3Commas - A technical review

Table of Contents

As we know, over the past several years, we have witnessed a real computer revolution. We have practically all available solutions replacing us with computers. These are already such advanced technologies that are already able to make a decision for us, and what’s more, they do it faster and more efficiently than man. It is particularly visible in trading, where several years ago all decisions were made by man. Now Traders are equipped in computer programs who are able to do all the work. However, the market is flooding with information on how many new programmes have been hiring by financial institutions recently. But what about us with retail traders? How should we deal with this situation? It remains for us either programming learning or uses trading bots (free/paid) from the Internet. There are really many of them when you looking for information on the web. That’s why I decided to check 3Commas in this short article. One of many users and additionally paid TradingBots. Let’s have a look at one of them – 3Commas. They were started in 2014, there are over 120,000 users currently being served with transaction volume in the tune of $60 million being handled every day, supported 23 exchanges- data from 3Commas website. You can trade on all exchanges from one single interface from 3commas’ window. Up to date, they support Bittrex, Bitfinex, Binance, KuCoin and Poloniex, Bitstamp, HitBTC, Cex, GDAX, OKEX, Huobi, YOBIT.

How well do 3commas trading bots work?

On the website, we can read that: “3commas is a cryptocurrency trading bot that provides a wide range of tools and services for users to choose from. It performs real-time market analysis using powerful algorithms for getting you the best trades possible”. Sounds interesting? Is this the right place to find a solution for retail traders? 3Commas offer a few types of trading bots: Simple, Composite, Short, Composite short. You can choose which one you want it depends on your individual approach to the market. At the moment available is almost 90 trading bots. Does quantity mean quality?

Browsing information about bots, I wonder why the best strategies work only 30 days. How to trust this kind of bots with short history (just 30 days history)? How do I find out how it behaves with high market volatility? I don’t know. I couldn’t find this kind of information on the 3Commas website. For institutional investors or professional retail investors, this kind of question is fundamental. If you invest money you should know how much you can earn at what possibility of loss. That’s why it’s better for your wallet, to wait for a strategy with a long history to know what to expect.

Can I make a profit on real market with 3Commas?

Let’s see, how 3commas trading bots work. As a retail trader, I would like to try one of these 90 strategies. I choose for my example one “Simple Long Strategy” and I opened Paper Account. Pairs: USD_BTC, USDT_LINK, USD_LTC. Target profit 5%. On 3Commas website we can read the short description: “Simple Long Strategy gives you the possibility to make price increases”- information from 3Commas website. It looks simple to buy a lower price and sell higher price. The bot opens new deal according to one of the conditions that are available for selection during the creation. After that, it immediately puts a coin for sale. If the price rises and the order gets filled, the profit goal is achieved. In case of a price fall, the bot places safety orders below the purchase price every X%. Every filled safety order is averaging the buy price, and it makes possible to move the TakeProfit target lower and close the deal without losing profits in the first price bounce.

My strategy has been worked for 14 days. Completed 15 orders and give me $0.16 profit ($10.000 balance). Strategy performance results and statistics below.

Whether the profit is big or small I leave the answer to you. The rate of return is positive (+0,16$), therefore we should be satisfied (really ?). My “New Bot” did not lose money. Of course, everything was happening on the real market but money was virtual. You should also know that is possible to change strategies parameters at any time and can adapt it to your current needs but I did not do that because left my 100% decisions to the bot.

The main purpose of trading bots is to automate things which are either too complex, time-consuming, or difficult for users to carry out manually. Good trading bots can save a trader time and money by collecting data faster, placing orders faster and calculating next moves faster. In my case, I just set the parameters and Trading Bot did the rest but is it enough to tell that the strategy is good? Please rate it yourself. Meanwhile on the market situation looks very interesting for my example (charts below). The market moved up, how I expected. As you can see from the charts below I could earn more money in this period of time.

