT5 platforms, which allows to subscribe to trading signals from the home terminal just in few clicks;
● high level of security for traders and suppliers of signals;
lack of third-party access to their accounts and balance sheets -while subscribing even investor password is not requested;
● absence of any commissions for transactions and absence of spread expansion;
● possibility to use virtual hosting, and trade in fully automatic mode, without even turning on your computer;
● offers a huge selection of signals exceeding 3500;
● low fixed cost of the subscription averaging about $20 dollars a month (regardless of the size of your deposit);
● special system of protecting subscribers from the wrong calculation of the size of lots traded and excessive load on the deposit;
● full transparency of trading history, including around fifty parameters of online monitoring to help the subscriber to select the most profitable signals.
I would like to draw your attention to some of the above mentioned issues, because, despite the seemingly obvious advantages, they also contain a number of pitfalls that can cause serious damage to your deposit.
1. Firstly, it is a fixed price of subscription.
Some social trading platforms make their profit by charging a commission on each transaction or expanding the supplier spreads and if the supplier trades at a broker with a spread of, say, 1.0 points, the same transaction may reach you with the spread of 2.0 points and what it becomes at the time of important news release - generally a closely guarded secret. As for the "Signal" on MT4 and MT5, then there are no secrets, everything is clear and transparent: you pay for subscription and get trading signals exactly, as the supplier. However, please note that in this case the subscription for the same signal can be both profitable and unprofitable. It all depends on the size of your deposit.
Example:
Suppose the signal on which you decide to subscribe, shows an average monthly income of 20%, while the cost of subscription is $ 20.
If your trading account deposit is $ 1,000, an increase of 20% would equal $ 200. Subtract the cost of subscription, and it turns out that your monthly income is $ 180, ie, 18% a month. or 216% a year, which, as you will agree, is more than good.
Now imagine that your account has only $ 50. Profit in this case would be $ 10, which, taking into account the subscription price of $ 20, will bring you a loss of $ 10. Thus, in just five months, you do not just reset your deposit, but lose another $ 100 you had paid for the subscription.
2. Another important point, which will also affect the amount of income that you receive. Depending on the size of your deposit, a special system of protecting subscribers from the wrong calculation of the size of traded lots may not allow you to copy the transaction in the same amounts as the at the signal supplier.
For example, if the supplier deposit at the moment is $ 500, and he opens a transaction of 0.1 lots, then, with the deposit on your account of $ 100 the transaction that will open will be 5 times smaller, that is 0.02 lots.
Therefore, in order not to experience frustration, when choosing a supplier it is essential to pay attention to the current balance of the account. The difference in the size of opened transactions will be particularly noticeable if the supplier trades on cent account, and you are going to copy it on a standard dollar account.
3. And one more thing concerning the calculation of the size of lots traded. Getting to the tab "Signals" ("Tools"> "Settings"> "Signals") on your terminal, you can manually set the load percentage on the deposit. And in this case we must also be very careful.
Let's take the same initial data as in claim 1. If your deposit is $ 1,000 and the supplier of signals has the same amount, an increase of 20% is equal to exactly $ 200, since the transaction will be copied in the ratio 1: 1.
And everything is good, but, having examined the provider's trading history, you see that the maximum drawdown for his account is of, say, 80%. This risk seemed unacceptably high to you, and you have decided to reduce it in half. Make it very simple (and it is also a definite plus of the service) - you set the maximum load for the deposit of not more than 50% in the tab "Signals". Thus, if the provider opens a transaction of 0.1 lot,the transaction on your account will be twice smaller, that is 0.05 lots. But with the risk reduction of risk, it is natural that your profit will decrease as well, which, instead of 216% per annum will now be equal to 108% (which, frankly, is impressive).
But if your account is only $ 50, the picture is quite different. With the double reduction of the maximum load on the deposit the profit will be halved and will be not $ 10 but $ 5 that, taking into account the subscription fee of $ 20, will bring you a loss of $ 15.
There is another very important aspect that affects the success of the trade - it is when you have to choose out of possible 3,500 subscriptions the only one that will bring you a good and stable income. We have repeatedly described how to do this, and, of course, will return to this topic in the future. And meanwhile ...

Happy New Year!

