In 23 of 82 Full Years Across 9 EA Backtests the Return Did Not Exceed That Year's Balance Drawdown; 12 Are One EA's

We took the published MT5 backtests of 9 of our EAs and, for every full calendar year, compared the year's return with the largest closed-balance drawdown inside the same year. The question: in how many years did the EA not earn more than it gave back at its worst point? This article uses backtests only. It contains no forward-account figures. Figures are as of 2026-10-26.

- Across the 9 tests there are 82 full calendar years. In 23 of them the return was equal to or lower than the closed-balance drawdown inside the same year. 16 of those 23 are losing years; 7 are profitable years that earned less than their own drawdown.

- 12 of the 23 belong to GOLD NEURON (12 of its 22 full years). 4 tests have no such year at all: GOLD KING, BITCOIN COMET, GOLD TRIPWIRE and GOLD VIPER.

- Inside GOLD NEURON the years are not spread evenly: 11 of its 16 full years from 2004 to 2019, against 1 of its 6 full years from 2020 to 2025.

- A year in which the return does not beat the year's drawdown is common in some of these tests and absent from others. The yearly view shows that a single total return and a single drawdown for the whole test hide this.

- Each closed trade is assigned to the calendar year in which it closed. Commission and swap are included. Open positions are not valued, so every figure here is on closed balance.

- The return of a year is its closed result divided by the closed balance at the start of that year. The balance starts at the 10,000 opening deposit (1,000 for GOLD TRIPWIRE). Years are compared by percent, not by amount.

- The drawdown of a year is the largest peak-to-trough fall of the closed balance inside that calendar year, with the balance at the start of the year as the first peak. It is smaller than an equity drawdown, which includes open trades, and it is not the drawdown of the whole test.

- A full year is a calendar year that the test covers from January to December. Years the test covers only in part (2026 in 8 of the tests) are left out. A year is counted when its return is equal to or lower than its drawdown, both in percent.

- TRINITY and AIFW are not in this article: the original report files behind their published backtests are not in our breakdown, so we could not split them by year.

EA | Test period and data | Full years in the test | Years with return equal to or below the same year's drawdown | Of which losing years | Largest closed-balance drawdown inside a year (year)

GOLD NEURON | M30, 2004.01.01-2026.09.01, 100% real ticks | 22 | 12 | 9 | 34.1% (2018)

ETHEREUM TREND | H4, 2019.01.01-2026.06.28, 100% real ticks | 7 | 4 | 2 | 10.7% (2021)

DONCHIAN ENGINE (free) | H1, 2017.01.01-2026.06.01, 100% real ticks | 9 | 3 | 2 | 9.2% (2020)

MEGAMAX DONCHIAN (USDJPY) | H1, 2017.01.01-2026.06.01, 100% | 9 | 3 | 3 | 52.2% (2020)

ATLAS PORTFOLIO | H4, 2019.01.01-2026.06.28, 100% | 7 | 1 | 0 | 19.2% (2022)

BITCOIN COMET | H4, 2018.01.01-2025.12.31, 98% | 8 | 0 | 0 | 16.6% (2018)

GOLD KING | M1, 2019.01.01-2026.06.01, 5% real ticks | 7 | 0 | 0 | 7.5% (2025)

GOLD TRIPWIRE | M15, 2020.01.01-2026.10.14, 11% real ticks | 6 | 0 | 0 | 9.8% (2020)

GOLD VIPER | M30, 2019.01.01-2026.09.01, 8% real ticks | 7 | 0 | 0 | 19.6% (2023)

Sorted by the number of such years, highest first. All columns come from the same yearly breakdown of the trade list. The tests cover different periods and data quality, and GOLD NEURON has 22 full years against 6 to 9 for the others, so compare the counts with the number of full years and do not rank the EAs against each other.

GOLD NEURON has the longest test (M30, 2004.01.01-2026.09.01), and the largest number of such years: 12 of 22, of which 9 are losing years. The other 3 are profitable years that earned less than their drawdown: 2006 (+20.5% against 23.4%), 2019 (+9.6% against 22.7%) and 2023 (+17.9% against 25.8%).

The first four full years, 2004 to 2007, all qualify. From 2020 to 2025 only 2023 does. We do not claim to know why; the test covers 22 years of changing market conditions, and the pattern may just as well be a feature of those years.

The 3 qualifying years of MEGAMAX DONCHIAN are 2017, 2018 and 2020. All three are losing years (-8.6%, -7.1%, -18.6%), with closed-balance drawdowns inside the year of 41.3%, 36.5% and 52.2%. In its other 6 full years the return is larger than the drawdown.

In 2022 ETHEREUM TREND returned +6.9% with a drawdown of 8.3%, and in 2023 +6.8% with 9.4%. Both closed above zero, and both gave back more at their worst point than they ended up earning. The next two years returned +105.8% and +71.9%, with drawdowns of 7.3% and 3.8%. The test has 12 to 28 trades a year.

GOLD KING, BITCOIN COMET, GOLD TRIPWIRE and GOLD VIPER have no year in which the return was equal to or below the drawdown. That is a statement about closed balance by calendar year. GOLD KING's largest yearly drawdown is 7.5% (2025), while the largest relative equity drawdown in its MT5 report for the whole test, which includes open trades, is 91.3%. A year can finish well ahead and still contain a deep unrealised drawdown.

- Do not judge an EA by one calendar year. In 5 of the 9 tests at least one full year did not earn more than its own drawdown.

- Read each year's return next to the drawdown of the same year, not only the total return next to one drawdown figure.

- A long test shows more of these years than a short one simply because it has more years. Compare the count with the number of full years.

- This article is about past tests. It does not promise any future result.

- All forward accounts we publish are demo accounts, and none is used in this article.