Automated tradingUpdated 2 min readBy the FXNOD team
When should you stop a trading bot?
Stop a trading bot when it reaches a limit you set in advance, when its results fall well outside what your testing showed, when conditions change in a way the strategy was not built for, or when you feel the urge to change its settings mid-run. Decide these rules before starting. Stopping on a feeling usually means stopping at the worst time.
Planned stops
| Limit | What it protects |
|---|---|
| Session stop loss | The most one run can lose |
| Profit target | A winning session from being given back |
| Maximum number of trades | Against a bot grinding on for hours |
| Maximum stake | Against one trade being too large |
| Daily and weekly loss limit | Against restarting until the account is gone |
The first four belong in the bot. The last one belongs to you, because a bot does not know how many sessions you have already run today.
Unplanned stops that are justified
- The drawdown is far beyond anything your test produced.
- The win rate over a few hundred trades is well below the tested one.
- The bot is doing something the rules do not describe.
- The broker or platform reports a problem.
- A major news event is due, on a real market.
- You have noticed a mistake in the settings.
Stops that are usually a mistake
- After three losses, when the test showed runs of eight.
- Just before the stop loss, to avoid seeing it reached.
- To restart at a bigger stake.
- Because it is winning and you want it to win faster.
Normal loss or broken strategy?
Know the tested range
Longest losing run, deepest drawdown and win rate from your demo record.
Compare
Is today inside that range? Then it is noise.
Set a retirement rule in advance
For example: if the drawdown exceeds twice the tested maximum, the bot is stopped and re-tested.
How to stop
Know what your stop button does before you need it. In FXNOD, stopping a run from its page ends it. There is also an emergency stop, which ends the run and sells what is still open where Deriv allows it. A contract that cannot be sold runs to its own end.
After it stops
- Do not start another run immediately.
- Write down how it ended and what you did.
- Change nothing until you have looked at the numbers calmly.
Questions people ask
- Should I stop my bot after a few losses?
- Not if your test showed losing runs of that length. Stopping inside the normal range turns a tested strategy into an untested one.
- Should I leave a bot running overnight?
- Only with a stop loss you are content to wake up to, on a bot that keeps its limits when your device is off.
- When should I retire a bot for good?
- When its results over a few hundred trades are clearly outside what testing showed, by a rule you set beforehand.
Run a bot that keeps its limits
FXNOD's bots run on its servers and will not start without a stop loss, so your limits hold when your device is off. Build one in Bot Forge or start a ready-made one in Auto Hub, on your Deriv demo account first.
Get started