What is Paper Trading?
Paper trading is practising trades with simulated money at real or replayed market prices, so mistakes cost nothing.
How it works
A simulator fills your orders at the price in the data and tracks a pretend account. It is useful for learning the mechanics of orders, stops and position size, and for testing whether you can follow a written plan. Keep a journal of every trade so you can review decisions, not only the profit and loss.
What it can't tell you
Simulated fills are cleaner than real ones, and losing pretend money does not feel like losing real money, so the emotional side of trading is largely missing.
How Tickfloor uses it
Tickfloor's practice simulator replays real, already-closed candles with a free practice account and a plain review of every closed trade.
Does it work as a strategy?
This is a concept more than a trading rule, so there is no single strategy to score. It matters for reading the results below.
Tickfloor's research desk has backtested 517 strategies, most against an equal-weight benchmark of the same assets rebalanced daily that pays no costs (the strategies pay theirs). After correcting for the 598 tests run (Benjamini-Hochberg), 0 passed. That does not prove no strategy works. These are historical diagnostics, not validation under Testing Standard v2: the backtest harness predates that standard and has not been re-run to meet it.
General information only. It doesn't consider your objectives, finances or needs. Tickfloor holds no financial services licence and never places trades.
Common questions
What is Paper Trading?
Paper trading is practising trades with simulated money at real or replayed market prices, so mistakes cost nothing.
How does Paper Trading work?
A simulator fills your orders at the price in the data and tracks a pretend account. It is useful for learning the mechanics of orders, stops and position size, and for testing whether you can follow a written plan. Keep a journal of every trade so you can review decisions, not only the profit and loss.
What are the limits of Paper Trading?
Simulated fills are cleaner than real ones, and losing pretend money does not feel like losing real money, so the emotional side of trading is largely missing.
How does Tickfloor use Paper Trading?
Tickfloor's practice simulator replays real, already-closed candles with a free practice account and a plain review of every closed trade.