MetaTrader Platforms: Knowledge is Power!
Or a Movie on How to Make Money

In 1597, the English philosopher Francis Bacon said, «Knowledge itself is power». Although this statement was made over 400 years ago, it still has not lost its relevance. Quite the contrary.
I think that there is no trader in the world, who does not know about the MetaTrader platforms - MT4 and MT5. However, as it turned out, not everyone is familiar with the opportunities that they contain, and therefore a lot of people lack the forces that their creators sought to give traders.
For me, MetaTrader is a bit like a computer action game: you go to the left - you find a treasure, you open the door to the right - you find an extra life. However, when it comes to Forex, the word "extra" out of place here: both treasures and lives - all come in handy. Still it would be great to find a secret map where all points of entry into position are marked.
Thus, wandering around the "nooks and crannies" of MT4 and MT5, you can find a lot of interesting and useful information that can give new strength to the trader to win in this exciting game - "Conquer the market." We are talking about services such as "Signals", "Market", "Freelance", "Virtual hosting". But when opening these "secret doors", it is not enough to see what is behind them, it is also necessary to know how to use all this arsenal with the maximum benefit for yourselves.
And here not only educational articles and videos a variety of which can be found in the portal mql5.com come to the aid, but also video instructions on the MetaQuotes official channel in YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/user/MetaQuotesOfficial). I had a chance to read in the news that during 2015 alone, this collection was replenished with 30 new "films" that help make money.
Personally, trading in the Forex market, I find these videos useful. Moreover, as a journalist I was interested which MetaQuotes services are at the top of trading charts. Therefore, among the leaders appeared:
- 7 episodes of "series" "Where Can I get a Trading Robot or an Indicator?":
1. "A Free Download from the Library of Trading Robots",
2. "How to build a trading robot in MQL5 Wizard",
3. "How to Order a Trading Robot in Freelance",
4. "How to Buy a Trading Robot or an Indicator in the Market",
5. "How to Find the Right Application in the Market",
6. "Free Testing of Indicators and Advisers before Buying",
7. "Renewal, Extension of the Lease and Installation of Products";
- The following section - "Virtual Hosting, and Round the Clock Trading," only 3 episodes:
1. "How to Rent a Virtual Platform",
2. "Preparation of Robots and Signals for Migration",
3. "Control over Resources and Subscription Management";
- And finally, section "Trading Signals and Copying Transactions" of 7 episodes:
1. "Showcase of Trading Signals",
2. "The Basic Parameters of Trading Signals",
3. "Statistics, Charts of Growth, Means and Balance of Trade Signals",
4. "Risks, Distribution, Comments and News in the Trading Signals",
5. "Displaying Provider Transactions Directly on the Chart",
6. "Subscribing to a Trading Signal",
7. "Report on Subscriptions to Trading Signals."
I have been watching what is going on and how it is going on in the sphere of algorithmic trade and social trading (in other words, copying signals). The conclusion is clear: the future belongs to them, not to “manual" trade. It is not by chance that they say, "One mind is good, but two are better!” And if they are not two, but 10022? And half of them are the brains of high-speed computers? Think about how much work they are able to perform for you!
Personally, I have a following picture on the monitor - eight terminals are open, four of them have robots trading, three - subscription signals, one is for amusement, for manual trading. In addition, note, there is still time not only for this, but also for writing posts. Such as this, for example.
That is how the things are!

MT4: Is It Possible to Earn a Million on Subscription?
Deposit Growth, "Reverse Martingale" and Other Interesting Parameters

Opening the tab "Signals" in the bottom of the MT4 terminal, the trader is able to become... an investor. That is, having ceased trading on his own and having subscribed to the signals of another trader, you go into a passive state, and only watch your deposit increase or, alas, dry.
So after all whom and how do you choose out of more than 4,000 suppliers of signals in order to enjoy stable profit? Of course, the opinion of colleagues can help with this. It will therefore be interesting to analyze in more detail which signals subscribers prefer. And most importantly - why they are so popular with them and what the subscribers are is facing.

