Hi Jason, Good o’ clint brought me here. That guy is pretty good on these forums, eh?
Anyway, I needed to ask you some questions about my demo account experience. This is for MT4 if that matters.
Question 1: Why is the “final” hour bar close different than the day bar close? I have looked at it over all major pairs and quite a few of the minors, but its the same for all my charts. My friend also has a demo with you guys, same everything as me, but same problem.
Question 2: Why is my Parabolic SAR, and their Parabolic SAR different? We had the same setting (both of us went into properties and double checked) and were on the same time frame, etc.
Question 3: Maybe my understanding of how the markets work on the inside are off, but would time zone affect the charts? As in, if I have a bearish bar lock in on my US account, and its a bullish on my Australian account, but both are your systems, why is that?
Question 4: I just found this out as I type. My day bar, as of 4 pm central (5pm New York) was not released. However, my friend’s day bar was released. This wasn’t always true. We used to have the same released day bars. This is just recently, if it isn’t just today.
Any help would be appreciated. I will reply to your reply with more questions if I have any. Thanks.
After investigating question 4’s topic some more, we also found out that the time frame grid lines (the dotted vertical lines that match up with the date and time of the bars) are off. My USDCHF , is showing 22:00 for the last bar that was released. Theirs is showing 00:00. At this point I am also wondering if that says anything about our day bar situation and sar situation, but this is also recent, this is not how its always been. On that note, I am saying that it changed on us some how…
I will open another demo and check the server details, but if we happened to trade on two different servers, still based in the us, why should the chart change? Why not just the time and date?
We might be on two different servers, as I just recently opened another demo account.
Yea, we were on two different servers. USD01 and USD02. I don’t see why there is a difference though.
The difference between the time zones on those two MT4 demo servers is the answer to all four of your questions. FXCM has multiple live and demo MT4 servers, and some are set to the time zone GMT, while others are set to GMT+2 in order to have chart bars that begin and end in sync with the New York Close*.
The reason some traders prefer New York Close charts is because it means that every week you are looking at 5 daily candles, each of which is 24 hours in length. This allows you to make an apples to apples comparison when you apply indicators to your charts such as the 50-day moving average, because each daily candle represents the same amount of time.
With charts that are not set to the New York Close, you can have 6 uneven daily candles per week. The Sunday candle might only be 2 hours long, while the Friday candle is 22 hours long, with the other 4 candles being 24 hours long. This can throw off the signals from indicators such as the 50-day moving average which work on the assumption that each daily candle should be given the same weight.
[I]* The MT4 platform has a limitation that daily chart bars must begin at midnight server time. Therefore, in order to have charts in sync with the New York Close, the MT4 server time must be set to GMT+2. It’s worth noting that other platforms FXCM offers such as Trading Station do not have such a limitation. Trading Station charts are always in sync with the New York Close regardless of the time zone you choose to display on them. To display the time zone of your choice on MT4, you can use the free Custom Time Zones app.[/I]
I am still confused on the bar part, however. I am having trouble understanding why the timezone matter would affect the close of the bars. If a new daily bar is just released, shouldn’t the close of the previous day match up with the hour bar just before? Regardless of timezone?
Or is it held because of the limitation? So the actual close matches the hour bar but is held until server time reset?
Or… none of the above and your answer haha.
I hope you will let me butt into this conversation one more time.
The question you raised is valid. After my previous reply to you (on your other thread), I did some checking on my FXCM MarketScope charts (not MT4), and saw the same anomaly that you referred to. That is, there were differences (of several pips) between the closing price on each daily bar, and the closing price on the corresponding hour bar. As discussed previously, it shouldn’t be that way.
So, I was getting ready to post a reply to you, to tell you that you were NOT imagining things, or misunderstanding things, and that I was seeing the same thing. But, before doing that post, I decided to check my charts again, during the weekend shut-down period when nothing is moving, and I was surprised to see that all the anomalies had disappeared.
I checked several days closing prices (Daily vs. H1) on several pairs, and the prices matched as they’re supposed to, in each case.
I don’t have an explanation for (1) the problem you noted, or (2) the way it seems to have corrected itself in the MarketScope charts.
If you have a chance, before the retail market opens on Sunday afternoon (NY time), see whether the D1 and H1 closing prices on your MT4 charts are now synchronized.
Hi, Jason. Clint here.
With all due respect, I think you are wrong about the two-server issue explaining the problem which Grabber detailed in question #1, above.
As I read his comments on this thread and on his previous thread, he was observing a mis-match between the closing price on the D1 candle (or bar) and the closing price on the corresponding H1 candle (or bar) on his MT4 demo charts. And (unrelated to this anomaly on his charts), his friend on a different server was seeing the same anomaly.
As I mentioned in my reply to his quote above, I saw the same anomaly on my MarketScope charts (on a live account) on Thursday evening, after the 5pm close. But, when I looked at it again early Sunday morning (while the market was closed for the weekend), the anomaly had disappeared — the closing prices on all the D1 candles that I looked at matched the closing prices on the corresponding H1 candles.
I haven’t taken any screen-shots, but if the problem reappears this week, I will do that.
Since you replied, and caught me checking my email, I read your reply and and checked my markets.
First, however, let me say that there is no problem with you joining this conversation.
Second, I first found out about you checking out the whole cftc board about brokers, and I must say I have respect for you, and the effort you put into helping people and setting up the list. You and the helpers of that board are great.
Back on topic, I just looked at my Aussie account and my US account (both demos of course) and check different markets. Guess what? The problem isn’t there for me either anymore. Its interesting. Whats more interesting is that you said you saw it on your live account? That is the true troublesome part.
I checked the FXCM MarketScope charts a while ago, and found the opening and closing prices on one pair (EUR/USD) now properly correspond across several time-frames. I didn’t check every time-frame in the platform, but I think that the ones which I did check are probably representative of the complete time-frame menu.
The following times are New York time (EST - Eastern Standard Time) which is GMT-5.
FXCM Daily charts open and close at 5pm, New York time (1700 EST, 2200 GMT).
The following prices are FXCM BID prices for EUR/USD on Tuesday, December 16, at the times shown.
Tick chart: 16:59 :59.7 (last tick of the trading day) — EUR/USD = 1.25093
m1 chart: 16:59 candle close = 17:00 candle open = 1.25093
H1 chart: 16:00 candle close = 17:00 candle open = 1.25093
D1 chart: 12/16 candle close = 12/17 candle open = 1.25093
So, at least at this point in time, the chart disagreement we’ve been talking about seems to be resolved. I’ll look at it again, later in the week.
You might want to check your FXCM MT4 charts to see if the problem has been resolved there, as well.
Your contributions are always welcome. Thanks for clarifying the issues you and BPG encountered. I’m glad to hear that the chart issue has since been resolved.
Hi BPG,
I’ve reported this issue to our techs, so they can keep an eye out. It doesn’t seem that any trades were affected by this (live or demo). However, it’s worth mentioning that if you ever have live trades that are negatively impacted by a tech issue on our end, FXCM will make the appropriate correction to your account.