Stop and targets: the channel’s or yours

There are two philosophies and both are defensible.

The signal's

The stop and targets published by the channel are used. That is the natural choice: whoever posted the signal presumably had a reason for that distance.

This is what comes by default.

Yours

You impose your own distances, in points or in multiples of risk, and ignore the channel's. It makes sense when a channel sets enormous stops that force you into tiny lots, or when its target is so far away that it almost never arrives.

You can also mix: the channel's stop and your targets, or the other way round.

When something is missing

Some channels publish the entry and the targets but no stop. You decide what happens:

• Discard the signal. The most conservative choice, and the one that comes set.
• Wait a few seconds in case it arrives in the next message, which is what many channels do.
• Use a stop of yours, at whatever distance you define.
• Open with no stop, which we do not recommend and which is therefore not set.

With no stop there is no way to size by risk, so one of them has to be chosen.

The safety cap

Among the sanity checks there is a maximum stop per instrument, as a percentage of price: 3% for gold, 2% for indices, and so on. If a signal brings a wider stop than that, it is discarded and we tell you why. It is not trimmed: we would rather not enter than enter something different from what the channel published.

The values are yours and are set instrument by instrument.

What does not change

The stop is placed in your terminal, not watched by us. If your computer shuts down, the stop is still sitting at the broker doing its job.