As of January 2016, top-10 most popular among subscribers signals are as follows:
I. Joker (increase of 14 228%, 377 subscribers)
II. MenjadiTrader PAMM 144842 (increase of 45%, 265 subscribers)
III. LidziyaForex (increase of 43227% 166 subscribers)
IV. Xedj BG (increase of 610%, 136 subscribers)
V. Blitzkrieg (increase of 771%, 128 subscribers)
The first step of the podium went to signal Joker. It is understandable - an increase of 14228% in the 23 weeks will drive anyone crazy (all the data given for 01/31/16). Just think - more than fourteen thousand percent! And with a quite tolerable drawdown of 36%! This is a living answer to those who say that it is impossible to become a millionaire in half a year!
I have been watching the preferences of subscribers for several years and you do not have to be a rocket scientist to figure out which one is the main criteria in the selection of a signal - of course, it is increase in the deposit. The Joker increases your deposit on average of 2 or even 3 times each month.
At the same time I would like to draw attention to the fact that during over 23 weeks of its work the Joker has made more than 15,500 transactions, i.e. about 700 transactions per week, or 135 per day. Apparently, we are talking about an active Scalping of just several pips with averaging the position. The fact that the signal does not have stop-losses speaks for this too. Therefore, before risking 1000, 2000, or 10,000 dollars, I would strongly advise you not to be greedy and spend $100 (this is the cost of a monthly subscription) in order to test the functionality of the signal on a demo account with your broker.
For example, in January, the most frequent with the Joker were deals on EUR/USD with 0.01 lot size and profit $ 0.33, i.e., just 3p. (The broker from whose account the signal is broadcast, the average spread for the pair is 0.75p.). Hence it is clear that the spread and slippage here will play a dominant role here.
It is clear that for investors with small deposits such subscription does not make sense. The reason for this is not even 'biting' subscription cost of $100/month, but the drawdown, which, taken by equity in absolute terms, reached $ 1100 (35.80% of the deposit).
Therefore, I personally think the place that the signal occupies in the ranking of MetaQuotes - 37th - is fairer.

In stark contrast to the Joker is the silver medalist of the rankings - the signal MenjadiTrader PAMM 144842. Compared to the rest of its "colleagues" from the "magnificent five" it looks an "ugly duckling" - where others show an increase in the hundreds or thousands of percent, the signal in almost 2 years showed a profit of 45% - some months 3-4% plus, some - minus 2-3%.And at the same time it turns out to be in the second place in the popularity rating! The reasons for this, apparently, are two:
1. The life span of the signal is 96 weeks on the market with a drawdown of less than 19%
and
2. Free subscription to the signal, which allows to use it even for small deposits, the average size of which, according to statistics, in this case, does not exceed $350.
As for the MetaQuotes rating, the MenjadiTrader PAMM 144842 occupies not the most prestigious 390th place there. But I'm almost certain that this rating does not in any way take into account the impact of such a strong factor as free subscription.
In the third place is a signal LidziyaForex. I can explain its place in the top 5 only by a 4500% increase in deposit in less than 3 months.
To be as "politically correct" as possible, I would not hurry with a subscription to this signal. Firstly, despite the "new-born" age, it has already demonstrated a rather high drawdown of 57%. Secondly, the lack of stops and 95% profitable trades say that in the case of loss-making position the author is inclined to wait for the trend to turn into the desirable direction and make minus into a plus.
And what if it does not turn?
Well, there is another aspect, which I dubbed "reverse martingale effect." It is the fact that a trader, first with a high degree of risk "speeds up" the deposit, and then begins to reduce the risk and, and, consequently, the profit. The presence of this effect is evident in LidziyaForex: November - increase + 1327% December - +107% January - +55%. I do not undertake to predict what the increase will be in February. Apparently, the MetaQuotes ranking system doubts its prospects as well - I have not found the LidziyaForex at least among the top 500 ranking signals.
The fourth place is occupied by the Xedj BG. This is a signal something like a LidziyaForex, with the difference that it is not 3 months old but 20, i.e., almost 2 years. At the same time here we have an impressive maximum drawdown of 72%, and a "reverse martingale": December 2014. - + 95%, January-February 2015 - from +23 to +29%, followed by two months at + 13%, and then an average of 3 - 4%.
Here, once again I want to stress the importance of the time of subscription to the signal. For example, if you had subscribed to the Xedj BG in November 2014, it would be one story, if you subscribe now, it is quite different.
Finishing the review of the Xedj BG, I decided to be patient and find the place that the signal occupies in the MetaQuotes ranking. But I didn't have enough patience and gave up after the eighth hundred. To be honest, out of the obvious advantages, I only found one - the subscription to the signal is free of charge.
Finally, the last signal of our Top 5 is Blitzkrieg. In this signal I found more pros than cons - it’s quite long lifespan (over a year), and a low maximum drawdown - 16% (despite the presence of stop-losses!), and quite a stable income - the average for the I quarter of 2015 was + 27.6%, in the II quarter. - + 24.2%, in the III quarter - +16.3%, in the IV - + 11.7%. (Although the "reverse Martingale" is also present).
And there is another plus - in the MetaQuotes ranking the Blitzkrieg ... occupies the second place! And this is the rare case when the opinions of subscribers, MT4 / 5 developers and my humble one are practically the same.
I'll be sure to keep track of what happens to these signals in the future and, of course, will not hold the information in confidence and will make it public. In the meantime, let me repeat what I said at the beginning of this review - if you select a subscription, of course, you can be guided only by the percentage of deposit growth. But it would be wise to glance at other options of online monitoring. Especially when the MetaQuotes have over fifty of them.

