One screen. Your rules on every order.
The chart, your positions, the order ticket and your rules, on your laptop and your phone.
The terminal: the Guard says clear to trade with $620 left today; account value $50,000; the order ticket ready to buy BTC.
Know if you can trade before you try.
The Guard at the top of every screen says Clear to trade, or what is stopping you and until when.
The Guard's four faces: clear to trade, one warning, paused until 16:05, kill switch on.
The check happens as you type.
The ticket shows which rules an order uses and how much room each leaves, and its button says what will happen.
Room check
BTC would be 11.2% of your account; your cap is 10%.
14 rules, in plain sentences.
Each rule is a sentence with your numbers in it, grouped the way you think about risk.
The daily loss limit as a sentence: stop me from opening positions when today's loss reaches 2% of my starting equity, for 120 minutes. With your numbers: $620 left.
Losses
Daily loss limit
Pauses new positions after today's loss reaches your limit.
Weekly loss limit
The same, over the last seven days.
Size
Max position size
Caps how much of your account one coin can be.
Max gross exposure
Caps everything you hold, as a share of your account.
Max leverage
Caps borrowing on margin accounts.
Buying power buffer
Keeps cash aside that no order can spend.
Category concentration
Caps one kind of coin, like Layer 1 or Meme.
Correlation cap
Stops you buying a coin that moves with one you hold.
Habits
Loss streak cooldown
Pauses you after a run of losing trades.
Re-entry lock
Stops you buying back a coin right after a losing close.
Trade frequency
Caps orders per hour.
Daily reset guard
Keeps you out around 00:00 UTC, when the daily candle rolls.
Order checks
Order sanity
Catches fat fingers: an order too large or priced too far from the market.
Kill switch
Stops every order until you turn it off.
Start from a preset.
Four starting sets. Apply one, then change any number.
Cautious
Small positions, hard daily stop, slow re-entry.
Day trader
Many small trades, a daily stop and a streak brake.
Swing trader
Concentration and correlation caps, a weekly stop.
Prop-firm style
Hard daily and weekly drawdown limits, leverage capped.
Warn or Block, rule by rule.
Warn lets the order through and tells you; Block stops it. Some rules let you place anyway with a note, kept in your journal.
A blocked order with a note: this rule lets you place anyway, and the note is kept in your journal.
A limit you can't raise in the moment.
Tightening applies now. Loosening waits the delay you set, up to 30 days.
Changing the daily loss limit to Warn applies in one day, your change delay; until then orders that break it stay blocked.
The kill switch.
Arm it and every order stops, including closes. Disarming takes the countdown you chose, from one minute to 24 hours.
Arming the kill switch: every order stopped, including closes; disarming takes 60 minutes; open positions stay open at Kraken.
Every order and every block, on the record.
Your journal keeps each fill, each block and its reason, and each order you placed outside.
The journal's blocks: an order blocked by the daily loss limit, one warned by trade frequency, one placed anyway.
Practise first.
A practice month opens with your account, and paper trading lets you place orders with no money moving.
A practice month in September, up $612.00, with one day paused by the daily loss limit.
What your exchange doesn't check.
Exchanges check your balance and margin. Those are their limits; these are yours.
| Exchange's own controls | Turtle Terminal | |
|---|---|---|
| Checks each order against limits you set | Partly | Yes |
| Pauses you after a daily or weekly loss | No | Yes |
| Pauses you after a losing streak | No | Yes |
| Makes loosening a limit wait | No | Yes |
| Says which rule stopped the order, with the numbers | No | Yes |
| Same rules across more than one exchange | No | Yes |
| Holds your crypto | Yes | No |
What Turtle Terminal doesn't do.
- 1
It doesn't check orders you place at your exchange directly. They're recorded as Placed outside.
- 2
It re-checks your account within 60 seconds, not instantly. A price move between checks is caught at the next one.
- 3
It doesn't close positions for you. The kill switch stops new orders; open positions stay open at your exchange.
- 4
It doesn't give advice, signals or predictions.
- 5
It doesn't trade futures, perpetuals or options.
