Our charting software is in the process of moving from ProRealTime to TradingView.

We have also changed our broker.

Such a move sounds simple. But like moving house, it is more time consuming than first imagined.

In the world of currency pairings (or FX markets) there is no central governing body. Instead, each financial institution provides its price feed to the trader. Whether institutional or private.

Bewildering, but in practice, it works.

What is essential to a trader is that the currency pairing price they observe on a chart is identical to that of the broker.

In the FX market prices are quoted to the fourth decimal point, so the decimal points (1/100th of 1%) must match up on the chart and with the broker.

Right, with that out of the way, why have I moved charts?

Previously browser-based charts were a bit clunky. Slow internet feeds and software that was not up to the job. The way around this was to use software downloaded to the computer.

As you can imagine, things have moved on recently in this area. Of all the charts considered we found TradingView to be the best for our needs.

I won’t list all the advantages that we found only to mention what to us is most significant, and that is the backtesting facility that comes with TradingView.

We would have moved for this alone. To us, backtesting provides an edge. “Repetition is the mother of wisdom” David H. Weis

But as an experienced retail trader, why take so long to move software and broker? It took me by surprise too. Researching, transferring, and practising was more involved than I thought. I guess Lewis Hamilton wouldn’t change cars halfway through the season if he could help it.

The change for us is so profound that it also got me to rewrite my personal trading plan, which is in progress on this site.

We will keep you posted over the next few weeks as our full trading comes online again.