Gold EA

Why gold is not just another pair

A currency pair is the price of one currency in another. Gold is a metal quoted against the dollar, and brokers sell it as a contract for difference or a similar product. An EA that works the same way on both is the exception. Four things differ, and each one can break a bot that was built without them in mind.

• Price level and size of moves. A pair is quoted near 1.1000 and moves in tiny steps. Gold is quoted in the thousands of dollars and can move several dollars in minutes. A stop of 20 "pips" means a different distance on gold, and the word pip itself is defined differently from broker to broker. Think in dollars of price movement.
• Contract size. What one lot means is set by the broker. Many use 100 ounces a lot for gold, but some do not. The lot size and the tick value decide what a $1 move is worth. The pip value calculator does the same sum for currency pairs.
• Spread. The spread on gold is quoted in dollars and cents, and it is wide compared with the size of one price step. It also changes more over the day. See the spread page.
• Swap. Holding a position overnight earns or pays a fee set by the broker. On gold it can be a real cost for a bot that holds for days, and many brokers charge it three times on one night of the week. The amount varies and changes.

Lot size and pip value on gold

A bot's risk is the stop distance times the lot times the value of one unit of price. For gold the unit is a dollar of price per ounce. With a 100 ounce lot, one lot makes $100 for each $1 the price moves. So the lot that risks a chosen amount is:

The made-up example below uses a $5,000 account and a risk of 1 percent, which is $50.00. Notice the two numbers a bot cannot guess: the stop distance, which its own rules set, and the ounces per lot, which the broker sets.

Worked example: one risk, four stop distances

This is a made-up account and a made-up contract, not any broker's. The same $50.00 of risk gives a very different lot as the stop gets wider. The smallest lot step is 0.01, so the lot is rounded down, and the real risk is a little under the target.

With a $2 stop the lot is 0.25. With a $20 stop the exact lot is 0.025, which rounds down to 0.02, and the real risk is $40.00. For comparison, a currency pair with a 20 pip stop and $10 a pip per lot would need 0.25 lot for the same $50.00. Calculated by us on 29 Oct 2026, exact. Copying "0.25 lot" from a currency EA onto gold with a $20 stop would risk $500.00 in this example, ten times the target. The lot size calculator does this sum for your own numbers.

Spread and swap on the same trade

Costs are paid in the same dollars. With a 0.10 lot, a spread of $0.30 costs $3.00 the moment the trade opens, and a spread of $1.00 costs $10.00. A bot that takes many small trades pays this each time. If the made-up swap is $6.00 a lot a night against you, a 0.10 lot held for 5 nights costs $3.00. These are made-up amounts. Your broker's figures differ and change.

How gold breaks a bot

• Stops sized for a pair. A stop that is wide enough on a currency pair can be hit by normal noise on gold. A bot that moves it tighter to keep the same lot just trades more losers.
• Spread filters left off. A bot with no rule against wide spreads will enter at rollover or in a news spike, when the cost is highest. A filter on the spread in dollars is one of the guard rules in the forex EA parts list.
• Ladders and martingale. Gold can trend for long runs. A bot that adds to a loser, or doubles its lot, finds out how large the margin used becomes. The martingale page shows the growth, and margin call shows what follows.
• Gaps and slippage. At the open after a weekend or a news release, the price can jump over a stop. The fill is then worse than the stop price. See slippage.
• Tests with a fixed spread. A test that charges a flat low spread all day understates the cost. The same test with the real, changing spread can give a different answer. See backtesting.

What to check before running one

• The broker's contract size, tick value, minimum lot and lot step for gold.
• The typical and the widest spread, and the swap per lot per night for each direction.
• What the EA's stop and lot settings mean in dollars on this instrument.
• That it has been tried on a demo account first. The demo account page explains why a demo still differs from live.

What this page does not tell you

It does not say gold is easy or hard for a bot, or that any gold EA makes money. Every number is made up to show the arithmetic. Contract size, spread and swap vary by broker and change over time.