How can we be sure that an EA for sale in the marketplace is honestly coded!

[Stefano Fazzino]

Good morning everyone,

I am a newbie to the MT5 platform and would like to buy an EA to start trading.

I have one doubt though! How can I be sure that an EA for sale in the marketplace is actually serious and coded in good faith and not is a scam?

Regardless of whether it is profitable or not I am interested in it not being a scam. Let me explain: a serious and honest programmer should program his EA according to his strategy, which can only be varied by input variables. If it were a scam, he could adapt to the past data by varying the algorithms according to the time periods under consideration in order to obtain an always positive tester response for past periods and clearly, probably negative for future ones!

The only answer I can come up with is trust, or is there a mechanism I am missing?

Thank you all,

[Sergey Golubev]

The articles:

• How to Test a Trading Robot Before Buying 
• The correct way to choose an Expert Advisor from the Market

[Sergey Golubev]

Besides, it is my suggestion about to buy EA on the Market: post #6

[Conor Mcnamara]

because the modelling "based on real ticks" doesn't lie, and only very well made EAs can be profitable on this strategy tester modelling. Beware of scam AI experts which only know how to be profitable on historical data

[Evren Caglar]

Stefano Fazzino:

Good morning everyone,

I am a newbie to the MT5 platform and would like to buy an EA to start trading.

I have one doubt though! How can I be sure that an EA for sale in the marketplace is actually serious and coded in good faith and not is a scam?

Regardless of whether it is profitable or not I am interested in it not being a scam. Let me explain: a serious and honest programmer should program his EA according to his strategy, which can only be varied by input variables. If it were a scam, he could adapt to the past data by varying the algorithms according to the time periods under consideration in order to obtain an always positive tester response for past periods and clearly, probably negative for future ones!

The only answer I can come up with is trust, or is there a mechanism I am missing?

Thank you all,

There is no real solution to this because you really don't know what are we doing under the hood.

But there is one trick. You need to be careful on EAs that updates every week or so. Because the owner can continuously optimize for the most recent data and update it on the platform. Then you test it with the most recent data. Therefore it is good idea to focus on EAs updates not very recently - 3 to 5 months is a good period to update usually.

If an algorithm is consistent and reliable, there is no need to update it regularly.

[Clemence Benjamin]

Stefano Fazzino:

Good morning everyone,

I am a newbie to the MT5 platform and would like to buy an EA to start trading.

I have one doubt though! How can I be sure that an EA for sale in the marketplace is actually serious and coded in good faith and not is a scam?

Regardless of whether it is profitable or not I am interested in it not being a scam. Let me explain: a serious and honest programmer should program his EA according to his strategy, which can only be varied by input variables. If it were a scam, he could adapt to the past data by varying the algorithms according to the time periods under consideration in order to obtain an always positive tester response for past periods and clearly, probably negative for future ones!

The only answer I can come up with is trust, or is there a mechanism I am missing?

Thank you all,

Hello, my good friend. In my opinion, the automatic validation process that occurs when publishing products serves to verify the authenticity of the algorithm, including essential error checks, which enhances your trust. I believe that scammers would struggle to submit high-quality code or address any errors detected during this process. Therefore, I think your responsibility lies in thoroughly testing the available systems and optimizing them for the best results.

[Paul Anscombe]

Clemence Benjamin #:

Hello, my good friend. In my opinion, the automatic validation process that occurs when publishing products serves to verify the authenticity of the algorithm, including essential error checks, which enhances your trust. I believe that scammers would struggle to submit high-quality code or address any errors detected during this process. Therefore, I think your responsibility lies in thoroughly testing the available systems and optimizing them for the best results.

This is incorrect, validation does not check the authenticity of an algorithm and it does not check if the EA is cheating to manipulate back tests