MetaTrader and cTrader

Every plan; Free imports one file a day. No AI answer: the four statements are known by their columns.

A forex account’s statement goes into a manual account like any other file: Import a file on Connections or Accounts, or the account’s page → Import trades → the file. TakeJournal recognises the four platforms’ statements, shows the trades they would make and writes nothing until you confirm. Every symbol of the statement is proposed as a forex pair, a metal or a CFD (forex and CFDs): the preview names it as the journal will (EURUSD.m as EURUSD, GOLD as XAUUSD, US30.cash as US30), says what a lot is and in which currency the price moves, and you can say “not forex” for a symbol that is something else.

What to export

• MetaTrader 4: Terminal › Account History › right-click › Save as Detailed Report (an HTML file). Its closed transactions become the trades, the open trades come in as open positions, the balance rows (deposits, withdrawals, credits) go into the account’s ledger; pending orders are left out.
• MetaTrader 5: Toolbox › History › right-click › Report › Open XML or HTML. The report’s Deals are the fills, each with its commission and swap; the balance deals go into the ledger; the Positions and Orders sections are not needed.
• cTrader: the History tab › Statement (HTML or Excel), or the History tab’s export as CSV. A row is a closed position with its opening and closing time, prices, commissions, swap and net profit. Show the Gross column before exporting if you can: it tells a CFD’s contract size exactly; the net one includes the costs. Quantities are read as lots, so set the History tab to show lots.
• Match-Trader: Portfolio › Closed positions › Export, file type CSV, with a date range that covers your trades. A row is a closed part of a position (a partial close is a row of its own) with its opening and closing time and price, the volume in lots, swap, commission and net profit; the file is read in whatever language the platform shows. A position opened against another on the same symbol (a hedge) joins it in one trade, its money the same. Open positions come in once closed; the Finance export (deposits and withdrawals) goes through the mapped import.

Any other forex platform’s export (DXtrade, TradeLocker and the rest) is mapped like any broker’s export: tick a forex platform’s statement in the mapping and name the swap column, and the symbols are proposed as forex just the same. DXtrade and TradeLocker are coming as known formats.

Lots, the contract size and the quote

A statement’s sizes are lots. What a lot is comes from the symbol (100,000 of a pair’s base, 100 ounces of gold, 5,000 of silver, 1 of an index) and, where the statement gives each trade’s profit, from the profits: TakeJournal reads the size they imply and uses it when it differs from the usual one, which is how an index CFD at 10 or 100 a point comes in right. The preview shows the size next to each symbol, “from the profits” when the statement confirmed it; the trade’s page shows it under Contract, where it can be changed, every trade of the symbol counting anew.

The quote currency is the pair’s second code, dollars on metals and the US indices, euros on the European ones; a trade in another currency than the account’s is converted at the European Central Bank’s rate of its close.

Swap and commission

The statement’s Swap column is a cost of its own, booked on the fill that closes the trade: the trade’s page shows it apart from the fees, the Fills tab has a column for it, the exports carry it. The commission (and MetaTrader 4’s taxes) is the fee.

Time zone

MetaTrader statements are in the broker’s server time without a zone. TakeJournal reads them in the time zone of your profile; if the broker’s server runs on another (many run on Eastern European time, UTC+2 or UTC+3), set it in the mapping (Time zone → a fixed zone, Europe/Athens for EET) before you import, and the mapping is kept for the next statement. cTrader’s statement names its offset in the time columns (“Opening time (UTC+2)”) and is read in it.

Match-Trader’s export is in UTC and is read in it.

The trading day

A forex trade counts on the day that ends at 17:00 New York time, as the brokers’ daily candle does, or on the calendar day of your zone when the profile says so (forex and CFDs).

Importing again, undoing

The same statement imported again adds nothing: a trade is known by its ticket, a deal by its number, a cTrader position by its id. An import is undone as a whole under Imports on the account’s page; the contracts the import declared stay, as a declared stock does.

A Match-Trader row is known by its times, volume and prices, as the parts of a position share its id, so an export of a longer range adds only what is new.