Official Partner of the September Competition — Gaus Crypto

Opening a position, step by step

1. 1Pick an asset from the list above the chart (e.g. BTC, ETH, XAU).
2. 2Choose a direction: Long if you think the price will rise, Short if you think it will fall. A Short profits when the price drops.
3. 3Choose Market to open right now, or Pending to wait for a price you name.
4. 4Pick a leverage if you want one (1× to 10×). Leverage multiplies both profit and loss — 1× means no leverage.
5. 5Set the size. The four buttons — cash / lots / units / % of balance — are four ways of answering the same question: “how big should this position be?” (see below).
6. 6Check the boxes above the button: margin (how much gets locked), exposure (the real size) and liq. price (where the position is force-closed).
7. 7Press the button at the bottom of the ticket. At Market the position opens immediately; on a pending order it is placed and waits for your price.
8. 8To close: scroll to Positions and press close — the profit or loss lands in your balance then.

Cash, lots, units, % of balance — what's the difference

These four buttons are four ways of stating the position size. The result is the same; you are just typing in a different unit.

Risk

You name what the trade may cost you (say 1% of your account) and where the price proves you wrong. The size is worked out from those two — so being wrong always costs the same, whatever you trade.

Cash

You type how many units to put up as margin — e.g. 500. The system works out how much BTC or ETH that buys.

Lots

Lots — the size unit most brokers quote in. In this contest 1 lot = 1 unit of the asset, so 1 lot of BTC is 1 BTC. The chips are the usual 0.01 / 0.10 / 0.50 / 1.00 ladder.

Units

You type the amount of the asset itself — e.g. 0.05 BTC. The cash figure is then derived from it.

% Balance

You type a percentage of your free balance — e.g. 25. The 25% / 50% / 75% / 100% chips below do the same. Note: the percentage sets the margin, and leverage multiplies that into the real position size.

Market or pending: two ways in

At the top of the ticket, Market opens the position immediately at the price on screen. Pending parks an order at a price you choose and opens it only if the market gets there — so an entry can be planned without watching the chart. Where you put that price, above the market or below it, is what the order means:

• LongBuy the dip — fills if the market falls to your price.Limit
• LongBuy the breakout — fills if the market rises to your price.Stop
• ShortSell the rally — fills if the market rises to your price.Limit
• ShortSell the breakdown — fills if the market falls to your price.Stop

• A limit order fills at your price exactly, however far past it the market ran. A stop order fills at your price too, unless the market jumped clean through it — then it fills at the market, but never further past your price than the spread.
• A pending order holds no money while it waits. The margin is taken when it fills, and if your free cash no longer covers it by then, the order is cancelled rather than opening a position you cannot pay for.
• Pending orders sit in the Orders tab beside Positions, each showing how far the market still has to travel, and they draw their level on the chart. Cancel one there at any time; anything still waiting when the contest ends simply expires.

Managing a trade that's already open

Opening is the easy half. These four buttons on each position card are the other one.

• 25 / 50 / 75%Close part of the position and let the rest run. Banks some profit without ending the trade.
• Break-evenMoves your stop to your entry, so the trade can no longer lose money. Only available once you're in profit.
• Trailing stopA stop that follows the price up as the trade works and never moves back down. It locks in more the further you're right.
• ReverseCloses the position and opens the same size the other way — for when you decide you're on the wrong side.

The rest of the vocabulary

Free cash

The part of your balance not tied up in open positions — what you can open something new with.

Margin

The part of your balance locked against this particular position. It comes back when you close, with the profit or loss applied.

Exposure

The real size of the position in the market = margin × leverage. Profit and loss are calculated on this figure, not on the margin.

Leverage

A multiplier. At 10× leverage a 1% move in the price changes your margin by 10% — in both directions.

Liq. price

The price at which the position is force-closed and its margin is lost. The higher the leverage, the closer this sits to the current price.

Equity

What you are worth right now: cash plus the profit or loss on open positions. This is what the leaderboard ranks.

Unrealized P&L

Profit or loss on open positions that hasn't been booked yet. It moves with every price tick and is only settled when you close.

TP/SL

Automatic exits: take profit closes you in profit, stop loss closes you in loss. Set them from the positions list after opening.

Order price

The price a pending order waits for. Putting it above the market or below it is the choice that makes the order a limit or a stop.

Where a take profit may sit

A take profit has to sit in profit and a stop loss in loss, measured from the live price. A level the market has already passed is not an order — it would close the position instantly at a price that never traded — so the ticket refuses it and says why. Trailing a stop up into profit stays legal, because the test is against the market, not against your entry.

The take profit / stop loss preview

Typing a take profit or a stop loss shows what it is worth in money and in percent, plus a bar comparing the two sides. It runs the same fill maths as a real close, so the preview cannot promise something the exit will not pay.

Spread

Buys fill slightly above and sells slightly below the price you see on the chart (5 bps). That is why a freshly opened position starts marginally negative — normal, and the same on a real market.