You also need to know that 3Commas is not for free. They have four subscription plans: Junior from €0 (your total balance across all accounts is $750 and no bots), Starter €24 (without limits for trading, no bots), Advanced €41 (Simple bots), Pro €84 (Simple, Composite Bots). The interesting thing is that you don’t know how much you can earn but you immediately know how much you have to pay!! Profits are potential but costs are fixed.

How safe is 3Commas?

3Commas don’t go into too many details regarding the security protocols that they choose to employ, however, it’s worth remembering that you don’t actually hold any funds on the platform and your trading bots are not able to make withdrawals from your linked accounts.

Similar to other trading bot platforms, your trading bots connect with your exchange accounts via API and then proceed to carry out automated trades on your linked exchanges. While this process takes place, users aren’t required to make any cash/crypto transfers to external accounts and simply need to provide their API keys which are generated by their exchanges.

These keys provide the trading bots with restricted access to user accounts strictly to conduct trades and do not grant the bots with any withdrawal rights. This also means that if your account becomes compromised, and some hackers were able to gain control of your trading activity, they still wouldn’t be able to directly access your exchange accounts in order to make withdrawals. However, the standard personal security rules of crypto still apply, as they could still have a detrimental effect on the funds held in your exchange accounts. Hackers have been known to obtain API access to exchange accounts, and commander the bots to purchase high quantities of low-value coins that the hackers have already previously purchased. After artificially inflating both the demand and price of said coins, the hackers then sell off their personal holdings for a profit, leaving the compromised account owners holding funds in the low-value coins.

3Commas has made a positive impression. It is also worth mentioning about Key Features:

Technology – Automated trading takes place via API integration with cryptocurrency exchanges and the bot works around the clock with any device and users can access their trading dashboard on desktop and laptop computers. The team have also developed mobile apps for both Android and iOS
Tools – The platform provides a good range of trading tools and in addition to the automated bots and performance analytics, users are able to create, analyze and back-test crypto portfolios and monitor the best performing portfolios created by other users. In addition, users can engage in social trading and follow and copy the actions of other successful traders.
Functionality- 3Commas utilises a web-based platform, and features an easy to use and intuitive user interface that includes a wide range of functions and detailed analytics. Users can make use of short, simple, composite, and composite short bots, and set stop loss and take profit targets, as well as customise their own trading strategies.

Strong points of 3 Commas Bot Platform

Emotionless, fact-based trades make sure that decisions taken are taken entirely based on the ideal conditions with little room for doubt, instinct, and human error. This reduces the intensity of the decision-making process and helps to take logical and high-profit decisions.
Good exchange connections.
The Smart Trading option that makes use of ‘trailing take profit’ keeps the user away from a loss when trading. Since it is designed to stay in the loop and adapt itself to the market, it is an intelligent solution to make as much as possible with a trade.
Easy to set up for beginners, making sure that newcomers can navigate the 3Commas bot and make trades without any hassles.
A well-laid-out dashboard and visualization of data allow the users to keep track of everything that is happening while boosting their appeal and ease of use.
The free access offers a great trial so that users can make full use of the platform.
A large number of exchange offers a wide array of information centres, making sure that your decision is well thought out with multiple inputs.
The fact that users can refer and copy portfolios of successful traders.

Weak points of 3 Commas Bot Platform

Security protocols are not explained with great clarity, raising concerns about whether the trades are truly secure. Users can, of course, enable the 2-factor verification for additional security, but the fact that not much is said about it leaves room for concern.
The plans change regularly and might prove to be a bit confusing to say the least with 3Comms’ paid plans, commission plans, and a mix of both.
The balance has to be filled up for commission, which may be a hindrance for many users.

Using trading bots for trading makes life easier. It can save traders a lot of time but will give it earn real money? Popular trading bots available to individual investors (regardless of whether paid or free) have one basic problem, namely the speed of response to changing market conditions, as well as the speed of placing and sending orders. This is not their strength. You will not find any information about latency, what is the maximum number of orders that can be sent per second. Using low latancy software will give you advantage on the market over retail bot users. Therefore, institutional investors have an edge on the market.

But retail bots are good place to start education on how automation on the markets can work.

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