Getting started

How paper trading works

Paper trading runs your strategies in a simulated brokerage account funded with $25,000 of virtual cash, so you can try them without real money.

What a paper account is

A paper account is a fully simulated Amaltash Brokerage account. It runs on our brokerage partner Alpaca’s sandbox, so no identity verification is needed and no real money moves.

Paper balances, positions and gains are virtual. They cannot be withdrawn, and how a strategy does on paper does not predict how it will do with real money: real trading has real prices, delays and costs, and you can lose money.

Who can use it

Paper trading is being rolled out gradually. If you see a Live / Paper switch in the sidebar of the web dashboard, it is on for your account. If you do not, it has not been enabled for you yet, and the server will reply “Paper trading isn’t enabled for your account.”

Setting up your paper account

Switch the sidebar to Paper, then finish the three setup steps. The setup window stays open until all three are done.

  1. Create your sandbox account: press Create sandbox account.
  2. Link a sandbox test bank: press Link sandbox bank. A test bank is linked for you.
  3. Claim your funds: press Claim $25,000. Your paper account is credited with $25,000 of virtual cash, once.

Running a strategy on paper

Deploy a strategy as usual and choose your paper account as the account to trade in. The minimum amount for a paper deployment is $50, unless the strategy sets a higher minimum.

Whether a deployment uses paper or real money is fixed when you deploy it, by the account you pick. To move a strategy from paper to real money, undeploy it and deploy it again from your live account.

Paper orders are filled by the sandbox, which adds a short artificial delay to every fill, so a paper order can take up to about a minute to fill.

On the Deployed Strategies page, each deployment carries a Paper or Live badge.

Starting over with a new paper account

On your paper account’s manage page, press New sandbox account. Close any open paper positions first; the request is refused while positions are open. Your paper strategies stop, and the old balance stays with the old account. Then link a sandbox bank and claim your funds again.

Simulated deposits and withdrawals are also available on a paper account, up to $50,000 per transaction and $50,000 per day. No real money moves.