Trading

Selecting Instrument

When opening a new trade or placing a new pending order make sure that the instrument selected in main window is the one you would like to use. Forex Simulator always selected instrument when placing new orders.

When Sync with chart button is switched on, you can change selection by clicking on a chart of other instrument. Selection will be updated automatically.

When Sync with chart button is switched off, you can change selection by choosing a different instrument from the drop-down list.

Opening Trades (Market Orders)

You can open new Buy and Sell trades using Buy and Sell buttons in Market order tab in main window.

Size

You can set the size of new trade in Lots input field. You can enter the size directly in lots or use risk-based position sizing.

SL/TP

If you want to set Stop Loss or Take Profit, you can do it in SL and TP input fields. Setting zero will disable Stop Loss or Take Profit.

SL can be set in 2 ways. You can choose one of them from the drop-down list:

  • SL pips - as distance from trade's opening price, for example 30 pips
  • SL price - by entering exact price level, for example 1.21344

TP can be set in 3 ways. You can choose one of them from the drop-down list:

  • TP pips - as distance from trade's opening price, for example 30 pips
  • TP price - by entering exact price level, for example 1.21344
  • TP ratio - TP distance will be set as a ratio of SL distance. SL must be non-zero. For example, if SL=20 pips and TP ratio is set to 3.0, TP will be set at 60 pips from entry price.

Opened trades will be visible on the chart in form of horizontal lines:

  • green line - open price
  • red line - Stop Loss
  • blue line - Take Profit

They will also be shown on the list of trades in Trades window in Market & Pending tab. This window can be opened and closed with Trades option in top menu.

Visual Mode

It is also possible to open trades in Visual Mode

Bid and Ask

Sell trades are opened at Bid price and closed at Ask price.

Buy trades are opened at Ask price and closed at Bid price.

Bid prices are shown on the chart. Metatrader plots charts using only Bid prices.

Ask price is not visible on the chart, but it is always above Bid price. It is not possible to see historical Ask prices, but you can show current Ask price in the following way:

  1. Right-click on the chart.
  2. Select Properties.
  3. Go to Show tab.
  4. Enable Show ask price line.

Placing Pending Orders

Size

You can set the size of new pending order in Lots input field. You can enter the size directly in lots or use risk-based position sizing.

Execution price

Execution price can be set in Pending order tab in main window in 2 ways:

  • In pips - as distance from current market price, for example 20 pips
  • As price - as price level, for example 1.21344
SL/TP

If you want to set Stop Loss or Take Profit, you can do it in SL and TP input fields. Setting zero will disable Stop Loss or Take Profit.

SL can be set in 2 ways. You can choose one of them from the drop-down list:

  • SL pips - as distance from trade's opening price, for example 30 pips
  • SL price - by entering exact price level, for example 1.21344

TP can be set in 3 ways. You can choose one of them from the drop-down list:

  • TP pips - as distance from trade's opening price, for example 30 pips
  • TP price - by entering exact price level, for example 1.21344
  • TP ratio - TP distance will be set as a ratio of SL distance. SL must be non-zero. For example, if SL=20 pips and TP ratio is set to 3.0, TP will be set at 60 pips from entry price.
Type

You can place 4 types of pending orders in Pending order tab:

  • Buy Stop - Buy trade with execution price above current market price
  • Buy Limit - Buy trade with execution price below current market price
  • Sell Stop - Sell trade with execution price below current market price
  • Sell Limit - Sell trade with execution price above current market price

It is also possible to place 2 corresponding orders at once. Both orders will be set at the same distance from entry price and will have the same SL and TP.

  • Buy Stop + Sell Stop - A pair of Stop orders: Buy Stop above current price and Sell Stop below current price.
  • Buy Limit + Sell Limit - A pair of Limit orders: Buy Limit below current price and Sell Limit above current price.

In case of placing 2 pending orders at once, you also have a chance to mark them both as One-Close-Other.

Pending orders will be visible on the chart in form of horizontal lines:

  • green line - open price
  • red line - Stop Loss
  • blue line - Take Profit

They will also be shown on the list in Trades window in Market & Pending tab. This window can be opened and closed with Trades option in top menu.

Visual Mode

It is also possible to place pending orders in Visual Mode

Bid and Ask

Sell Stop and Sell Limit orders are triggered by Bid price, which is shown on the chart. Metatrader plots charts using only Bid prices.

Buy Stop and Buy Limit orders are triggered by Ask price, which is not visible on the chart by default. Ask price is always above Bid price. It is not possible to see historical Ask prices, but you can display current Ask price in the following way:

  1. Right-click on the chart.
  2. Select Properties.
  3. Go to Show tab.
  4. Enable Show ask price line.

Visual Mode

You can also open trades and place pending orders visually by dragging lines on the chart. All you need to do is to enable Visual Mode in main window. SL, TP and Execution Price input fields will become greyed out.

