The question
What would make a result credible?
- Rules must use information available at the decision time.
- Costs and ambiguous fills can change results materially.
- Unseen evaluation data matters.
Separate the decision from the outcome.
A historical chart contains information that was unavailable during the trade. A completed session high or an unfinished candle’s final value cannot legitimately support an earlier entry.
Rules and evaluation assumptions should be recorded before judging results. Repeatedly changing them after seeing the outcomes can make a historical fit look stronger than it is.
Ask how the trade could have filled.
A candle touching both stop and target does not reveal which came first. A touched limit price does not prove a fill. Detailed data or a disclosed conservative rule is needed to handle that uncertainty.
Futures contract rolls, missing bars, session calendars, fees, and slippage also matter. A smooth equity curve without these details is incomplete evidence.
Look beyond one favorable period.
Keep development data separate from unseen evaluation data. Review trade count, average outcomes, drawdown, long and short behavior, and sensitivity to execution costs.
This guide describes evaluation standards. It does not claim that a NQ Research House strategy has passed them or that a historical result guarantees future returns.
The testing platform supplies assumptions.
TradingView’s Strategy Tester uses a broker emulator. Its calculation settings, simulated order timing, slippage, and commissions affect the result. Bar Magnifier can provide a finer view when supported and available, but limited intrabar coverage still needs disclosure.
Changing a setting to obtain a favorable equity curve is not evidence that it represents your original rules. Keep the data period, rules, version, settings, and unresolved fill ambiguities with the report.
Sources & further reading
Consult the original exchange or platform documentation for current specifications, schedules, and simulation behavior. These sources do not validate our strategies.