A run executes here, against data the platform already holds — nothing you submit leaves. Forward testing is the step after: it fixes a strategy to a date, so it can be scored on bars that did not exist when you committed to it.
The gap it closes
Every check on the scorecard evaluates the single run it was handed. None of them can see a parameter search you ran beforehand — and because market data is public, that search can happen entirely off this platform. The platform measured it: a search over roughly 3,000 parameter combinations against pure noise, submitting only the best-looking one, clears all eight checks.
Scoring a strategy on data that arrived after you committed is the one defense that search cannot reach, because there is nothing to optimize in advance.
Registering
On a strategy’s Forward tab, registering fixes the current spec — by hash — to the moment you press the button. From then on, only trades signalled after that momentcount toward the strategy’s forward record. Accrual runs as a scheduled sweep on the server, so the numbers update on their own, not when you open the page.
Registering is part of Pro, sub-minute bars included. On Free, the Forward tab says so in place of the button. Registrations made on Pro aren’t touched by a move to Free: they stay on record, keep accruing, and can still be withdrawn.
How a forward record is read
Each symbol gets its own verdict, scored on its forward trades after all costs. How many trades a verdict needs comes from the strategy’s own backtest: the smaller the per-trade edge it claimed, the more forward trades it takes to tell that edge from luck. The Forward tab shows that number, and roughly how long it takes at the backtest’s own trade rate, before you register. For a strategy that trades a few times a week it can be years.
- Still accruing until the forward trades reach that number. A handful of spectacular trades stays here: rewarding a lucky small sample is the failure this mechanism exists to prevent.
- Contradicted once they do, if the forward trades show no edge above zero, or fall significantly below what the backtest claimed.
- Held up so far otherwise. It means the forward record has not contradicted the backtest yet. It is never a confirmation, and it is not shown as one.
- Not accruingwhen the strategy signals far less often than its backtest did: something about the market or the data changed, and while it lasts, waiting won't bring a verdict closer.
With several forward tests live at once, the tab also says how many of them would look this good by chance alone.
Withdrawal is final
- Withdrawing stops accrual. The registration stays on record with whatever it had — a record you could delete would let you keep only the runs that went well.
- A withdrawn spec cannot be registered again. Resuming it would let a strategy skip the window it was withdrawn during, which is the cherry-picking this mechanism exists to prevent.
- To commit the idea again, refine it. A changed spec is a different hypothesis: new hash, new clock, starting from when you commit it.