Modify Trading Style Dialog: General Settings
The Modify Trading Style Dialog allows you to specify the settings associated with a particular trading style. The General Settings page allows you to set the name, broker settings, and position sizing of the trading style.
& For help with trading styles, see Using Trading Styles.
Setting the General Account Settings
¨ Types of Trades
This value indicates the name to use for the trading style. New trading styles are assigned a default name, such as "My Stock/ETF Trading Style".
Ä Note: Trading style names must be unique within the group of all trading styles.
¨ Market Type
This value indicates the market type that this trading style applies to. Changing this value will result in any defaults associated with the previous selection to be changed to the defaults for the new selection.
Ä Note: This value cannot be changed for trading styles which are currently in use.
& For help with market types and the associated settings, see Understanding Market Types.
Setting the Broker Settings
¨ Trading Units
These values indicate the smallest unit that can be traded.
· Fractional Shares/Units/Contracts
This setting indicates that any fraction of a share can be traded.
Ä Note: In TradingSolutions 3.0 and previous, this was indicated using the Trade fractional shares checkbox.
· Whole Shares/Units/Contracts
This setting indicates that any number of whole shares can be traded, but that fractional shares cannot be traded.
· Whole Lots
This setting indicates that only whole lots can traded. The size of a single lot should be entered in the Lot Size box.
Ä Note: For the FOREX market, lots are always amounts in the Base (first) currency.
¨ Commission Type
These values specify the amount to be deducted for commissions, both on the entry of each trade and the exiting of each trade.
· Fixed Price Per Trade
This setting indicates that a fixed price is charged for each trade.
Ä Note: For trading that does not require any direct commissions, such as FOREX markets, select this setting and set the associated value to $0.
· Fixed Price Per Lot / Share / Unit / Contract
This setting indicates that a fixed price is charged for each lot traded in each trade.
Ä Note: For Whole Shares/Units/Contracts, this value is charged for each unit.
· Percentage of Trade
This setting indicates that a percentage of the value of the trade is charged for each trade. A minimum value can be set, as well.
¨ Maximum Leverage (FOREX only)
This value indicates the maximum leverage that can be applied for FOREX trading.*
Ä Note: For FOREX brokers that have different leverage rates for trade entry and trade maintenance, enter the maintenance leverage here. Then, set the Position Size to a fraction of the account to limit the initial position size.
Position Types and Sizing
¨ Initial Account Size
This value indicates the amount of money which the simulated trading account starts with.
Ä Note: To emulate fixed position sizes from TradingSolutions 3.0 and prior releases, set this value to $0. This will cause the account to begin with the amount invested in the first trade and ignore times when there is not enough money to cover a new position.
¨ Types of Trades
This value indicates whether to trade using long or short trades, or both. Higher profits can typically be made by trading a stock both when its price is moving up and when it is moving down. Therefore, the default is to include both long and short trades. However, since short trades can add an additional layer of complexity to trading activity, some people prefer to begin with long trades only.
¨ Position Size
These values specify the amount to invest each time a new trade is entered. The following options are available:
· Percent of Account
This setting indicates that the specified percentage of the money that is in the account should be traded.
Ä Note: Trading may stop abruptly if the account falls to a level where the specified percentage is not enough to cover the entry of a new trade.
Ä Note: FOREX trading should avoid trading 100% of the account. This will typically result in immediate margin calls due to the bid/ask spread.
· Fixed Amount
This setting indicates that all trades should invest the amount specified here.
· Fixed Shares/Units/Contracts
This setting indicates that all trades should be of the size specified here.
· Fixed Lots
This setting indicates that all trades should be of the size specified here.
Ä Note: For FOREX, the amount of money allocated for trading is the pre-leveraged amount. For example, if your position size is $1000 with 50-to-1 maximum leverage, a position would control $50,000.*
Ä Note: Annualized returns for all investment methods are calculated by determining the constant rate at which the initial account would have to change to reach the final account value.
Ä Note: Many analysts use an alternative method called Internal Rate of Return (IRR) for calculating the annualized return, especially when dealing with fixed amounts and fixed shares. This method was investigated for use in TradingSolutions. However, in many cases, early single trades with high percent gain significantly skewed the results of a given analysis range. It was determined that, while numerically valid, the IRR does not produce returns that are good for comparison or optimization.
Ä * Note: Be aware that without proper risk management, high degrees of leverage can lead to large losses as well as gains. Be sure to thoroughly analyze any systems before trading them at high leverage.
What Do I Do Next?
If you are finished modifying the settings associated with the trading style, press the OK button to save your changes or select another property page. If you would like to exit from this dialog without performing any changes, press the Cancel button.
Additional Property Pages
The Modify Trading Style Dialog has the following property pages.
This page allows you to set the name, broker settings, and position sizing.
This page allows you to set limits, stops, and slippage values.
This page allows you to specify the characteristics to take into account when optimizing an entry/exit signal.
This page allows you to specify which trading style settings are available for optimization.
This page allows you to specify the fields to use for values during signal analysis.
& For help using property pages, see the help for Property Pages.
How Did I Get Here?
The Modify Trading Style Dialog is displayed when you press the Add New… button or the Edit… button on the Define Trading Styles Dialog.