The Spread of the Backtests

[Carl Schreiber]

I have seen and read a lot of commets about the spread (durig weekends, bougus server, ..) of MT4.

But what I have not found is an answer to to that question:

If I start a backtest - e.g. ~10'000 tries:

is the spread taken once at the beginning this backtest, so it's the same for all the ~10'000 runs,

OR everytime a new run is started the spread is actually taken from the server of the broker acoount, which means that - depending on the account/broker - the spread might vary for each run?

Thanks Carl

[Simon Gniadkowski]

gooly:

OR everytime a new run is started the spread is actually taken from the server of the broker acoount, which means that - depending on the account/broker - the spread might vary for each run?

Yes.

[Clerin]

gooly:

But what I have not found is an answer to to that question:

To solve the problem, you can make a copy of your symbols.sel file (in the relevant folder of your history folder in the MT4 directory) when the current spread is as you want it for backtests.

Then prevent that terminal from connecting to the internet (because every time it logs in to an account it overwrites that file), copy your saved symbols.sel file back into the relevant folder and do your backtests.

You can check the spread for the backtest using the Symbol Properties button. It is best to keep a separate installation of MT4 just for backtests.