The platform clock and the bug that wrecks session statistics

[Shadow Trader]

Most platforms show server time, not local time. Server time might be GMT+2, or GMT+3 during daylight saving, or something entirely different depending on the broker. Almost nobody notices until the journal gets analysed.

Here's how it bites. A scalper tags trades by hour to find the best session, using the timestamps from the platform export. The data says the best hour is 10:00, but that's server time. In real terms it's the London open, 8:00 GMT. Meanwhile the worst hour, apparently 16:00, is actually the New York lunch lull.

That alone is manageable. The real mess arrives when daylight saving shifts. US clocks and European clocks change on different dates, so for a few weeks each year the gap between server time and the actual market open changes. Statistics from March or October may mix two different realities.

A clean fix: convert every timestamp to one fixed timezone before analysis, preferably New York or UTC, and keep it consistent.

What timezone does the journal use, and was it ever checked against the platform's server time?