A trading style where trading orders are initiated by the trader is called a manual trading style. Traders enter orders based on their fundamental or technical analysis. Trading fundamentally means trading on a long-term basis while trading technically can mean both long-term and short-term trading. Traders that tend to trade technically usually follow their trading system.
Following a trading system requires a lot of patience and concentration whether a trader is trading on a long-term or a short-term basis. Well, we are humans and you know that it is hard to maintain a higher level of concentration over a longer period. In many cases, these concentration fluctuations can affect trading performance. A trader can miss an entry opportunity or wrongly interpret his trading signals. Another problem, especially for short-term traders is that they can monitor one or a few trading instruments at the same time. To avoid all these problems they are using alerting utility tools.
One of the possible solutions is a Scanner EA for a trading system (also called Dashboard EA), it is an alerting utility tool that is sending alerts when the trading signal appears. It can monitor as many trading instruments as you want and monitor them in different time-frames. Trading instruments that will be watched are selected as a robot entry parameter. Depending on the design these kinds of experts can have automated trading functionality but more common is that they require a confirmation from the trader to enter the trade. When the entry signal for a certain instrument appears the expert is sending an alert. Alert can be sent as a MetaTrader pop up message, as mobile phone push notification, and as an email message.
Why do I need a Scanner EA?
You might ask yourself why should I use the expert only as an alerting mechanism since the automation is possible for the system. Well, manual traders prefer to make the final decision because they take into account additional factors that are not or that can not be automated. Maybe the direction of the trade does not match their fundamental analysis, candle or chart pattern does not match the direction or economic news announcement will occur in the nearby future. Also, maybe they have already opened the position with a similar trading instrument so they want their portfolio to be more diversified. These are some of those additional factors.
For receiving the notifications via mobile phone and email you have to enable the feature in your MetaTrader settings. To enable an email notification mechanism, go to Tools → Options → Email, check Enable box and input SMTP server, SMTP login, SMTP password, From and To fields. When you have entered the data you may check if everything is set correctly by pressing the Test button. To enable push notifications, go to go to Tools → Options → Notifications, check Enable, and input your MetaQuotes ID. By pressing the Test button you will see if everything is set correctly. Of course, all notifications have to be enabled in the expert advisor. Though the expert will not enter the trades a trading mode also has to be enabled.
Commercial trading systems are usually offering this utility tool as a part of the system. However, if your system does not have it I strongly recommend developing it because it would significantly boost your trading performance. To develop it, an experienced developer would require just a few hours. The development is possible even if you do not have source files of the indicators that are used in the system. If you do not have programming skills you can rent the developer on freelance site upwork.com or at MetaTrader’s mql5.com. The cost would depend on the complexity of the system and on the features that you would like to add and it should be between $50 and $200.
Final Thoughts
Scanner EA for a trading system is a must-have utility alerting mechanism that helps by alerting you about possible entries in your trading system. It will prevent you from missing trading opportunities and a wrong interpretation of trading signals. You will be able to monitor more trading instruments at the same time. It is a common part of commercial trading systems. However, it can be developed additionally even if you do not have source files of all the indicators.
