MACD Trading Tutorial – Trading System – February 17, 2024
This tutorial applies to EA ‘MACD Trading’ which you can access the product page by clicking on the image below.
This product allows you to receive alerts or place orders based on the MACD strategy. The main advantages of this EA are:
- It includes additional filters (moving average, RSI, and pivot point filters).
- It has complete order management features (break-even, trailing stop, close before weekend, max loss or win/day…).
- All market clock symbols can be used simultaneously.
Below is a backtest of this EA against EURUSD (default settings) from January 1, 2020.
Detailed features are described on the product page. Below is a list of EA settings with descriptions.
-====General Settings====-
sign: Warning and trading symbols (all or symbols on the chart)
There are several ways to choose which symbols to scan.
– ‘Only symbols on charts’: You should use this option if you want to use it for backtesting or apply bots to chart symbols.
– ‘All major forex pairs’: The bot scans all 28 major forex pairs (EUR/USD/GBP/CHF/AUD/NZD/JPY).
– ‘Market Clock’: The bot scans all market clock symbols.
– ‘Only symbols listed below’: Only symbols listed in the field below are checked.
Symbols to check or exclude: Here you write which symbols you want to scan (‘Only symbols listed below’ mode) or which you want to exclude (‘All major forex pairs’ and ‘Watch the market’ modes).
Broker prefix (if required): Applies only to brokers using the prefix. For example, for mEURUSD, enter m.
Broker suffix (if required): Applies only to brokers using the prefix. For example, for EURUSDm, enter m.
If you need to enter multiple symbols in this field, they must be separated by commas.
Use timer: Define the trading day and time.
Orders are only opened on trading days. However, orders can be closed/modified outside of the set times if one or more of the following parameters are enabled::
– ‘maximum loss rate/day’ ;
– ‘Maximum win rate (%)/day’ ;
– ‘Closes before the weekend’ ;
– ‘Close on reverse crossing’ ;
– ‘End order when price closes above/below Ma’;
– ‘break-even point’;
– ‘Trailing stop’.
monday: Monday Reminder and Deals
tuesday:Tuesday Reminder & Deals
wednesday: Wednesday Notifications and Deals
thursday: Thursday Notifications and Deals
friday: Friday Reminder & Deals
Saturday (Cryptocurrency): Saturday notifications and transactions (usually for cryptocurrency trading)
Sunday (Cryptocurrency): Sunday notifications and trading (usually for cryptocurrency trading)
start time: Start session
end time: End session
Indicator Alert: Terminal and/or smartphone notifications
Transaction Notifications: Terminal and/or smartphone notifications
-====MACD Settings====-
MACD Strategy: MACD strategy used to receive alerts and/or place orders
Currently EA has two strategies available: Other strategies are also implemented according to customer requests. The two strategies are:
– MACD crosses the signal line:
-> Buying conditions: The MACD main line is below the 0 line and crosses the MACD signal line from bottom to top.
-> Selling conditions: The MACD main line is above the 0 line and crosses the MACD signal line from top to bottom.
– MACD crosses 0:
-> Buying condition: MACD main line crosses the 0 line from bottom to top
-> Selling conditions: The main MACD line crosses the 0 line from top to bottom.
Alternative buy and sell orders: Prevents two consecutive buy orders or two consecutive sell orders
period: All MT4 periods
warning! Use the “CURRENT” value to use the chart’s time period!
If you use other values, the current chart period will not affect the MACD calculation.
MACD Fast Period: Period for quick average calculation
MACD’s slow period: slow averaging period
signal cycle: Period of MACD signal
MACD applied price: Closed / Open / High / Low / Median / Normal / Weighted
-====Filter Settings====-
-=Moving average settings=-
Use MA: Check whether the price is above (buy signal) or below (sell signal) this MA.
mom period: All MT4 periods
mom period: MA period
Ma method: SMA / EMA / SMMA / LWMA
Ma applied price: Closed / Open / High / Low / Median / Normal / Weighted
mom shift: Movement of MA
-=RSI Settings=-
Use RSI: Check the RSI value before placing an order.
RSI Period: All MT4 periods
RSI Period: Cycle of RSI filter
RSI applied price: Closed / Open / High / Low / Median / Normal / Weighted
RSI changes: Movement of RSI filter
Minimum RSI value for purchase order: RSI > If this value, a buy order is opened.
Maximum RSI value for sell order: sell If RSI < this value, the order will be opened.
-=Pivot point settings=-
Daily PP: Check whether the price is above (buy signal) or below (sell signal) the daily PP.
