Spread doesnt get drawn

[OneandOnly666]

Hi!

After downloading tick data with 1.8 pip spread, the spread doesnt get drawn from the equity in BT.
The only thing this does is to widen the freeze and stop level.
Same goes for the commision setting, the commision doesnt get drawn.

Any suggestions on how to get this working correctly?

//Thomas

[tickstory]

Hi Oneandonly - Not entirely sure what you mean by "drawn" - the spread is only relevant when calculating the current Ask price or when your EA wants to know the current spread. The Ask price is calculated by the MT4 strategy tester as "Bid price plus spread".

Regarding commissions, please refer to this post to find out how to set the values:

http://www.tickstory.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=283

Thanks.

[OneandOnly666]

Hi!

Correct me if Im way off, but

If you have 1pip spread and place an order of 1Lot and with 10 pip SL and 10 pip TP.
This is either going to hit the TP or the SL.
1Lot = 10$ and 1 pip spread = 1$ and 10pips TP/SL = 10$ plus or minus

If it hits the TP its going to give 1Lot = 10$ - (1 pip spread x 2) = 8$
If it hits the SL its going to give 1Lot = -10$ - (1 pip spread x 2) = -12$

When I download TS with 1 pip spread it is giving me +10 and -10 all the time, nothing else, what happened to the spread?

Regarding the commision setting it was my own fault. I didnt read the instructions right, I just followed the steps
Comm type = 0
Base comm = 10
Comm lots = 0

In the TS settings the Base Comm is first, then the Comm type and Comm lots.
So I put the 10 in Comm type.

//Thomas

[tickstory]

Hi Oneandonly,

In order to simplify the example, assume that you are trading EURUSD and the bid price is 1.3510. If your spread is 2 pips, your ask price is going to be 1.3530. This means that if you put on a buy market order, you are executed at the ask price. If you are entering a sell order, the spread will not apply and you will be executed at 1.3510.

Hope this helps.

[OneandOnly666]

Ok I understand that.

But if I put a fixed spread of 50 pips, and then have a sl and tp that is lower like 15 pips.
I wouldnt be able to win because the difference from current price to tp in sell orders and sl in buy orders is lower then the spread, but I do.
Can you explaine this?

[tickstory]

Hi Oneandonly,

No, this doesn't make sense. I would be analysing a specific trade and printing out all the relevant values (spread, bid/ask price, etc) to make sure everything is as you expect.

Regards.

[OneandOnly666]

So here is the case!

the only thing Im changing in the ts data is this:
Using XAUUSD

Export Data:
dates from-to
timezone

MetaTrader info:
currency-usd
spread-600 (60pips)
digits are 3 automatic

I have 40 pip SL and 40 pip TP, this should not be possible because of the 60 pip spread.

B/S lot open SL TP W/L
23 2013.01.15 09:09 buy 9 0.63 1679.42 1679.02 1679.82 0.00 1072.80
24 2013.01.15 09:09 t/p 9 0.63 1679.82 1679.02 1679.82 25.20 1098.00

21 2013.01.15 08:29 buy 11 0.63 1675.50 1675.10 1675.90 0.00 1047.60
22 2013.01.15 08:29 t/p 11 0.63 1675.90 1675.10 1675.90 25.20 1072.80

41 2013.01.23 16:36 sell 20 0.69 1687.07 1687.47 1686.67 0.00 1147.60
42 2013.01.23 16:36 t/p 20 0.69 1686.67 1687.47 1686.67 27.60 1175.20

43 2013.01.23 16:36 sell 19 0.71 1686.14 1686.54 1685.74 0.00 1175.20
44 2013.01.23 16:36 t/p 19 0.71 1685.74 1686.54 1685.74 28.40 1203.60


Is this possible or am I doing something wrong?

[tickstory]

Hi OneAndOnly,

This sort of makes sense from a pure back-testing perspective as the back-tester appears to be evaluating that you have reached your TP because the Ask price is beyond this point on the next tick.

Generally speaking, you aren't really performing a reasonable test to have a SL/TP that is less than the spread. If you tried this on a demo/live server I imagine you'd be denied. IHave you mentioned this on the MT4 forum - I imagine they may have more details on why the back-tester behaves in this way.

Regards.

[OneandOnly666]

I get your point!

But what Im afraid of is that it doesnt use the Ask line at all and only calculates the SL and TP from a 0 spread.
It does perform the same if I make the SL bigger, but how do I know that it uses the Ask line?
And how do I know that it doesnt just calculate from the Bid line all the time, both buy and sell?

Can yoy make some tests on your side to see if it can be proven that the Ask line is used.

[OneandOnly666]

By the way, I should get an error in the BT if the SL was under the spread. But as you can see I dont. Not even if i put 1 as SL.