An Metatrader Expert Advisor is a preconfigured Forex trading strategy which is created to run on the Metatrader platform. As is suggested by the name, an Expert Advisor aims to assist in the traders Forex trading decisions. This is acheived by the advisor signalling trading opppornities on the traders account in line with the strategy of the advisor.
Metatrader has a large amount of Expert Advisors from which to choose. Simple EA’s will simply offer potential trades as signals while more complicated ones wil actually trade on your account on your behalf. Advanced EAs can be left to trade independantly on your account and will take care of trading parameters of the strategy. This automated approach to Forex trading is what we are generally referring to when we talk about Expert Advisors (EAs). Because of this we often refer to Expert Advsiors as Forex robots Automatic Forex Trading software.
Metatrader Expert Advisors are developed using its own unique MQL4 programming language. This is a built in script langauge that all users of the platform can access if they wish. The Metatrader MQL 4 coding language allows custom scripts, indicators and of course expert advisors to be programmed easily. This means that Expert Advisors can be configured to reference the many feeds and trading indicators that Metatrader provides. Once finished the Expert Advisor can then be distributed as a file to traders who wish to use it.
One of the main benefits to using Expert Advisors is that they allow you to easily follow a predfined trading strategy on your account. This helps negate the emotional approach that many traders bring to their Forex trading. With an EA decisions are based upon a range of statistical parameters and algorithms. These can be processed in a matter of seconds allowing the robot to make split second calculations when trading the markets. When you start looking at Expert Advisors you will find a large range to choose from. Each will follow a unique trading strategy. In common with all these strategies is the objective of making high profits from the Forex markets.
Not all Expert Advisors will perform equally however. The peformance of some will far exceed that of others which will simply just lose you money. Therefore you need to evaluate the likely performance you expect from any strategy prior putting it live on your Forex trading account.