Weekly PP: Check whether the price is above (buy signal) or below (sell signal) the weekly PP.
Monthly PP: Same as previous parameters for monthly PP
Note: The more filters you implement, the fewer orders will be opened. If you don’t have enough open orders, try disabling some filters.
-====Transaction Settings====-
-=General Settings=-
Allow transactions: If false, only warnings work.
Magic number: Must be unique if other EA’s are running.
‘Max Open Orders’, ‘Max Loss Percentage/Day’ and ‘Max Wins/Day %’ are calculated as magic numbers. For example, if there are 3 EA’s with the same magic number, the total number of orders opened will be the sum of the orders opened by those 3 EA’s.
max open order: Maximum number of orders opened simultaneously (if 0, no maximum)
Maximum loss rate (%)/day: Once the maximum value is reached, the EA opening order will be closed and no other orders will be opened until the next day. (no maximum if 0)
Calculation is based on account balance + open order benefits. To speed up backtesting, calculations are performed every hour during backtesting, rather than every minute during a live trading session.
Maximum win rate (%)/day: Once the maximum value is reached, the EA opening order will be closed and no other orders will be opened until the next day. (no maximum if 0)
This is the same explanation as ‘maximum win rate/day’.
Maximum loss rate (capital ratio): When the maximum is reached, the EA opening order is terminated and the EA is terminated (if 0, there is no maximum).
Same description as ‘max win/day %’ but calculations are done every 5 minutes (for backtests and real trading sessions).
Closes before the weekend: All EA orders close on Friday.
Deadline before the weekend: When ‘Closed before weekends’ is ‘true’
Take advantage of money management: Lot size (% balance) if ‘true’
Fixed lot size: Lot size per order (if ‘Enable Money Management’ is ‘false’)
Lot size (%): Balance % per order (if ‘Enable Money Management’ is ‘true’)
maximum spread: Maximum spread allowed for order opening (if 0, no maximum spread)
WARNING: If the spread value is too low, your order will not be opened! To avoid problems, we recommend setting the backtest value to ‘0’.
maximum slip: Maximum slippage allowed to open an order
Same description as ‘maximum spread’.
-=SL and TP settings=-
SL(pips, points)…: Stop loss in ‘Normal SL’ mode x pips above/below current price and Ma above/below selected in ‘Ma SL’ mode
TP(pips, points)…: Regardless of the ‘SL Mode’ you choose, when you open your order you will win x pips profit above or below the current price.
-=BE/TS/Grid Settings=-
Break-even point: If ‘true’, the break-even point is activated.
Break-even point in pips, points…: Triggers a break even at certain profits in pips and points…
trailing stop: If ‘true’, trailing stop is enabled.
Trail profit in pips, points…: Executes a trailing stop at a specific profit in pips, points…
Trail distance in pips, points…: Distance in pips, points… between trailing stop and price
Trail steps in pips, points…: pip units, points… for trailing stops
Additional orders open: Whenever profit reaches one level, additional orders are opened.
Maximum additional orders (per symbol) : ‘Open additional orders’ must be ‘true’.
It is better to have a smaller lot than your main order.
It is better to have a smaller lot than your main order.
Profit levels in pips and points for opening additional orders: Whenever profit reaches this stage, a new order is opened.
Pips for additional orders, SL in points: Pips of additional orders, SL in points
TP (pips, points) for additional orders: TP (pips, points) of additional orders
- Before using the ‘All Major Forex Pairs’ mode, make sure you have 28 major currency pairs in the “Market Watch” tab in MT4.
- We recommend that you use multi-symbol mode only for warnings. If you find a profitable way to use symbols, it is recommended to apply them in ‘only_symbol_on_the_chart’ mode.
- EA works for all types of symbols, but in some cases (depending on the broker) adjustments to SL and TP must be made for certain types of symbols (except forex and indices). In this case, you will need to multiply your pip or point settings by 10 to match the correct value. Example: For a stop loss of $10 on the crude oil symbol, the ‘SL(pips, points…)’ parameter should take the value 100, not 10(x10). You can do some testing using backtesting to find the right values.
Major Forex Pairs :
EURUSD / GBPUSD / USDCHF / AUDUSD / USDCAD / USDJPY / NZDUSD
EURGBP / EURCHF / EURAUD / EURCAD / EURJPY / EURNZD
GBPCHF / GBPAUD / GBPCAD / GBPJPY / GBPNZD
AUDCHF / CADCHF / CHFJPY / NZDCHF
AUDCAD / AUDJPY / AUDNZD
CADJPY/NZDCAD
NZDJPY