Signals at MT5: Stability is a Sign of Skill

We have earlier looked at the preferences of subscribers to trading signals for MT4. It is understood that the tab "Signals" is also available at the MT5 platform, and it has its own leaders and its own outsiders.

The Top 5 of subscribers' preferences at the end of January 2016 here is as follows:
I. Alfa Scalp (367% increase),
II. Performance CoolLite (748% increase),
III. Performance xTREME (472% increase),
IV. Leonardo Acc with Full Automated EAs (238% increase),
V. Accurate signal (123% increase).

The first place in popularity here is taken by the signal Alfa Scalp, whose main advantage, in my opinion, is its life span - 112 weeks, i.e. more than two years. It was during this time that it has shown an increase of 367%, so it is difficult to recommend it to those who want to become a millionaire in a few weeks. But for those who are just not satisfied with the interest rates on deposits, it will certainly be very interesting - bank rate of the largest Russian bank - Sberbank - on rouble deposits is about 12%, while here the forecasted increase is 10 times higher, 118%, without any expenses, as the given signal is free of charge.
Overall, there are 7 signals of this author represented in the MT5 showcase, one of which - Alfa Scalp 3 year - takes the 4th place in the ranking of the capital increase - + 565%. This is also a survivor; it was born in April 2013.
The specifics of these signals under the «Alfa» brand is enhanced by the fact that they all work on rouble accounts (RUR), although in his address to the subscribers the author offers to contact him and get recommendations for trade in other currencies.

The second place in popularity among subscribers takes the signal Performance CoolLite. It occupies the same second place in the MetaQuotes ranking. This "classic" social trading signal, the author of which, according to the ideal direct line of the deposit growth, "tops up" the negative position by averaging or martingale, and does not hurry to close them, waiting for them to give a positive result. As a result there are more than 97% winning trades and 29 profitable (not a single unprofitable one!) working months. The deposit growth is in the range from 3% to 20% per month and a maximum drawdown has not exceeded 38.5%. It happened last spring, after which no serious drawdown has been reported, which undoubtedly can be attributed to the advantages of this signal.

The third place is occupied by the signal Performance xTREME and, it is not difficult to guess, it is the work of the same author as the previous signal. And almost everything that has been said about Performance CoolLite, can be attributed to the Performance xTREME, except for a slightly higher drawdown - 52.0%
The fourth ranking signal - Leonardo Acc with Full Automated EAs - has been created by a hot Brazilian guy named Leonardo, and it fully reflects the South American temperament - from -31% to + 65% per month with a maximum drawdown of 32%.

