Enter trade price when MA crosses

[andyduvall]

Hi,

Is it possible to enter a trade at the price when the 2 moving averages actually cross and not when the candle closes etc - because whats the point of choosing X> (crosses above) when you could end up entering a trade nowhere near where you intended.
If you can enter a trade at a specific RSI value for example why can't this happen with the MA's ?

Andrew

[fxDreema]

It's interesting what do you mean by actual cross.

MA indicator is a list of values. Single value per candle (well, it depends on what price the MA is calculated, but let's skip this for a moment). The nearest two points in MA are those from two nearest candles.
Crossover is when two lines crosses each other. In case of MA, when in candle X one of the lines is above the other and in candle Y - the opposite.

Now, when one of the candles is the current one (candle 0), then the MA value on this candle is not still, it is moving. If crossover happens on this candle, it will be temporary crossover because the candle is not yet finished. My point of view is that this is the "actual cross". But by "actual cross" you may understand the crossovers that you actually see on the chart after the backtest. In this case, you should work with already finished candles, starting from candle 1 (the previous one). Just put 1 on candle ID parameters.

There is no difference between MA and RSI in term of calculations. You probably do crossover of RSI with some level, for example 30. MA can also crossover fixed level, for example 1.3456, but MA has no limits and choosing fixed number is not practical. That's why MA is crossed with another MA, this is in the nature and in the basic idea of this indicator.

[andyduvall]

thanks for the detailed reply.
Yes you're right. For Cross to be confirmed it would have to be the previous candle otherwise like you said it would just be a temporary Cross.
I will try with candle ID 1.

Cheers !