The Workshop · The Trade Desk · one trade at a time · 6 of 11
Freeze a read on the day you saw it. The desk grades it from its day; the tracker grades it from yours.
Suppose you had not seen SHOP on the evening it was posted but three sessions later. The desk's mark since posted is one number; yours is another, and the tracker never confuses them. Pick the day you would have pressed + Track and see the row you would have had.
The moment you track, the read is written down: the Alpha, the state words, the exit, the day on the clock. From then on the row is graded against that frozen read, close to close, from the close of your day. It does not move intraday on the settled number, which is why a trade tracked this morning shows nothing until tonight's close; during the session the row shows a "now" mark beside it, so you can see where it stands, and the settled number is the one that counts.
Key insight. Two people who track the same line on different days hold two different trades. The tracker keeps them separate on purpose: your record is yours, and the desk's record is the desk's. That is the only way a track record means anything.
Every tracked line watches its own exit. When the Alpha line is crossed or the day cap arrives, the bell rings and, if you want it, an email arrives the same evening; "close to an exit" warns you two sessions out. Nothing is placed or closed anywhere; the tracker is a list of what the rules said, with your decisions beside it.
+ Track on any row of Today's list, or Track outlook on a name's ticket for your own read. The tracker sits under the list with the two books, yours and the house's. The manual's chapter: The tracker.
Keep this: track on the day you see it; the row is graded from that close, by the exit it was posted with, and nobody re-grades it afterwards.
Analytical tools and historical measurements for educational and informational purposes only; not investment advice or a recommendation. Replayed figures are hypothetical: today's rules applied to past prices, after modelled costs, and no account was traded on them. Hypothetical results have inherent limitations and do not represent actual trading. Past performance, including backtested results, does not guarantee future outcomes. Trading stocks involves substantial risk of loss.
The Workshop is education, not advice. Replayed numbers are averages over many trades, after average trading costs (2 bps a side on a stock, 1 on a fund, included for fairness; yours vary by broker and liquidity) unless stated, and are not forecasts; the live record is on the engine page. Analytical tools and historical measurements for educational and informational purposes only; not investment advice or a recommendation. Replayed figures are hypothetical: today's rules applied to past prices, after modelled costs, and no account was traded on them. Hypothetical results have inherent limitations and do not represent actual trading. Past performance, including backtested results, does not guarantee future outcomes. Trading stocks involves substantial risk of loss. About · Support · Terms · Privacy · Refunds Open the deskManualThe EngineChangelog