Finally, the fifth signal in our top 5 - the Accurate signal. So far, everything looks very good - an average of more than 20% growth in deposits per month. There is only one minus - the age of the signal is only 3.5 months. Although the fact that the other signal by the same author - the Time system - has lived for almost two years, makes it possible to hope that the Accurate signal will live happily ever after.
In addition to the above, there is another signal, to which I would like to draw the attention of subscribers running the MT5 platform. Precious is another product «made in Brazil», the leader in the ranking of deposit growth - + 4457% in just 8 months with a very small drawdown of 25%. However, to be honest, despite all the advantages of this signal, there is quite a significant disadvantage - the one that I call "reverse martingale" - it is its sharply damped profitability:
- July 2015 - + 288%
- September - + 92%
- November - + 24%
- December - + 6%
- January of this year - even minus 8%.
I would like to say that this phenomenon has to be observed in a sufficiently large number of suppliers of signals, it is likely not characterized by their loss of skill but by psychological factor - after achieving certain results they no longer want to risk so that not to lose the hard-earned funds. This point should definitely be considered when subscribing, selecting the signals that give maybe not so high, but steady income.

MT4 and MT5: Is the Best the Enemy or the Friend of the Good?

I have been dealing with Forex for a long time - starting from those "grey" times when it just started, with the use of Internet, to actively interfere in the life of an ordinary person. That was around 2008.
Initially I tried a number of trading platforms with different brokers, and did so until the moment when the fate brought me to know MetaTrader. I will not prevaricate, but it is thanks to this platform, that I abruptly changed my life, surrendering to Forex with my body and soul. I literally fell in love with the MT4, having learnt it upside down and, like any lover, could not find a slightest flaw in it.
And here came a terrible thing... I remember that fateful 2010, when it appeared on the horizon, MT5, the rival! I know that millions of MT4 fans worldwide faced a choice, where to give their heart - to the same reliable and proven companion, which they had for many years, or to a young, modern, and, as instructions stated, more nimble rival?
Frankly, I myself still have not solved this dilemma and therefore decided to collect and systematize the opinions of traders in the various forums, who turned out to be many.
So, here are some quotes:
1. "A more convenient opportunity to switch the timeframes, it is not necessary to download any scripts and mumble with the minutes settings. I am very pleased with the 12 hours frames." In addition, I should note that there are 21 timeframes available in the MT5.
2. "Transition of the interface from one language to another." I, for example, have Windows in English. And when I try to translate the interface of MT4 terminal into Russian using the Languages function, there appears a meaningless set of characters instead of words. In the MT5, the same function works flawlessly.
3. "In addition to a modern design and pretty 🙂 buttons there appear additional graphical objects that the user can place on the graph." Moreover, the terminal MT5 allows you to open up to 100 charts simultaneously.
4. "There came Depth of Market, which displays information about applications for the purchase and sale of a financial instrument".
As developers write: "MetaTrader 5 platform is designed to give the ability to trade stocks, futures, options and other exchange-traded instruments in real markets. Therefore, Depth of Market is available both for symbols that are traded in the stock exchange during run-time, and for non-exchange symbols. For stock symbols, Depth of Market displays real prices and the volume of trade orders. The Depth for OTC instruments is a scalping tool which allows one-click market and pending orders."
We will talk separately in more detail as to how to use this Depth of Market, in the near future. In the meantime, let us say that one more built-in function of MT5 - "Symbols" - is intended to facilitate such trade. This issue will also be useful and interesting as after MT5, the Depth of Market appeared on MT4 as well.
5. "The new MQL5 programming language used in MT5 has become much faster than the MQL4. That is why the MT5 is preferred for the automated analysis systems and / or trade. In MQL4, the robot worked by tick, in MQL5, there appeared events: the timer, at any trade action, changing the user's depth of market, with action on the chart. "In connection with what has just been said, setting a particular indicator, script or Expert Advisor to the terminal, traders should definitely pay attention to which of the platforms - MT4 or MT5 - it has been written.
6. "In MT5 there is a very handy thing - the news release time is shown directly on the chart, ie there is no need to look every once and again to the calendar."
7. "The MT5 has a very big advantage - it is the tester, there the testing speed is much higher, plus the ability to test the scalping, plus the ability to test the multi-advisors on several currency pairs." There can also be noted that a tester supports multiple processors (not only its own, but also a local network of computers) for optimization strategies. We will also discuss the ways to use it in a separate article.
8. "There are practically no indicators or expert advisors for MT5." Here I beg to differ - open the tab "Market" in the terminal and see how many products there are in its "Navigator" - hundreds! Of course, they are not so many as for the MT4, but note that the MT5 is twice younger than its rival.
9. And finally, the last point, which was the cause of many of the fiercest disputes. Of course, it is automatic merging of several orders on one instrument into one general position, and as a consequence, inability to put "locks", opening opposite orders. In other words, if in MT4 each order exists on its own, in the MT5 all open orders are accumulated into one.
For those who are accustomed to use counter-positions, grid advisors or Ilan type advisors, this causes a permanent displeasure. Although, in my opinion, there is a very simple way out: two trading accounts and two terminals - at the first one buy positions are averaged, on the other - the sell ones.
But that's not all! According to unconfirmed rumours, which have reached me from very reliable and authoritative sources, the possibility of hedging (opening countervailing transactions in the same instrument) will be available soon on MT5 as well. Meanwhile, intensive work in this direction is going on in the MetaQuotes.
What is it? Is it beginning of the end of the MT4 era? Probably yes. At least, I have downloaded the "five" on my computer and I study it thoroughly, as it is awkward to drag at the tail of progress.

