How To Setup Market Profile In Tradovate

Loading Chart Windows in Tradovate

To load a chart window click on the plus icon in the top left hand corner. From there load a new charting module and populate it with the futures symbol of your choice. By default a candle stick chart should come up.

There are two ways we can now change this to a market profile chart. First method is to click on the candle stick icon and make the adjustment to TPO type charts. The second method is to use the gear icon and adjust the style of the price action. This is the menu where the in depth settings exist.

Customizing Market Profile Charts

First of all I would point out that we can have a TPO chart made up of letters or blocks. I prefer letters so we can see the different time periods, but blocks are an option as well for those who dont mind. We also have control of the size of the letters and blocks, and for ease of navigation I would always recommend that be set to auto.

Underneath that we can adjust the color of our letters. This feature here is the master control for all color. If you select this per letter box, you can change the color for every single letter, which as we know represents a 30 minute time period. Notice however that if I change the master, the ABC do not move with it. Those three will always need to be manually set if you have the per letter on.

Under that we have our time frames for sessions. Traditionally I have two sessions set up. One for the regular trading hours and another for the after hours. You can set a start and stop time, as well as a letter to start with. I choose to use lower case for the extended hours session. Notice also that you can have a secondary color over ride what you set in the default color, per each session. Thats how we get the after hours to be gray.

Under all of this is where we get to the real power of market profile which is showing the different indications. First up we have the initial balance. This is not something that I personally use but here is how its set up. Interval of course corresponds to the timeframe that you would consider the IB. First period? First two periods? Three? Of course we have color, and then thickness. If thickness is set to 0 it will not show up. Lets have a look at this when its set to 5px for example. The add extension will add a percentage distance to the top and bottom of the range. Not something I use.

Next up are the TPO settings. We can set the point of control and whether or not it should have an extension, value area distance color and whether or not you want it to show up as a bar along side the profile or be highlighted. Make sure that the colors are going to contrast enough on the dark background because they will have some amount of transparency to them.

The same holds true to the volume profile. We have the ability to adjust colors for the profile in total, the value area, and the point of control. We can also draw things as bars if you want more clarity on where the value area is. The label is for being able to see the number of contracts that have traded at a specific price. Make sure that this will contrast enough with the value area highlight color you choose.

Additional Settings

At the very bottom is where you can turn on and off some additional information like the open and close triangles and the half back. We also have trade information that you can add.

Lastly you can save the settings you have configured as a template. This means that we can have multiple looks and feels at the touch of a button. Very convenient for those who like to analyze multiple different time frames.