[Info] [Info] Spotting martingale and grid EAs in 5 minutes

A lot of commercial EAs are martingale or grid systems. Even when the sales page doesn't say so, the trade history gives it away in five minutes.

What martingale and grid are

• Martingale: after a loss, the next trade is bigger (usually 1.5–2×) so one win covers all previous losses
• Grid: keeps adding positions in the same direction every time price moves a set distance
• Both show very high win rates and smooth curves — until one big trend wipes out the account at once.

Signs in the trade history

1. Several positions in the same direction open at once — 5 or 7 buys stacked like stairs means grid.
2. Lot sizes keep growing — 0.01 → 0.02 → 0.04 → 0.08 is martingale.
3. Many positions closed at the same moment — a "basket close" once the average price recovers.
4. Empty stop loss (S/L) — relying on "it'll come back eventually."
5. Balance and equity curves drift far apart — periods of holding losing positions.

Signs in the numbers

• 85–95% win rate, but the average loss is far larger than the average win
• Max drawdown is usually tiny, then suddenly one huge spike
• 10+ positions open at the same time at peak

So avoid them all?

• A grid isn't a scam by itself. But it needs a defined maximum number of levels and a hard stop.
• With limits like "max 5 levels + basket stop at −15%," you can calculate the risk. Without limits, you can't.
• Only use money you can afford to lose, and if copying, always set a copy loss limit.

On EADesk, members who actually ran a strategy tag it with Martingale, Grid, Averages down or No stop-loss stickers, and live-linked strategies record the share of entries without a stop and the number of open positions automatically. Look at these signals before the numbers.