Forex Trading Hours

February 22nd, 2011, 04:12 AM

Hi guys,

I live in Hong Kong and sometimes find the trading hours of different exchanges very confusing. I therefore wrote this indicator which displays the trading session of different timezones. It also draws a new time x-axis of the exchange timezone.

If you cant find the pre-defined timezone, you can use custom_local_gmt and custom_exchange_gmt to configure your own timezones.

note that this indicator does not automatically check daylight saving.

February 22nd, 2011, 05:12 AM

puppeye

Hi guys,

I live in Hong Kong and sometimes find the trading hours of different exchanges very confusing. I therefore wrote this indicator which displays the trading session of different timezones. It also draws a new time x-axis of the exchange timezone.

If you cant find the pre-defined timezone, you can use custom_local_gmt and custom_exchange_gmt to configure your own timezones.

note that this indicator does not automatically check daylight saving.

Attachment 31507

Did you pay attention to the different daylight savings times?

Europe has different dates for switching from standard time to summer time than the US. As far as I know, Japan has no daylight savings times schedule at all.

The necessary methods are now all available with .NET 3.5., which was not the case with .Net 2.0, so you can easily use them to determine the correct values for the variable exchange_gmt which you use in your indicator code.

February 22nd, 2011, 05:34 AM

Fat Tails

Did you pay attention to the different daylight savings times?

Europe has different dates for switching from standard time to summer time than the US. As far as I know, Japan has no daylight savings times schedule at all.

The necessary methods are now all available with .NET 3.5., which was not the case with .Net 2.0, so you can easily use them to determine the correct values for the variable exchange_gmt which you use in your indicator code.

Thanks Fattails. I am not sure if i can code that, I only know how to code in Ninja (and VB), I have put in for example NewYork_EST and NewYork_EDT in the exchange_timezone options to reflect daylight saving mode but the user has to know when to use which one.

BTW, those of you who downloaded the indicator before 4:30 a.m., please re-download, i have changed some of the trading session hours according to this: Market Hours - Big Mike's Trading Forum

February 22nd, 2011, 05:43 AM

I wasnt online when i tested the indicator. Now, I am connected to zenfire, the x-axis keeps changing, it makes me feel dizzy :puke: , does anyone know how to make the plot_override to update only when it is FirstTickofBar?

February 22nd, 2011, 06:23 AM

puppeye

Thanks Fattails. I am not sure if i can code that, I only know how to code in Ninja (and VB), I have put in for example NewYork_EST and NewYork_EDT in the exchange_timezone options to reflect daylight saving mode but the user has to know when to use which one.

BTW, those of you who downloaded the indicator before 4:30 a.m., please re-download, i have changed some of the trading session hours according to this: Market Hours - Big Mike's Trading Forum

I can certainly help you with the DST issue, it is not really difficult to do.

February 22nd, 2011, 08:39 AM

this should fix the crazy time axis problem

February 22nd, 2011, 09:21 AM

OK, here just a small example, how to convert exchange time correctly to local time.

Let us assume that you want to convert Tokyo Market Hours to local time. This is not trivial, as a US based trader will switch to Summer Time in March and back to Standard Time in November.

Conversion is needed to correctly display the opening hours on your chart. This is cannot be done by using a fixed offset from GMT. Unlike .Net 2.0, which was used by NT 6.5., .Net 3.5. comes with a library allowing for time conversion. By the way this was prerequisite for the introduction of session templates.

(1) Find Time Zone for Tokyo

First declare a string variable and declare a variable of Type TimeZoneInfo

Code

private string tstName = "Tokyo Standard Time";
private TimeZoneInfo tstZone;

then affect correct time zone to TimeZoneInfo variable

Code

tstZone = TimeZoneInfo.FindSystemTimeZoneById(tstName);

(2) Retrieve the current session start and end times

Code

Bars.Session.GetNextBeginEnd(Time[0], out sessionStartTimeLocal, out sessionEndTimeLocal);

You will need sessionEndTimeLocal, which holds the end of the current session in local time.

(3) Determine the Session Date

Code

sessionDate = TimeZoneInfo.ConvertTime(sessionEndTimeLocal, TimeZoneInfo.Local, tstZone).Date;

(4) Convert Opening Hours

Code

xchange_start="9:00 AM";
xchange_end="6:00 PM";
xchange_start_Local = TimeZoneInfo.ConvertTime(sessionDate+xchange_start, tstZone, TimeZoneInfo.Local);
xchange_end_Local = TimeZoneInfo.ConvertTime(sessionDate+xchange_end, tstZone, TimeZoneInfo.Local);

Of course you need to declare the variables first. So let me summarize the process:

You first look at the end of your current session. This allows you to retrieve the session date (no trading session ever closes after midnight local time). You add the local opening hour to the session date, and you will now get the current opening time in Tokyo Standard Time. In a last step you convert Tokyo time to the local time zone of the NinjaTrader user.

Not difficult at all.

February 22nd, 2011, 09:41 AM

Fat Tails

Not difficult at all.

LOL

Thanks. I will certainly try that when i have time.

February 23rd, 2011, 12:36 AM

So this one uses the TimeZoneInfo suggested by Fattails. It checks your local timezone and detect daylight saving automatically.

you can also define your own timezone by using UTC/GMT standards.

Added the following exchanges and fixed some serialized font/color problems:

NewYork_StockExchange,
NASDAQ,
London_StockExchange,
Toronto_StockExchange,
Euronext_Paris,
Frankfurt_StockExchange,
Swiss_Exchange,
NewZealand_StockMarket,
Australian_SecuritiesExchange,
Tokyo_StockExchange,
HongKong_StockExchange,
India_StockExchange,

February 23rd, 2011, 01:24 AM

puppeye

So this one uses the TimeZoneInfo suggested by Fattails. It checks your local timezone and detect daylight saving automatically.

you can also define your own timezone by using UTC/GMT standards.

Indicator works well. Your London start time is a bit late. Volume shows that the dealers are already at their desks around 7:00 GMT, because otherwise they miss the Asian-European overlap.

Another way to display the FOREX hours is just to use an appropriate session templates. The vertical lines indicate the opening of the London and New York markets. Nobody really cares, when the markets close.

Forex Trading Hours

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Forex Trading Hours