Strategy also: martingale sizing, doubling strategy

Martingale

A position sizing method that doubles or multiplies the lot size after each losing trade, based on the premise that a winning trade will eventually occur and recover all prior losses plus profit.

Why it fails in practice

Martingale assumes infinite capital. After 10 consecutive losses at doubling, the required lot size is 1024x the initial. A sequence of 10-15 consecutive losses — which happens in real markets — requires a position that exceeds typical account sizes or broker margin limits.

How to identify martingale in an EA

Look for a lot multiplier parameter. If the lot size increases as losses accumulate, the EA uses martingale sizing. The absence of a hard stop-loss is a confirming sign.

EAs in this catalogue that use grid strategies use flat lot sizing — the same lot size at every grid level. This is explicitly not martingale.