Trading bots and strategies

Bots vs signal sources

A signal source reacts to somebody else's message. A bot generates its own entries from market data on the instruments you assign it. Both end up in the same risk engine and the same order router.

• Bots live under Trading Bots; the instruments they may touch are set under Instruments.
• They obey the same account risk limits as copied signals — a bot cannot exceed your max lot size.
• The kill switch stops bots and signals alike.

Setting one up

1. 1

   Pick the strategy

   Each carries its own parameters and its own idea of what a good entry is.

2. 2

   Assign instruments

   Fewer is better at the start. One instrument makes attribution readable.

3. 3

   Assign accounts

   Same routing model as sources — one bot can trade several accounts, each sized independently.

4. 4

   Run it forward first

   Forward Testing runs live market data with no orders. It is the honest version of a backtest.

Watching it

• Portfolio shows exposure across everything running, which is where over-correlation shows up first.
• Performance separates bot results from copied-signal results.
• A bot that stops trading is usually blocked by a risk limit rather than broken — check the account's limits first.