Algorithmic Trading
Bot Functions with 3commas
Chapter 4
Simple DCA Bot Maintenance
Now that you have created your first bot, there are some things you need to know about managing it before you turn it on. When your bot starts a deal there is very little you can do to manage it. It is important to understand what you can do and how it can save your money if your bot fails due to a miscalculation or the market is behaving outside of your bots guidelines. Editing a bot’s configuration will not affect the current active deal. The bot will wait to close any active deal before applying configuration settings. NOTE: If you program a bot properly with a safe deviation for the selected currency pair, your bot should not error or malfunction.
Overview
Use this video and the texts/images that follow to learn about managing an active deal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhVQgA0_PJI&list=PLa_th_mkwVKvXOb0rCVCaJl5OU6WmHWz0&index=13
If you click on the arrow in the upper left hand corner to display the side tab like we did earlier, you can see all the available menu tabs. You can select My Deals from the subcategory under DCA Bot to view all your active bots active deals, deals history, and other stats. Your stats and your active deals will be displayed in a beautiful fashion that is easy to observe and manage. Depending upon how many bots you have running and what the market conditions are like, you will see something like this.
If you scroll down, you will find your active deals (if you have any).
This is your active deals page. You can see the bots are listed by name. From this overview you can see all of your currently active deals and choose one to edit. As mentioned earlier your editing options are limited once a deal is started, so it is important to program your bot for any possible scenario before turning it on. Let’s take a closer look at what all this information is telling us.
Bot
The first thing to understand when viewing your active deals is which bot is responsible for which deal. If you name your bots carelessly, it can be difficult to track your deals. When configuring your bot you should at least include the pair name and exchange wallet you are using.
Deal Expansion
You can expand the deal to reveal more about the open deal by clicking the drop down arrow on the left of the bot name display.
When you click one of those arrows for any deal, the deal will expand and you will see something similar to the photo below. You will see what market the bot has created a deal in, the DCA buy price, your sell price (only if you have a stop loss active), the take profit percentage and price, the deal ID (which is important if you will need to dispute a deal with 3commas support for any reason), and the deal start time.
Pair
Here you can see what pair the bot is trading. If you have a composite bot running active, you will see all of the selected pairs here. We will cover composite bots in a different module. For now, let’s get familiar with managing simple bots.
Profit/Loss
In this section you can see the progress of each deal as it moves towards safety orders or take profit orders. If the deal is at a loss, the bar will display red. If the deal is profiting, the bar will display green. Do not worry if all your deals are displayed at losses. The bots are simply doing their job by averaging down the purchase price. The bot will supervise the price action and sell your deal for a profit, it is only a matter of time. The only exception to this is if you have a stop loss, then the bot could possibly close the deal for a loss. To reiterate, if you are not using a stop loss your bot will always close deals for a profit – it will just take time for the price of the asset to be profitable again. Patience is key when using bots. The purpose of bots is to achieve passive income, not to constantly monitor and change them when deals reflect negative. Program them correctly, let them do their jobs, and you will make profits.
Volume
In this area you can observe how much funds are being used for each deal. The software will display the information in both base and quote currencies.
Status
In this area you will see the status of your bot. If the bot is malfunctioning, that would be displayed here as “error.”
Safety Order
This is perhaps the most crucial area to observe when managing bot. From top to bottom, you will see Completed, Active, and Max.
Completed – This shows the number of safety orders completed by the bot for the current deal. This number does not reflect the base order.
Active – This shows the number of safety orders that are currently placed on the market but not yet filled. This number is determined by the “Max active safety trades count” input when you configure a bot.
Max – This is the max amount of safety trades your bot will initiate before it stops placing them. This number is determined by the “Max active safety trades” input when you configure a bot.
Now that we understand what the bots are telling us, let’s take a look at what possible actions we can take and how each one can affect the bots’ active deal.
Active Deal Options
This video will talk about the options you have once a deal is active. There are additional photos and texts regarding active deal options following the video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVZ3_hE87vU&list=PLa_th_mkwVKvXOb0rCVCaJl5OU6WmHWz0&index=14
There are a few actions you can take when it comes to an active bot deal. In this section we will go over what each action does as they appear from left to right.
Cancel
You can cancel an active bot deal by pressing the Cancel button. You will have the option to confirm or go back. You will see a pop-up similar to the one above. IMPORTANT NOTE: Canceling the bot’s buy order DOES NOT close the position. Canceling a bot’s order will only stop the bot’s management of the deal. The deal will still remain open as an order and can be managed from the SmartTrade terminal of 3commas. This can be advantageous for getting your bot out of a wedge during poor market conditions that your bot was not programmed for. Canceling a bot’s deal will allow the bot to start a new deal at a new price instead of trying to DCA an extreme price movement. You can leave the new trade open and wait for it to become profitable as your bot starts making deals again.
Close At Market Price
If you take the action to Close at market price you will see a pop-up similar to the one above. Your profit will be displayed as either a loss in red, or as a profit in green. Selecting this option will close the deal immediately at market price. This can be useful in certain scenarios when the market is behaving outside of your bot’s deviation range and you want to prevent further losses, especially if you are trading futures or margin.
Switch
This feature enables the user to convert the deal from long to short and vice versa. Only the active deal will be flipped and the bot will continue its original strategy after the deal closes. If you want to change the bot’s strategy, you should re-configure its input settings.
Edit
You can edit a bot’s current active deal by selecting the “notebook” icon right after switch in the same area we were just working at. You will then see a pop up similar to this one. These are the same settings you will find when you are configuring a bot. Editing them here will only affect the current active deal. Any deal after an edit here will be done with the bot’s original configuration UNLESS you have edited the bot’s configuration. If you want to change the bot’s strategy permanently you need to edit its configurations.
Add Funds
If you are all out of safety orders and want to further DCA your bots position, you can assist your bot by adding funds to it manually. This is a great way to get a bot out of a bind without having to close your position for a loss. If you have the funds available to add to your bot, then you can significantly reduce the average buy price and take profit price. Select Add Funds to display the pop up above. Choose how much you want to add and press Save.
Smart Trade Convert
By using the Convert to SmartTrade option you will be converting your bots active deal to a smart trade with the same parameters. This can be useful if your bot entered the market at a rally and you can not DCA any further manually due to lack of funds. This will free the bot up to start making deals again. You can also choose to turn off the bot at this time before confirming the conversion of your active deal. You can then view and manage the smart trade in 3commas SmartTrade Terminal.
Refresh
The circular green action button at the very end is the refresh button. You can refresh your active deal to see where its profit progress is.
Adding Funds Vs Converting to Smart Trade
Reference
Just for reference, we will include this photo to give you an idea of how a bot functions in a real trade with filled and pending safety orders. Your bots grid may look different based upon its configuration.
