USDCHF on M15: scale out or one target?

[FXS London Scalper]

A question that comes up with USDCHF on M15 structure with M1 entries: take partials, or hold for one target? It's worth testing on your own trades rather than deciding by feel, and the test is cheap because you can run both versions on paper from the same entries.

How to set it up:

• Version A: one full target at 1.5R.
• Version B: half off at 0.75R, the rest at 1.5R, stop unchanged.
• For every entry, record the furthest point price reached before the stop or the target, so both versions can be scored afterwards.

A worked example shows why the answer isn't obvious. Say 40% of trades reach 1.5R and another 20% reach 0.75R before reversing to the stop. Version A: 0.4 × 1.5 − 0.6 × 1 = 0.00R. Version B: the 40% earn 1.125R, the 20% earn 0.375R − 0.5R = −0.125R, the rest lose 1R: 0.45 − 0.025 − 0.4 = +0.025R. Shift a few trades from the middle group into the full winners and A wins instead. The middle group decides it.

USDCHF on M15 often makes one push, stalls at a round number like 0.8000 or 0.8050, and then decides. If your target sits beyond one of those, the middle group tends to be bigger, which argues for scaling. With clean space, one target is simpler.

Has anyone run this comparison on USDCHF or another slower pair? Curious what the middle group looked like for you.

[Amanhasnoname]

I ran almost exactly this comparison on USDCHF last summer, using about ninety entries from M15 structure with M1 triggers. The middle group was bigger than I expected, a bit under a third of the trades, and nearly all of them stalled at a figure or a half figure before rolling over. On that sample the scaled version came out slightly ahead, but only by a few hundredths of an R per trade.

What surprised me more was how the result changed by session. Entries taken in the European morning reached the full target much more often, so one target was the better choice there. Trades from the New York afternoon were the ones that kept stalling halfway, and scaling clearly helped those.

So I ended up with a simple rule rather than one answer. If there is a round number between my entry and 1.5R, I take half at that level. If the path is clear, I leave the whole position on. It keeps the decision mechanical, which matters more to me than the small difference in expectancy.