From an idea to a trading rule.
A practical tour of the strategy builder, historical tests and trading sessions: what each control does before a strategy reaches your exchange.
Write both sides of the trade
In Strategies, give your strategy a name and define its buy and sell conditions. Indicators describe the signal; the buy amount sets the size of each entry. Sell rules decide when an open position is sold.
Use and when conditions must be true together, and or for alternatives. A crossover is a transition between two completed candles; above is a state that can stay true across many candles. That difference changes how often a strategy can buy.
Check the maximum number of open trades and the wait between buys. A condition that stays true can create repeated entries when these controls allow it.
Choose the signal timeframe
The signal timeframe sets which completed candles your rules read. It’s separate from the chart’s display range: a one-hour signal and a daily signal can behave very differently, even with similar conditions.
Moving-average and movement durations must fit whole signal candles. Indicators also need enough history to warm up; until that history is available, the indicator can’t produce a signal.
Read a backtest beyond its return
Pick a historical window, then set the fee and slippage assumptions. Look at the trade count, losses, drawdown and positions still open at the end. The assumptions are part of the result.
Backtest buys are capped at the signal’s closing price. A buy fills only when the modeled next-minute opening price, including slippage, fits that cap. Sells use the model’s market-execution assumptions. Real exchange liquidity and partial fills can produce different outcomes.
Historical results describe one period under one model. They don’t show that the rules will be profitable in another period or in live trading.
Paper and live execution
Paper simulates orders without sending them to an exchange. Use it to watch how your rules behave as new market data arrives.
Live places orders through a connected Kraken or Coinbase account. Buys are price-capped immediate-or-cancel limit orders, and any unmatched amount is canceled. Sells are market orders. So a buy signal doesn’t guarantee a fill, and a sell signal doesn’t guarantee an exit price.
Connect an account in Settings with a dedicated API key that can query balances and trade, and keep withdrawals disabled.
Limits and stop controls
- Max exposure
- Checks open positions plus the proposed buy before allowing an entry. Fees are extra, and it doesn’t cap later price gains.
- Max daily loss
- Blocks new buys once realized losses for the UTC day reach the limit. Sell rules keep running. It isn’t a guaranteed maximum loss.
- Stop now
- Halts automation after pending orders are reconciled. It doesn’t sell your holdings.
- Stop after close
- Stops new buys and keeps the strategy’s sell rules running until positions close. This can take time, and small balances may be below the exchange’s trading minimum.
Review the session status and executions on Trading. A stopped session can still leave assets in your exchange account.