What is the reason we don't see EAs for stocks, but mostly for currencies?

 

Hello, I have been curious as to why we have signals and EAs for currency/forex, but not for stocks. 

 What is the reason for this - it would be great to know the historical reasons as well.

MT4 itself is a decade in, so what are the reasons developers or strategists don't offer stock indicators/EAs for trading over the years?

I saw a couple of posts where people suggested picking up a EA and then just adding a stock chart and seeing if that work. But that means, its not optimized for stocks. What is the reason for this?


Thanks,


A

 

The main reason would be MT4 was forex only. MT5 Offers more instruments on various exchanges, so legacy wise Forex has been dominant for MT.

Assuming we are talking about technical automated trading, strategies for stocks or even futures is not very different from Forex. And coded properly any EA could run on anything other than currencies.

 
Enrique Dangeroux:

The main reason would be MT4 was forex only. MT5 Offers more instruments on various exchanges, so legacy wise Forex has been dominant for MT.

Assuming we are talking about technical automated trading, strategies for stocks or even futures is not very different from Forex. And coded properly any EA could run on anything other than currencies.

Got it Enrique. Glad to hear from you.  The legacy reason might have been the key reason for the lack of a stock focus. Are there other softwares that have focussed on stocks and not on forex?

Coming to the 2nd point of the strategies being similar - I agree that the while the strategies might be similar, the forum seems to be having enough people looking for stock specific EAs and not finding them. I reached out to some of the currencies technical trading EA coders and found that they don't suggest using their EA for stocks. So there might be a certain reason why it isn't plug and play for stocks - but I am not able to understand where the divergence is and was looking for more insights on that before I pay up and test some of the EAs. I don't have access to forex, but only to stocks


 
Aloo:

Got it Enrique. Glad to hear from you.  The legacy reason might have been the key reason for the lack of a stock focus. Are there other softwares that have focussed on stocks and not on forex?

Coming to the 2nd point of the strategies being similar - I agree that the while the strategies might be similar, the forum seems to be having enough people looking for stock specific EAs and not finding them. I reached out to some of the currencies technical trading EA coders and found that they don't suggest using their EA for stocks. So there might be a certain reason why it isn't plug and play for stocks - but I am not able to understand where the divergence is and was looking for more insights on that before I pay up and test some of the EAs. I don't have access to forex, but only to stocks


I would think that most if not all brokers that offer MT4/5 platforms include Forex instruments.

My personal opinion is that you do not tend to get the volatility with stocks that you see with forex. Stocks are great for trading on the daily chart, not so good on the lower time-frames. This doesn't appeal to a lot of traders as most of them want to become millionaires overnight.

Nearly all the standard indicators were developed to trade with stocks and commodities, but on the daily charts. They do not work nearly so well in the lower time-frames, but then again they are not so hot with forex either.

More brokers are including more stocks, indices and commodities, so you should be able to find a broker that suits you.

Then why not develop your ideas and have an EA coded specifically for stocks.

 

Hi Aloo, Good to see your message. Can you share the details of the technical EA coders you know. I am looking to develop a new system. Best, Guhan

Aloo:

Got it Enrique. Glad to hear from you.  The legacy reason might have been the key reason for the lack of a stock focus. Are there other softwares that have focussed on stocks and not on forex?

Coming to the 2nd point of the strategies being similar - I agree that the while the strategies might be similar, the forum seems to be having enough people looking for stock specific EAs and not finding them. I reached out to some of the currencies technical trading EA coders and found that they don't suggest using their EA for stocks. So there might be a certain reason why it isn't plug and play for stocks - but I am not able to understand where the divergence is and was looking for more insights on that before I pay up and test some of the EAs. I don't have access to forex, but only to stocks


Reason: