Is the spread field in the strategy tester in pips or fractional pips?

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Is the spread field in the strategy tester in pips or fractional pips? I can't find it in the documentation. For instance, on a pair with 5 digits should that parameter be set to 1.6 or 16 if you want to simulate a spread of 1.6 pips?

 
burgie:

Is the spread field in the strategy tester in pips or fractional pips? I can't find it in the documentation. For instance, on a pair with 5 digits should that parameter be set to 1.6 or 16 if you want to simulate a spread of 1.6 pips?

Create a simple EA to print the Spread and test it.
 
RaptorUK:
Create a simple EA to print the Spread and test it.

 

Good idea! And it turns out that it is in fractional pips. So if you want to simulate a 1.6 pips spread on a 5 digit pair, you have to enter it in as 16. If you enter 0 it seems to do the same as selecting "Current".

 

This pretty much ruined my mood by the way because I thought I had a perfect new EA with a lot of potential. But unfortunately I tested it with a 0.2 pip spread instead of the assumed 2 pips spread... :-( 

 
burgie:

Good idea! And it turns out that it is in fractional pips. So if you want to simulate a 1.6 pips spread on a 5 digit pair, you have to enter it in as 16. If you enter 0 it seems to do the same as selecting "Current".

This pretty much ruined my mood by the way because I thought I had a perfect new EA with a lot of potential. But unfortunately I tested it with a 0.2 pip spread instead of the assumed 2 pips spread... :-( 

Thanks for sharing what you discovered. 
 

Burgie said: "This pretty much ruined my mood by the way because I thought I had a perfect new EA with a lot of potential. But unfortunately I tested it with a 0.2 pip spread instead of the assumed 2 pips spread... :-( "

Same for me, yesterday, Burgie; tested this scalper EA to take profit at 2.5 pips, with a stop of 7.5 pips. It kinda made like 4700% profit over 4 years. For years I've assumed the spread in the MT4 Strategy Tester to show 2 pips (default), after all, who would think it's normal for most brokers to offer 0.2 pips spread, right. Well, I should have known one can not put anything past metaquotes, because they have no idea what trading is about (or maybe they know all too well). Bet ya, we're not the only ones who got tricked into wondering why those few wonderful EA's don't perform well in live trading at all ;-)

Cheers 

 
Spread is calculated in Points.
 
Oh, I do understand the implementation of the spread. A pip is a fictional concept. Everything in Metatrader works with points. The Metatrader terminal can't know what a correct pip is. So I don't think this is something MetaQuotes did on purpose to trick us. It's just something you should know.
 
burgie: A pip is a fictional concept. Everything in Metatrader works with points.

  1. False. A pip is defined as 0.0001 for non-jpy major currencies and 0.01 for the jpy. When mt4 was written a point was equal to a pip. With the advent of 5 digit brokers a point became 1/10 pip. The value of a pip doesn't change just because the broker allow fractional pips.
  2. Mt4 defines a point as the least significatant digit of a quoted price (which is not the same as ticksize for metals.) Code your EA in pips and convert to points (TP/SL/SLIPPAGE) or you will have to check/change your settings every time you switch brokers.
 
WHRoeder:
burgie: A pip is a fictional concept. Everything in Metatrader works with points.

  1. False. A pip is defined as 0.0001 for non-jpy major currencies and 0.01 for the jpy. When mt4 was written a point was equal to a pip. With the advent of 5 digit brokers a point became 1/10 pip. The value of a pip doesn't change just because the broker allow fractional pips.
  2. Mt4 defines a point as the least significatant digit of a quoted price (which is not the same as ticksize for metals.) Code your EA in pips and convert to points (TP/SL/SLIPPAGE) or you will have to check/change your settings every time you switch brokers.


Didn't you just say what I already said? So why false?
 
burgie: Didn't you just say what I already said? So why false?
  1. You said "fictional concept"
  2. I gave the exact, defined, non-fictional, definition..
 
WHRoeder:
burgie: Didn't you just say what I already said? So why false?
  1. You said "fictional concept"
  2. I gave the exact, defined, non-fictional, definition..




From the viewpoint of MT4 a pip is a fictional concept because MT4 doesn't know what a pip is ;-)
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