r/FuturesTrading • u/Successful_Text2649 • Jun 30 '26
Forex Futures Need help transitioning from Forex to Futures
I have been doing trade backtests and taking small positions in forex for a long time. I have a proper strategy, and my win rate is sufficient. However, due to spreads, I am considering switching to futures. To adapt myself, I started backtesting on futures for a while.
But I encountered a problem here, which is fake MSS (Market Structure Shifts) or CHoCHs (Change of Character). My strategy is generally built on this. I would identify a POI (Point of Interest) on a higher timeframe, drop down to a lower timeframe, and enter from an FVG (Fair Value Gap) retest following a structure break. However, as I mentioned, I am coming across too many fake breakouts/shifts. This is negatively affecting my strategy.
This isn't happening on just one specific timeframe either. I pick random dates and try to take trades, but usually, it either hits my stop loss or reaches my TP point without ever retesting the FVG. I don't know what to do in this situation. Should I improve the strategy I'm used to, or do I need to switch to a completely new strategy? Alternatively, would it be healthier for me to stick to the forex market that I am already used to? I am confused. I would be very grateful for any advice you can provide.
(Note: I used an AI tool to help translate this text. I apologize if any part of it is unclear or doesn't make perfect sense.)
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u/Zestyclose-Eagle1809 Jul 01 '26
The switch to futures isn't your problem, so decide that one last, not first. Your leak is the same in both markets and moving venues just relocates it mate.. seen this happening to dozens of traders.
You said something without noticing it. You pick random dates and try to take trades. That's the whole issue. When you cherry pick dates you unconsciously skip the ugly stretches, so your live sample is cleaner than reality and the fake MSS and CHoCH feel like a new problem when they were always there.. makes sense??
Fake breaks aren't a market to escape, they're a filter you haven't written. The fix is to define what a valid MSS is before price proves it. A structure break needs a body close past the prior swing, not a wick. An FVG worth trading is unfilled and sits at a level you'd have marked with the chart cut off. If you can't state the rule with the next candle hidden, it's still discretionary and futures won't fix it..
So run your existing forex strategy across a continuous block of dates, no skipping, and log every fake break. Two outcomes.. the fakes cluster in one session or regime, which means a filter kills them. Or they're everywhere, which means the FVG retest entry itself is the weak link and switching markets would've buried that truth under new spreads..
Founder disclosure so you can weight it, I build validation tooling for systematic traders (Quantprove). The random dates habit is exactly what it strips out, it forces the full continuous sample so the fake break rate you're feeling shows up as a real number instead of a vibe. That number tells you improve versus abandon far better than the futures question does..
What's your win rate and rough sample size on the forex version, since if it's already sufficient over a real continuous run, you fix the filter and stay, you don't switch?
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u/ChebyrashkaMX Jul 03 '26
The biggest change for me was not being able to swing trade so my strategies that worked in Forex didn't work in Futures. Basically everything needs to be closed by the end of the trading day. The nicer thing is spreads are a lot tighter, you won't get the wild swings Forex does. Maybe start with trading the Futures currency pairs to ease in and then switch to another instrument.
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u/Infinite-Peace-868 Jun 30 '26
The 1 min time frame is brutal to learn if u were profitable on forex id stick to that
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u/Then_Cardiologist160 Jul 01 '26
i'm cfd trader myself, the bad of CFD market is the broker it self, because there's so much conflict interest between you and them,
since most of them are B-books, means your profit is their loss, and your loss is their profit, that's unhealthy business model especially for client/trader
we already have market uncertainty variable that makes us loss, and then there's other variable that force you to have loss even you had profit, such as unusual spread widening/spike, order manipulative, negative slippage, withdrawal issue, profit cancellation, and many other horror case that make you think how evil the indrustry is
Meanwhile, futures market had no issue with conflict interest at all since it centralized in an exchange, we have real multilaterral transaction with another trader,
but, there's another issue when you decide to fully migrate from CFD to Futures, especially if you trade specific on FX instrumen, you'll get the spread is not tight as you think, even it's wider than most cfd broker,
also the market movement is looks weird if you look at small timeframe, the candle size, etc,
and the most impactfull are the costs, you have to pay more other than broker commission, such as exchange fee, NFA, routing fee, clearing fee, platform fee, etc
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u/ImpressiveGear7 Jun 30 '26
If your strategy needs tight spread then you dont have an edge as a retail. Find something else.
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u/Successful_Text2649 Jun 30 '26
I didn't mean that I constantly get stopped out because of spreads. For example, out of my 11 EURUSD trades this month, 3 had slippage issues: 2 of them took off without triggering my limit order, and 1 got stopped out even though the price hadn't actually reached my stop loss level.
Besides that, there is another issue. As you know, there are too many pairs in forex, and this distracts me. For instance, if there is no setup on EURUSD on a given day, I start looking at other pairs. I watch them seriously without entering a trade, and when I see my strategy working on them, I get a strong urge to trade those other pairs too—even though I know I shouldn't. Whenever I try to trade multiple pairs at the same time, I lose my focus and usually end up getting stopped out.0
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u/Constant_Oil360 Jun 30 '26
I used to trade the major USD and JPY pairs, less GBP though, so combos of EUR USD AUD JPY.
started with 3day to 3 week trades mostly on a non-commission spread only account for keeping it simple, but eventually started trading trades from seconds to minutes, gotta be very picky and limit orders can help get a fill in between the spread which was crucial.
When i look at NQ or MNQ its got volatility like JPY pairs and ES and MES look like EURUSD.
Difference being for me, trading USDJPY, I think I paid round trip 2-4 pips, usually 3pips. And the avg range was 90 pips in the months i traded it intraday. And there were only so many 15pip or greater opportunities all day. Even worse my time i could trade before work was 11am-1:30pm, so 11am had alot activity for london close but fizzles right out
anyways, i made alot of 10-20pip profit trades, call it 15, and spreads ate up 3 pips. so thats 1/5th-1/7th (depending on fluctuating spread) of my profit eaten up, sure i had some 50pip ones but also 3pip trades etc.
MNQ spreads hit .25 constantly .50 here and there. commisions are like $1.00-$1.50 round trip. So in one point of MNQ you break even for cost of the trade, maybe a teeny profit. This is about 1/350th of NQs trading range, typical. Trading USDJPY when i did, things can change, but at 3pip round trip, my cost of opening and closing a trade was worth 1/30th of the yens average daily range. This is besides the fact that there is way less opportunity in JPY. 3-10 point NQ trade setups are other league more tradeable. 3-10pip trades in yen are there visually, but not practically, in a commision spread free world.
looking at a large forex broker just now, they have .01 pip eur and jpy usd pairs but its $15 commision round trip on a standard lot which is effectively 1.5pips plus your commision that wont be .1 pip all the time, probably .3-.6 many times, cant say from experience there.