Judging by the working timeframe, a Ray Scalper expert advisor can be attributed to the usual scalpers, because deals are made on the m15. The main difference from the rivals is that higher timeframes ranging from W1 are taken into account during the analysis of the market.

Actually, the work of the EA starts with analyzing the levels of high/low and closing price of the last week – these levels may become resistance/support for prices in the future. After this, the analysis is performed on a smaller timeframe – h1. Here the work is done by a similar algorithm – extreme price values are detected (not 1, but a few candles are considered).

As a result, even before the transition to the m15, the expert advisor already has several potential support/resistance levels, it remains only to determine the entry point. A set of indicators is used for that purpose: BollingerBands, Stochastic and Envelopes. The algorithm of the MTS also involves ATR, but it isn’t directly involved in trading, only the values of SL and TP are calculated on the basis of his readings.

The author also says that after the close of each candle on m15, the EA builds a diagonal finitary spread of the rays to determine the direction in which the transaction is more promising. The readings of indicators are also taken into account here.

Ray Scalper expert advisor: getting started

In terms of setting, the EA does not stand out compared to others, with the following available settings:

• FixedLotSize – you can set the working lot. The EA may calculate it on its own, depending on the situation; to set MM automatically, parameter in this field should be equal to "0";
• MaxAllocationPerTrade – only works when FixedLotSize is disabled, in percentage; shows the percentage of available funds that the EA can risk;
• FinalTarget/StopLoss _x_H1_ATR – respectively the multiplier that is used in the calculation of SL and TP by ATR. You can enter decimal values;
• Trail_StopLoss_x_H1_ATR – the multiplier used to calculate the trailing stop. If this parameter is greater than the multiplier for TP, the trailing stop will not work;
• Trail_Trigger_x_H1_ATR – it is recommended that the multiplier of the start of the trailing stop be equal to the previous parameter;
• Friday_Trade – the EA can be programmed to cancel trading on Friday;
• MagicNumber – allows the EA to not confuse the orders opened by the advisor with the orders opened manually or by other trading robots.

In general, the EA does not feature a variety of settings, but it has all you need for work. The only thing that can be attributed to the shortcomings is lack of settings of indicators themselves and it is therefore actually impossible to optimize them.

How the Ray Scalper expert advisor works

In order not to overload the chart with indicators and additional constructions, the trading robot does not display indicators and support/resistance levels. But you should know the algorithm of its work.

As a result of analysis on W1 and h1, the expert advisor receives a set of support/resistance levels, then the bot analyzes the trend on h1 (the author is silent on how it happens) and proceeds to m15. To make a deal you need the signals for all three indicators to match and, preferably, a rebound from one of the previously marked levels.

Bollinger Bands and Envelopes in fact overlap, both indicators are used to trade on a rebound from the upper or lower limit. Be sure to obtain confirmation on Stochastic.

The example shows almost an ideal situation – the price rebounds from the top of Bollinger Bands and Envelopes, Stochastic showed the crossing of the fast and slow lines in the overbought area. In addition, a rebound from the borders of 2 indicators coincided with the rebound from the level obtained on h1.

Testing of the EA

The Ray Scalper expert advisor, according to the author, feels good both during the flat and during the trend movement, helped with the multiple timeframe analysis of the market. Since the analysis includes higher timeframes, the tests were carried out on a long time interval.

The results were quite good, over almost 5 years of testing (2007 to 2012), the initial deposit grew from $1,000 up to $260,000. The curve of the changes in the deposit shows that growth happens all the time, without a period of stagnation. Drawdown was a bit too large and reached 26.55%, but you can live with it.

But this year the situation has changed and not for the better. When testing the basic version of the EA for the period from the beginning of the year, a loss of $915.54 was recorded. The very look of the balance curve shows the need to optimize the EA.

The basic version of the EA is really outdated and a modified Ray Scalper expert advisor is already released (versions 1.9 and 2.0). The official website says that the main difference from the basic version is that on the m15 timeframe, the bot is now building the channel, and trading as a whole has become more efficient. The results of the monitoring of the latest version of the EA are displayed.

Summing-up

This expert advisor is different from most rivals by the method of analysis of the market, starting with the higher timeframes, it gradually descends to the working m15. So, trading is conducted with the current trend, and not just on a set of the signals of indicators.

The basic version of the expert advisor, freely available, no longer gives the same result as it was 6-7 years ago. Therefore, later versions 1.9 and 2.0 can be recommended for real trading. Version 2.0 cannot be found in public domain, so only Ray Scalper expert advisor of the 1.9 version can be recommended. Moreover, there are almost no differences between 1.9 and 2.0 (in a more recent version the author slightly "pulled" the ratio of TP and SL and made a couple of cosmetic changes).

There are also references to some Pro version of the EA online, but even the official website doesn’t mention such modification. So, most likely, it is either a development of some handyman, or not quite accurate translation of information from the authors, or just a hoax.

But the main drawback of the EA can be considered the almost complete lack of optimization. The maximum that can be changed in trading is the value of the lot and the SL and TP, while indicator parameters remain unchanged. But this deficiency does not negate the main advantage of the expert advisor – you can really consistently earn with its help.