Depth of Market: a Tool That Makes the Invisible Visible

Everyone is familiar with the rhetorical question about the glass, which is either half-full, or empty. In our case it will be an instrument Depth of Market (abbreviated DOM), which is something visually resembling glass, it allows the trader to see how it is filled with requests and quotes. This tool is integrated into MT4 and MT5 platform and at the same time, as shown by a survey of traders, many of them not only do not use this feature today, but also do not understand why it is generally necessary.
In the classical understanding, Depth of Market is an order book for the purchase and sale of securities on the stock market. Each application includes a price (quote) and the number of shares. The Exchange sends this information to brokers (sales representatives), and they pass it to traders (bidders).
Indeed, all this is true. And the appearance of DOM on MT5 has been aimed to open the door for traders to a full-fledged stock exchange trading. As one of them cried out in social networks: "Colleagues, it is time to grow out of short pants and begin trading as it is done on Wall Street!"
Indeed, it is time. And really, everyone would like to. Still it is not that easy.
And precisely in order to provide traders with access to exchange instruments, DOM originally appeared in MT5 terminals. It is very easy to call it - just click the right mouse button on the chart, and the screen immediately shows information about the volume of orders for the purchase or sale of an instrument by the best and closest to them prices. We emphasize we are talking about exchange-traded instruments. As for the OTC market, which is the Forex, we will talk about it below.
The stock and commodity markets have many strategies that are based on trade with the help of Depth of Market, which allows you to visually assess the supply and demand at a given time. Simply put, the DOM is a window of outstanding orders closest to the market.
It would seem that this is the Holy Grail, which allows you to quickly identify not only possible trends, but also the support and resistance lines; and understand, at what price at this or that given moment one can buy or sell, for example, a particular stake.
However, it is not that simple. Trading robots, as well as market makers often do not stop the desire to mislead the competitors, and therefore put large applications to buy or sell into the Depth of Market, and then... remove them. So trading with its help is not so simple in the modern conditions, as it may seem. Nevertheless, the fact remains - MT5 gives traders quite an effective tool for exchange trading, be it Dubai DGCX, Brazil's BOVESPA, Istanbul BIST - Borsa Istanbul or Moscow Exchange in Russia. And in order to start operations there, it is sufficient to just select an appropriate broker.
As for the Forex, the picture is quite different. There are frequent reviews of traders who claim that the DOM is not needed at all. I will not agree to this. It is a great tool for scalpers - as it has momentary speed of execution of orders for purchase/sale, as well as the issuing and transfer of orders. Testing on real accounts, at a wide variety of brokers, has shown its efficiency.
The only thing, we must remember that, in spite of the automatic summation and averaging of open positions in trading on MT5, averaging the values of the take-profit and stop-loss does not occur there. Therefore, you have to make corrections manually. But with regard to the MT4 (and now the Depth Of Market is available on this platform), there is no such problem - the symphony of high-speed trading and scalping sounds on "the four" like clockwork, which greatly increases the effectiveness of this action.
Summing up this material, we will ask once again: is our "glass" half empty or half full? It all depends on who needs what. However, the above demonstrates that it is able to quench the thirst for information of many of those who need it so badly.