Time to move to MT5???
Helo,
I suppose that many people are asking themselves the same question right now. Hedging techniques aside, has anybody tried to move to Vs5 successfully? I started building some EA half a year ago and was going to start my paper trading phase now. But I wonder if it is worth to use this opportunity to move everything to MT5.
Have you guys seen any brokers switching to the new version? Problems with the language? Decrease in user of the forum?
All comments will be helpful.
Thanks,
YONA
PS: As I said, let's try to keep the hedging issues out of this post, lot has been said about that already.
It's still in Beta. Some brokers have Beta MT5 demo server set up but none (as far as I know) have a LIVE server yet. MT5 doesn't even have the Tester module yet... So I think no point 'moving' there now. At least not until brokers are offering LIVE accounts.
Thanks for the tip... I suppose MT5 should be out of our radars for a while then. I am just worried on putting too much time designing something that will have to be rewritten in less than a year!
Here is a list of intending MT5 brokers http://www.100forexbrokers.com/mt5brokers
But it is so different that we wont be rushing - a summary of +/- here http://www.100forexbrokers.com/mt5-metatrader5
Without an MT5 shell or compatibility mode to run 'old' MT4 EA's and indi's, its a huge job to convert all your files...
So I anticipate MT4 support will be around for a long time
-BB-
It also seems that with the NFA and the CFTC killing off the Forex market in the US soon.. Metaquotes BIG customers will be going out of business.
The revenue numbers from IBFX last year because of the 100:1, FIFO and No Hedge rules are way down... I assume most other brokers have seen a similar crash. These new rules will mean US Forex game over....with a like crash in the license fees paid to Metaquotes...
I'm not sure the FIFO/ No Hedge piece is as problematic as it appears. My broker maintains only one active order per currency pair representing the sum/difference of the total of any orders on that pair. So if I buy 2 lots on one timeframe and sell 1 on another, I now have an open buy position of 1 lot. I'm not sure if it's because MT4 already calculates it that way or if that's how the broker processes it. Either way, this method allows compliance with the FIFO/no hedging rule from the NFA while allowing hedging and non-FIFO strategies. My understanding is that MT5 also will only have one active order per currency pair using that method. Has anyone heard differently?
I agree with the post above though - The margin requirement may be problematic if enacted. Though I think the market will find a way to survive.
I'm not sure the FIFO/ No Hedge piece is as problematic as it appears. My broker maintains only one active order per currency pair representing the sum/difference of the total of any orders on that pair. So if I buy 2 lots on one timeframe and sell 1 on another, I now have an open buy position of 1 lot. I'm not sure if it's because MT4 already calculates it that way or if that's how the broker processes it. Either way, this method allows compliance with the FIFO/no hedging rule from the NFA while allowing hedging and non-FIFO strategies. My understanding is that MT5 also will only have one active order per currency pair using that method. Has anyone heard differently?
I agree with the post above though - The margin requirement may be problematic if enacted. Though I think the market will find a way to survive.
I'm developing a Virtual Order Manager for MT5 which will enable multiple orders on the one pair. See http://paulsfxrandomwalk.blogspot.com/ for more info. The screenshot below of six test EAs shows 18 virtual orders open and one position with the broker.
Paul has done a great job trying to get around the (ridiculous) No Hedge rule... The impossible thing is still the basic initial 1 Buy - 1 Sell...
What you're describing as "ridiculous" is a standard feature of most other trading software, and also of most underlying platforms communicating position info over FIX (e.g. Currenex or Hotspot). But treating individual orders as separate positions is one of the key components which have made MT4 wildly successful, and abandoning it in MT5 is a, er, courageous decision by Metaquotes. (In which sentence, for UK visitors of sufficient age, "courageous" has the same meaning as it does in the TV series "Yes, Minister".)
However, it's difficult to say that it's ridiculous. Firstly, Metaquotes could be said to be converging on a common standard. Secondly, and more specifically, they're converging on a standard required by regulation in the US. Thirdly, as I understand it, much of the point of MT5 is expanding the range of financial instruments which can be traded through the software, and this involves communicating with brokers and exchanges who just aren't going to change their current practice of reporting a single net position per symbol. You and even Metaquotes might want them to change this behavior, but it's not going to happen (except that, back in the forex world, Currenex are apparently considering it). That may be unpalatable, but I don't think anyone on this forum right now is the intended primary customer of MT5. I think that Metaquotes want to augment their business with a stream of new customers.
I'm not for a second disagreeing that this has major implications, and is undesirable in one way or other for perhaps a majority of existing MT4 users. For example, I think that what phampton is calling a "Virtual Order Manager" is simply the way that any trading software must already behave on almost any platform other than MT4 if it's to be compatible with other systems which are potentially trading the same symbol on the same account. Putting it another way, it's currently easy in MT4 to isolate one EA's activity from all others using magic numbers etc, but it's going to become very much harder on MT5. There are going to be countless EAs produced and sold which break if they're run in conjunction with other EAs trading the same symbol.
yona22 wrote >>
PS: As I said, let's try to keep the hedging issues out of this post, lot has been said about that already.
Whoops.
MQ can solve the no-hedge rule problem by implementing a 'built-in' system for one order management. Sort of like a built-in "Virtual Order Manager", but superior since any number of different EA's can run at the same time automatically, with no need to change their code.
All the system does is make sure that no matter what order opening or closing requests the client makes, just one net order is present at all times for each symbol, including a net TP and SL. It would simplify life greatly for all involved... I would even say that the brokers will benefit from this kind of system as well and will probably support it.
Regarding the logic behind the no-hedge rule - as a programmer I find the complexity it brings annoying and I am not looking forward to program EA's under this kind of environment (although I do look forward to many of MT5's improvements, especially OOP and multi-currency Tester), but from a pure economical point of view the rule makes perfect sense. I know many on this forum will not agree with the following statement: the no-hedge rule benefits clients MORE than it benefits brokers. It actually eats up all the profit they have been making off of many of their client's same-symbol hedging (causing the client to pay unnecessary double-spreads).
For anybody who did not agree with my last statement, there's an excellent explanation on the economical usefulness of opening opposite trades in the MT4 book - in the section about function OrderCloseBy() -> https://book.mql4.com/trading/orderclose (it's somewhere in the middle of that page).
yona22 wrote >>
PS: As I said, let's try to keep the hedging issues out of this post, lot has been said about that already.
Sorry, did not notice this till jjc edited his post.
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Helo,
I suppose that many people are asking themselves the same question right now. Hedging techniques aside, has anybody tried to move to Vs5 successfully? I started building some EA half a year ago and was going to start my paper trading phase now. But I wonder if it is worth to use this opportunity to move everything to MT5.
Have you guys seen any brokers switching to the new version? Problems with the language? Decrease in user of the forum?
All comments will be helpful.
Thanks,
YONA
PS: As I said, let's try to keep the hedging issues out of this post, lot has been said about that already.