Cost structure changes with horizon
A scalp pays spread repeatedly and swap never. A swing position pays spread once and swap every night. Neither is inherently better; they are different bills. The mistake is choosing a horizon for emotional reasons and then being surprised by the invoice.
Why very short horizons rarely survive retail costs
If your average target is smaller than a few multiples of your typical spread, the cost of participation consumes the edge before variance has a chance to. Gold's spread behaviour makes this worse than in major FX pairs, and it is the main reason most retail gold scalping systems look brilliant in backtest and mediocre live.
The sweet spot for most operators
Horizons measured in hours to a few days tend to be the most forgiving: spread is amortised across a meaningful move, swap exposure is limited, and the strategy is not competing on infrastructure with participants who have vastly better infrastructure. It also happens to be the horizon most compatible with having a job.
The cost curve of holding longer
Every additional session a gold position stays open adds swap and adds exposure to overnight gaps, while the expected favourable movement does not scale with the same reliability. There is a holding period beyond which the marginal cost exceeds the marginal expected gain, and finding it empirically is more valuable than most entry refinements.
Compute your own break-even horizon
- —Record swap charged per lot per night on your live account, both directions.
- —Plot average realised gain against holding duration for closed trades.
- —Identify where the curves cross — that is your practical ceiling.
- —Re-check quarterly, because swap rates move with policy rates.
Weekend risk and the Sunday gap
Gold gaps at the weekly open more often than most operators expect, and a stop placed on Friday afternoon is a level the market is under no obligation to trade through in order. Whether to carry positions over the weekend is a policy decision that should be made explicitly and encoded, not left as an emergent property of when trades happen to open.
Three defensible policies
A stop is a resting order, not a guarantee. On Sunday evening, that distinction becomes concrete.
Everything discussed here is applied on a public, third-party verified account — updated continuously, losing weeks included.