Strategy Activation & Trading Days

1. Purpose and Overview

Strategy activation and the definition of trading days determine when a strategy in OptionsApp is actually executed. This section specifies whether a strategy is active, in which account it should trade, on which days trades are allowed to open, and whether certain days should be explicitly excluded. Additionally, you can limit here how many trades within a strategy may be open simultaneously.

This makes this section one of the central building blocks for operational control of a strategy. Only through these settings does a configured strategy become an actual trading strategy.

2. Strategy Selection

At the top, you'll find the "Strategy" dropdown menu. This is where you select which of your existing strategies you want to edit. All further settings in this section apply to the strategy you've selected here. A checkmark next to the strategy indicates whether it is currently activated.

3. Strategy Activation

Directly below the strategy selection is the "Activate" checkbox. Once you enable this checkbox, the strategy is turned on and can begin executing trades in the assigned account from that moment onward.

It's important to note that activation takes effect immediately. The strategy does not wait until the next day or until the app restarts, but begins executing right away. If the strategy already has trades scheduled for the current trading day, they will be considered on that same day, provided their planned execution time is still in the future.

For example: If you activate a strategy at 12:00 PM and it contains a trade scheduled to execute at 3:00 PM, that trade can still open on the same day.

4. Account Selection

Another dropdown menu lets you specify which account the strategy should trade in. This is particularly relevant if you have multiple accounts available within OptionsApp.

Pay attention to the account designations. If the account designation begins with a U, it's a live trading account. If it begins with a D, it's a paper trading account. This distinction is important to prevent a strategy from being executed in the wrong account by mistake.

5. Definition of Trading Days

The next field defines on which days the strategy is permitted to open trades. Three different options are available here.

5.2 Weekly

If Weekly is selected, an additional selection field appears to the right. In this field, you can specify which specific weekdays the strategy should be executed on.

This allows you to restrict a strategy to specific days of the week. For example, you could set it so a strategy only trades on Mondays and Wednesdays. In that case, OptionsApp would only open the contained trades on these two weekdays each week.

This setting makes sense when you want a strategy to be used deliberately only on certain weekdays.

5.3 Specific Dates

If Specific Dates is selected, an additional input field appears to the right. There you can enter individual specific calendar dates on which the strategy should be executed.

This way, the strategy is executed not according to a recurring pattern, but exclusively on explicitly defined individual dates. You can enter specific dates such as June 10th, July 16th, and August 13th, for example. In that case, the strategy would only trade on exactly these days and no others.

This option is especially useful when trades should only take place on selected individual dates.

6. Blackout Dates

When Daily or Weekly is selected, the "Blackout Dates" function is additionally available on the right. Through this function, you can specify individual days on which no trade openings should occur, despite otherwise permitted trading days.

Blackout Dates function as an exclusion list. A strategy can generally trade daily or weekly, but certain specific days can be deliberately excluded.

Typical use cases are days with expected special market situations. These include, for example, US Federal Reserve interest rate decisions, political events, election days, or other occasions when elevated volatility is expected. Results from backtests can also be a reason to deliberately exclude certain days.

For example: If a strategy is set to Daily, it would normally execute on every trading day. However, if certain days are designated as Blackout Dates, no trades will be opened on exactly those days.

7. Max Open Trades

On the right side, there is also the option to Max Open Trades" enable. When you check the associated checkbox, you can define how many trades within this strategy may be open simultaneously at most.

This limit applies to the entire strategy. It does not apply only to a single entry point, but to all trades running within this strategy. This prevents too many positions from being opened in parallel.

For example: A strategy contains multiple entry opportunities distributed throughout the day. If you set the maximum value to 3, then no more than three trades of this strategy may be open at any given time. Once this limit is reached, further possible entries are not executed until a trade has been closed beforehand.

This function is especially important for strategies with multiple entry signals per day, as it deliberately limits risk and the number of parallel positions.

8. Summary

Strategy activation and trading days determine when a strategy actually becomes active in the market. "Activate" turns the strategy on immediately. Account selection determines whether trading occurs in a live or paper account. Daily, Weekly, or Specific Dates define which days trades are permitted to open. Blackout Dates allow you to deliberately exclude individual days, and Max Open Trades lets you limit the number of simultaneously open trades within the strategy.

This section is therefore critical for the timing and practical execution of a strategy in OptionsApp.