Quick Questions regarding strategy historical processing

[bridenour]

Hi,

I have a strategy that manages its own ongoing balance (AccountBalance). I set the initial value in the strategy dialog in the beginning, and then the strategy manages the ongoing total based on profit/loss.

When i run this strategy live at the beginning of each day, it goes back and processes a significant amount of historical data and virtual trades (seems like about two weeks worth or more). The end result is that after it processes this historical data, the account balance is very wrong to start the trading day.

I have min bars required set to zero, and i also have the lookback number of minutes set to only 60. For some reason, it still processes a couple of weeks of historical data.

How can i keep the strategy from processing historical trades? I used the (Historical) function, but this will keep any historical data from being processed and will impact the signal generating functions of the strategy.

Any ideas how I can keep my account balance from being updated before the strategy begins to process live orders?

Thanks

[NinjaTrader_Josh]

You can just let it run and do its thing and then as it goes live, reset the AccountSize value.

if (!Historical && setAccount)
{
AccountSize = 25000;
setAccount = false;
}

[bridenour]

now that is good thinkin'!

Thanks!

[bridenour]

So, i think this will fix my core problem and allow the strategy to execute ok.

But, won't this throw off my profit related metrics? For example, i track and report on cumulative profit...since it is processing all these historical trades (virtually), it will think it has amassed this profit prior to ever processing a live order.

is there anything easily done about that? Its not the end of the world, but it would be nice to produce accurate statistics.

Thanks

[NinjaTrader_Josh]

Not sure what you mean. Profit performance is not influenced at all.
http://www.ninjatrader-support.com/HelpGuideV6/GetProfitLoss.html
http://www.ninjatrader-support.com/HelpGuideV6/Performance.html
http://www.ninjatrader-support.com/HelpGuideV6/TradeClass.html

[bridenour]

Hi,

I use this statement to add trade profit to my running balance during processing:

Positions[currentStock.GetIndex()].GetProfitLoss(Close[0], PerformanceUnit.Currency)


What I am finding is that when i run the strategy live, it preprocesses a bunch of historical data and runs up the balance prematurely. Is there some way to only take profit/loss from real time trades? Maybe that is my mistake.

thanks

[NinjaTrader_Josh]

First, remember GetProfitLoss() is unrealized PnL. I recommend you use the Performance class and just aggregate those.

if (Performance.RealtimeTrades.Count > 0)
{
// Get the last completed real-time trade
Trade lastTrade = Performance.RealtimeTrades[Performance.RealtimeTrades.Count - 1];

// Calculate the PnL for the last completed real-time trade
double lastProfit = lastTrade.ProfitCurrency * lastTrade.Quantity;

// Pring the PnL to the Output window
Print("The last trade's profit is " + lastProfit);
}

[bridenour]

Great, thanks. I will switch to that!

[bridenour]

Hi Josh,

I switched to this method of profit calculation, but it seems a little flaky.

Basically, I am calling "ExitLong()..."

and then I am generating an email that immediately sends me the P/L based on the code you provided. Unfortunately, it is sending me some numbers that don't correlate to the real P/L of the trade (not even close, really).

Is there any requirement that I must wait until another bar is processed to use this code, or should it work on the same bar immediately after calling ExitLong?

Thanks!

[NinjaTrader_Josh]

bridenour,

Just because you called ExitLong() does not mean the order was filled by the exchange yet. You need to wait for your order to be filled before you will receive proper values.

[bridenour]

Ok, thats what i was afraid of. What do you think is a "best practice" for this? Simply wait until the next bar arrives? Or is there a more surefire approach?

[NinjaTrader_Josh]

If you have the ExitLong() stored to an IOrder you can use OnOrderUpdate() and OnExecution() to track the status of the order. When you receive an order state of Filled then you know you can run your profit checks.

[bridenour]

Ok i will give that a shot.

one thing i noticed -- when I submit a market order, it is often filled in multiple batched. When i execute your real time trade profit code, it seems like it is only grabbing one of these partial fills, and not the profit for the overall market order. In order words, it seems like each partial fill for a single market order is tracked as an individual real time trade, making it difficult to get an overall P/L for the entire trade.

Does this agree with your understanding?

Thanks

[NinjaTrader_Ben]

Hello,

I am not sure. I will have someone respond to this post on Monday.

[bridenour]

I do have the IOrder stored and am using OnExecution. Does a single market order get stored to multiple "trades" (such as each partial fill is stored on a "trade")? If so, is there any way to group them logically to sum up the total P/L?

Thanks!

[NinjaTrader_Bertrand]

Hi bridenour, please check your settings in the 'Strategies' tab - http://www.ninjatrader-support.com/HelpGuideV6/StrategiesTab.html

Have you set it to 'PerEntryExecution'? If so, please retry with 'ByStrategyPosition'.

You can find more details about the Trade class here - http://www.ninjatrader-support.com/HelpGuideV6/TradeClass.html

[bridenour]

Ok, i switched it to byStrategyPosition and will see how that affects the "Trade" reporting. It's not completely clear, but does sound like it might then report on the holistic trade.

Thanks for your help...