If you now use any of trading buttons in Market or Pending tab, the simulator will display horizontal lines on the chart. You can drag them to desired location and open a new trade or place a new pending order by choosing Accept.

If Stop Loss or Take Profit is not needed, you can disable it using checkboxes.

Risk-based Position Sizing

It is possible to adjust the size of new trades and pending orders dynamically based on the amount you want to risk in each trade. There are 2 options of setting the risk:

  • Risk % - risk a percentage of your account's balance
  • Risk $ - risk an amount of money (in account's currency)

The simulator will calculate the size of new trade so as not to lose more than selected amount when Stop Loss gets hit.

Stop Loss is important

Risk-based position sizing works only when Stop Loss is set (when it is not zero).

[Risk is set too low or SL is set too far. Trade size would have to be 0.00 lots.]

If you see this message, it means that it is not possible to open a trade according to your risk settings. The simulator is trying to calculate the size of trade in such way that you won't lose more than you set in Risk% or Risk$ when SL gets hit. If the result of calculations is smaller than 0.01 lots (which is the minimal allowed size of trade), the simulator won't open the trade and it will display the above message.

The result of calculations may be smaller than 0.01 lots in two cases. First one is when your stop loss is too far. Second one is when you want to risk too little. Try setting SL closer to current price or increase risk setting.

Modifying Orders

You can modify a trade or a pending order by choosing Mod. in Trades window. This lets you change Stop Loss and Take Profit of selected trade or pending order. For pending order it is also possible to change its execution price.

Modification is done visually by dragging lines on the chart.

Add/Remove SL or TP

You can also add or remove Stop Loss or Take Profit using + and X buttons in Trades window.

Choosing + will open a small window where you can choose one of 3 ways of setting a new Stop Loss or Take Profit:

  • Pips from entry - by entering a distance from entry price
  • Price - by entering a price, for example 1.45554
  • Visual - by dragging a line on the chart

Closing Trades

Closing trades from Main Window
  • Close All - closes all open trades
  • Close Winners - closes all profitable trades
  • Close Losers - closes all unprofitable trades
Closing from Trades Window
  • Close All - closes all open trades
  • Close Winners - closes all profitable trades
  • Close Losers - closes all unprofitable trades
  • X button - closes selected trade from the list
  • Close Part - closes only a part of selected trade, for example 50% or 0.20 lots

Deleting Pending Orders

Deleting from Trades Window
  • Delete All - deletes all pending orders
  • X button - deletes selected order from the list

Break-Even

Some traders like to move their initial Stop Loss to entry price (break-even price) once market price has moved in their favor.

You can set Stop Loss at break-even price immediately using buttons in B/E column.

You can also let the simulator do it automatically by using buttons in Auto B/E column. Auto B/E function has 2 parameters:

  • When order is X pips in profit - activation level for break-even function
  • Move SL to Y pips of profit - secure Y pips of profit (setting zero means placing SL at break-even price)

Presets

You can also set Auto Break-Even in Presets tab

Trailing Stop

Trailing Stop function will move Stop Loss to follow current market price. When price moves in your favor, SL will be moved towards it to secure more and more profit. When price moves against you, SL will stay in place.

Trailing Stop has 2 parameters:

  • Trail stop at X pips - distance from current market price that should be kept by Stop Loss
  • when order is Y pips in profit - Trailing Stop will be active only when trade is at least Y pips in profit

Presets

You can also set trailing stop in Presets tab

One-Close-Other (OCO)

When you mark two or more pending orders as OCO (one-close-other), execution of any one of them will automatically delete others.

Presets

Presets section in main window lets speed up taking trades. If you use certain settings for many consecutive trades, you can preset them once and avoid entering them for every newly opened trade. You can choose to preset Comment, Trailing Stop and Auto Break-Even.

Everything you set up here will be applied automatically to every new trade and pending order.

Order Templates

Sometimes Presets are not enough. For example, if you use two or more types of trade management depending on situation and you need to switch often between two or more setups. In such case Order Templates should help you.

Saving order templates

Simply click Save Order button and choose a name for your new order template. Then, click Save.

Following settings from main window will be saved to your new order template:

  • trade size
  • Stop Loss and Take Profit
  • comment
  • pending order type
  • pending order distance
  • one-close-other (OCO)
  • trailing stop
  • break-even
Loading order templates
  1. Click Load Order in main window.
  2. Select a template from the list.
  3. Click Load. Settings from selected template will be applied to input fields in main window.