Key takeaways
- A grid opens several positions at set price intervals and takes profit as price swings. It works well in pullbacks and badly in long one-way moves.
- Many grids hide their risk by adding larger positions as price moves against them, with no hard stop. They can win for months and then lose most of an account.
- IRONVAULT trades with the trend, uses the same lot on every level and shares one basket stop, so the worst case is known before the first order.
- Size the maximum basket risk as a small part of the account. Without an account exposure ceiling, a basket may risk at most 10% of the balance.
- Grids still lose. A run of baskets that fill every level and hit the stop is part of normal behaviour.
Contents
What a grid is
A grid strategy places several orders at regular price intervals, like the lines on a sheet of graph paper. When price moves to a level, a position opens there, and each position has its own small profit target. If price swings back and forth, the grid keeps opening and closing positions and collecting small profits from the movement.
Gold is a popular market for grids because it moves a lot within the day and often pulls back after strong moves. A grid tries to turn those pullbacks into a series of small gains without needing to predict the exact turning point.
Why many grids are dangerous
The weakness of a grid is a long move in one direction. If price keeps going against the grid, more and more positions open, all of them losing. Many grid robots sold online make this worse in two ways: they increase the size of each new position to bring the average price closer, and they have no hard stop for the whole basket.
Such a grid can show a smooth equity curve for months, because most baskets eventually come back. When a strong trend finally arrives, the basket keeps growing until the account cannot carry it and the broker closes it at a huge loss. A grid that "never loses" usually has not lost yet.
Spreads, overnight financing and broker limits add to the risk. Spreads on gold can widen sharply around news and the daily break, and many open positions held for days pay financing on each one.
How IRONVAULT works
IRONVAULT is the DONKOFX grid automation. It trades gold by default and also supports silver, major forex pairs, Bitcoin and Ethereum, on MT5 and cTrader accounts. It was designed around one rule: the worst case of every basket must be known and sized before the first order is placed.
- A trend filter picks the side. On the chosen timeframe, hourly by default, a fast and a slow moving average must point the same way and be far enough apart to rule out a flat market.
- A higher timeframe must agree. By default the four-hour trend must confirm, and the last close must be on the trend side of the slow average.
- The first level opens with the trend. Further levels of exactly the same lot open as price pulls back against it, up to the chosen number of levels.
- Each level has its own take-profit at the broker.
- Every level shares one hard basket stop placed beyond the last level.
- The lot is calculated so that the worst case, every level filled and the basket stop hit, equals your maximum basket risk.
Why same-size levels matter
Because IRONVAULT never multiplies the lot, the loss of a full basket grows in a straight line with each level instead of exploding. That is what makes it possible to calculate the worst case exactly and to place a stop that the basket will actually honour.
The trade-off is that a deep pullback recovers more slowly than a grid that doubles up. IRONVAULT accepts that. It would rather take a defined loss on a basket that went wrong than hold an ever-growing basket in the hope that price returns.
A worked example on gold
Take a $1,000 account with a maximum basket risk of $10, which is 1% of the account. Using fixed spacing in pips, where 1 gold pip is 0.10, the bot uses 2 levels 30 pips apart and a basket stop 30 pips beyond the last level. In a buy basket, level 1 opens at the market, level 2 opens 30 pips lower, and the shared stop sits 60 pips below level 1.
If both levels fill and the stop is hit, level 1 loses 60 pips and level 2 loses 30 pips: 90 pips in total for the chosen lot. On a typical gold contract of 100 ounces, one pip is worth about $10 per standard lot, so 90 pips cost about $900 per lot. To keep the worst case at $10, the lot is about 0.011, which is rounded down to the broker's step of 0.01. The real worst case is then about $9.
Contract sizes differ between brokers, so IRONVAULT reads your broker's own specification. If even the minimum lot on every level would risk more than your basket risk, the basket is refused with a message rather than quietly sized up.
Spacing that follows the market
By default, IRONVAULT spaces its levels using the average true range, or ATR: a measure of how far price normally moves per candle. When gold is moving a lot, the levels spread out; when it is calm, they come closer. The default profiles use ATR spacing because those settings held up on later months of gold prices they were not tuned on.
You can switch to fixed spacing in pips if you prefer levels that never change. Whichever you choose, the maximum basket risk stays the same, because the lot is recalculated from the actual distances.
Settings that shape a basket
- Maximum basket risk: the most one basket can lose. Start around 1% of the account.
- Grid levels: how many positions a basket can hold, from 1 to 10. More levels means smaller lots for the same risk.
- Grid step, take profit per level and stop buffer, in ATR multiples or pips.
- Optional basket take-profit: close the whole basket at a combined profit instead of level by level.
- Direction: auto follows the trend; buy or sell forces one side.
- Max baskets per day and a session filter for the Asian, London and New York sessions.
How the account limits apply
A grid basket is open risk like any other trade, so it counts towards your account exposure ceiling in Settings, Risk. If you have set the ceiling, the maximum basket risk must fit inside it, together with any other automations on the same account. If the ceiling is unset, one basket may still risk at most 10% of the balance; DONKOFX refuses a larger setting and suggests 1% as a sensible start.
What a losing period looks like
Most IRONVAULT baskets close one level at a time at their targets. Some baskets fill every level and reach the basket stop, and they cost the full basket risk. Several of those in a row can happen when gold reverses its trend or chops sideways after a strong move. That is normal grid behaviour, and it is why the basket risk should be small enough that five or six full losses in a row would be uncomfortable but not damaging.
Because the broker holds the record of each basket, IRONVAULT finds its own legs again after a restart and resumes the same basket instead of opening a new one.
Questions to ask about any grid
- Does the lot size grow with each new level? If so, the worst case grows much faster than it looks.
- Is there a hard stop for the whole basket, placed at the broker, or only a hope that price returns?
- Can you see the worst case in cash before the first order?
- Does it trade with a trend filter, or open levels in both directions regardless of trend?
- What happens to an open basket if the software restarts?
Running IRONVAULT sensibly
- Use a demo MT5 or cTrader account first and watch several baskets complete, including at least one that hits the basket stop.
- Keep the maximum basket risk around 1% of the account to begin with.
- Set an account exposure ceiling if other automations share the account.
- Check the economic calendar; consider pausing around major US releases.
- Judge results over months of baskets, not a single week.
Education, not financial advice or a profit promise. Trading carries a risk of loss. Practise on demo, understand the full risk and keep control of every automation you start.
Questions
Is grid trading profitable?
Some grids have been profitable over some periods, and many have lost heavily in strong trends. No grid can guarantee profit. The most important feature is a hard limit on what one basket can lose.
What is the difference between a grid and Martingale?
A Martingale grid increases the size of each new position. IRONVAULT uses the same size on every level and one basket stop, so its worst case grows in a straight line and is known in advance.
Can IRONVAULT trade on Deriv?
No. IRONVAULT runs on MT5 and cTrader accounts only. The broker directory shows which brokers connect each way.
How much should I risk per grid basket?
Many users start around 1% of the account per basket. Without an account exposure ceiling, DONKOFX allows at most 10% per basket.
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