Broker that displays the time frame around the US market close or otherwise?

Beginner Questions
1

I have 2 brokers one is TOS and one is oanda. I noticed that they display their candles very differently on the same fxpairs and on the same timeframe.

I asked around and was told it’s because TOS creates their candles around the US market close which is at 5pm EST. So the end of the day for TOS is at 5pm while for oanda the end of the day would be at midnight. I was told that the 5pm US market close is preferred over the midnight close. Is this correct?

PS i wasn’t aware of this at all. I always thought that since the fx markets are 24 hours the end of the day would be the 2359 hours and didn’t know that there were brokers that centered the end of the day according to the US market close.

One more thing i read that oanda also considers the day close at US market close but oddly enough my mt4 oanda closes candles at 12midnight.

1 Like
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I assume that TOS means ThinkOrSwim?

You will find quite a bit of variation, from one broker to the next, in the time that Daily candles open and close. But, most of that variation occurs between 5pm and midnight New York time (10pm-5am, London time).

The opening/closing time for Daily candles affects candles on all timeframes from 2-hour through Daily.

Candles on timeframes from 1-minute through 1-hour are not affected, regardless of when Daily candles open and close.

And candles on Weekly and Monthly timeframes are also not affected by the Daily opening/closing time.

Well, it’s preferred by many traders, including me. And this has nothing to do with the fact that I’m an American, or that I live on the U.S. east coast. It has to do with the natural, daily ebb and flow of worldwide forex trading volume. Generally, total world trading volume is at its lowest level of the 24-hour day between 5pm and 6pm New York time. This pattern repeats daily (with occasional exceptions).

At 5pm New York time, the [B]normal business day[/B] has ended, or is ending, in the 3 largest forex markets — central Europe (which is all one time zone), London (the world’s largest forex market), and New York (which accounts for the vast majority of forex trading throughout North America).

Furthermore, at 5pm New York time, the normal business day has not yet begun in the major forex markets of Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Only New Zealand and Australia are open in the hour between 5pm and 6pm New York time, and those two markets combined account for only 4% of total worldwide forex trading volume.

2359 hours [I]where?[/I] Would every broker around the world set their platform to open a new daily candle at midnight, local time? There are nominally 24 time zones around the world. So, except for the time zones in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, you would have about 16 different time zones where local forex brokers would be setting their platforms to open/close at midnight, local time. That situation would be even crazier than the situation we presently have.

Brokers lease the MT4 platform from the Russian developer, and it comes defaulted to whatever open/close time the developer has built into it. A few years ago, I saw an MT4 tutorial video (from Alpari-UK, I believe) in which they explained, in detail, why they opened and closed daily candles at 10pm Central European Time. At that time, it was possible for individual brokers to re-configure their MT4’s to open/close at a different time, but most brokers didn’t bother.

I’m not an MT4 user, so I don’t know whether things are different now.

Correction:

The Alpari video mentioned above explains that MT4 daily candles open and close at MIDNIGHT Central European Time, not 10pm as I stated above. Central European Time is the time zone in Paris, Frankfurt, Zurich, Stockholm, Berlin, etc.

Midnight Central European Time is 11pm London time, and 6pm New York time.

The Alpari MT4 video is still hosted on YouTube; so, I presume that means that the information it contains is still current.

Here’s a link — Tutorial 1 - MetaTrader 4 Tips and Tricks - YouTube.

Scroll to about 2:00min in the video, for the explanation I referred to.

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TOS is thinkorswim and 2359 hours EST that’s what my oanda platform shows. Actually i am surprised that oanda doesn’t follow US market close and a few ppl have told me to use the TOS charts and my teacher also uses US close candles.

I suppose i need to open a demo account on a broker that has US candles closes cos i sometimes look at charts on my cell phone and TOS isn’t too mobile platform friendly their mobile version sucks.

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Hi Clint,

You wrote, “The opening/closing time for Daily candles affects candles on all timeframes from 2-hour through Daily. . . . And candles on Weekly and Monthly timeframes are also not affected by the Daily opening/closing time.” How, exactly, are the 2-hour through Daily candles affected by brokers’ chart settings?

Of even greater import to me is this: Just as the New York daily candle closes at 5 PM EST, I would assume that all 2, 4, 6, 8 and 12 hour candles close at some standard time. If that is true, then when do they close? When do they, including the Daily, open - according to some standard time?

Thank you,
Norm

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I trade with Oanda & you can change what server you’re connected to in order to change the daily close. It bugged me for ages as mine closed at something like 4 or 5am GMT but after a bit of googling, I got it to NY close so 10pm GMT.

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Hello Norm,

I can’t speak for all brokers, but generally the following is true:

If your broker’s Daily candles open/close at 5 pm New York time, then 2-, 4-, 6-, 8-, and 12-hour candles will also open/close [I]beginning at 5 pm.[/I]

In this case, you would have 2-hour candles opening/closing at 5 pm, 7 pm, 9 pm, … etc.

You would have 4-hour candles opening/closing at 5 pm, 9 pm, 1 am, … etc.

Your 6-hour candles would open and close at 5 pm, 11 pm, 5 am, and 11 am.

Your 8-hour candles would open and close at 5 pm, 1 am, and 9 am.

And your 12-hour candles would open and close at 5 pm, and 5 am.

The [I]closing[/I] time of one candle (any time-frame) corresponds to the [I]opening[/I] time of the subsequent candle.

So, using the standard 5 pm New York opening/closing time for Daily candles —

At 5 pm (New York time) yesterday, Sunday August 28, [I]the Monday August 29 Daily candle opened.[/I]

At 5 pm (New York time) today, Monday August 29, [I]the Monday candle closed,[/I] and at that same moment, [I]the Tuesday candle opened.[/I] And so forth.

Because one candle closes and the next candle opens [I]at the same instant,[/I] it often happens that the closing [I]price[/I] of the previous candle and the opening [I]price[/I] of the subsequent candle are identical.

Hope that helps.

I’m still on vacation, until later this week. So, if there are additional questions, I will deal with them when I get back to the States.

Clint

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Thank you very much, Clint!

You wouldn’t believe how much research I did on this to get some clear answers!

Best wishes,
Norm

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Trade Bitcoin…much easier. Trading Forex is like fumbling around in the dark with blindfold on. I must’ve spent all day looking at the Tradingview screen, trying to figure out why I couldn’t see one- minute candles forming…or 5 mintues candles etc (like I do with Bitcoin). How are you supposed to enter stops et al when you don’t have live time information about price action, except for the info provided in the trading panel?? I got frustrated and gave up.

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[quote=“solaris40, post:8, topic:55690, full:true”]

Trading Forex is like fumbling around in the dark with blindfold on. I must’ve spent all day looking at the Tradingview screen, trying to figure out why I couldn’t see one- minute candles forming…or 5 mintues candles etc (like I do with Bitcoin). How are you supposed to enter stops et al when you don’t have live time information about price action, except for the info provided in the trading panel?? I got frustrated and gave up.[/quote]

The retail forex market is closed for the weekend. So, ALL forex charts, whether from TradingView or from brokers, show prices as of the Friday close.

Live prices will resume later today, when the retail market opens for week —
(beginning at about 8 am Monday, New Zealand time).

TradingView chart - market closed.png808×739 35.8 KB