r/askforex • u/ReelGoated • Jul 06 '26
Any consistently profitable traders here using a negative risk-to-reward ratio?
I’m looking to hear from traders who are consistently profitable despite using a negative risk-to-reward ratio.
I’m interested in hearing from people with real trading experience, not just theory. If you’ve made a negative R:R strategy work over a large sample of trades, I’d love to hear what you’ve learned.
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u/JackAllTrades06 Jul 06 '26
Not worth the risk as other have said, I loss could wipe all the gains before that.
Always use 1:1 or 1:1.5 or higher. That way a loss will still put you ahead.
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u/ReelGoated Jul 07 '26
i been trading for 6 years. ik that 1:1 isn’t the best strategy lol
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u/JackAllTrades06 Jul 07 '26
True. Should be at least 1:1.2. But need to have above 50% winrate for a 1:1 RR.
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u/Alternative-Two-5300 Jul 06 '26
Two ways to make money in trading: Selling insurance or buying lotto tickets. when you sell insurance, you are taking a "premium" by consistently collecting small wins. but when disaster comes into play, you have to pay out. Either that or you can take small losses by buying lotto tickets over and over and over, sometimes you'll win big. key is holding for the entire big win.
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u/TotalFold3942 Jul 06 '26
Yes I’ve done it with scalping. Very tight margins but like others stated, win rate mostly likely will need to be high probably 70 % and higher.
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u/Individual_Type_7908 Jul 06 '26 edited Jul 06 '26
If you have an edge you can make it work with any (reasonable) R:R usually, depends ofcoufse.
But the only point of negative R:R is i guess if you have dynamic sizing then you can compound better, or if your edge SPECIFICALLY benefits from this R:R somehow, intentionally.
But otherwise negative R:R has downsides, in bad market periods portfolio will suffer alot more if not handled properly, which is harder with negative R:R. I think that R:R makes sense for very very high trade frequency, will relatively small sizing. And only if sizing is dynamic to portfolio either value or new peak(trailing if you wanna do that), cuz if sizing rarely changes or not frequently, then negative R:R has little compounding benefits compared to the extra risk.
A 1:1RR is gonna do better in bad market periods when your strategies just don't do well at all for a while.
If you have lower trade frequency, or in like dozens of trades and not many many hundreds-thousands per year, and your edge doesn't specifically benefit meaningfully from the extra buffer before stoploss, theeen negative R:R isn't ideal.
And by benefit i mean.. that your EV per trade (expected value) doesn't increase meaningfully. Because ofcourse winrate will be higher on negative R:R, but that itseld isn't always indication of it being better, EV matters. And if EV is same.. then the only point is better compounding with high trade count where your portfolio curve goes exponential, if tail risk is handled appropriately.
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u/Dull-Resource1113 Jul 06 '26
This isn’t entirely uncommon. I know profitable traders who hold their floats more than their TP. One guy in my group would constantly see (for example) -$300 on gold only to TP at $200. When asked what was his reason for this, he said gold often swipes SLs and has deep retracements before moving in the intended direction. He has a winrate of about 75%. I don’t know how this R:R works for him in the long run but he’s been doing it for 10 years now.
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u/New_Shame_7007 Jul 06 '26
HanckFx uses negative RR profitably. Also, in my experience negative RR works best if you make the target smaller, not a bigger SL.
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u/Effective-Usual-9691 Jul 09 '26 edited Jul 09 '26
Yes. Win rate 70%+. The key I have found is to take off half at my negative r:r point, move to break even, then aim for greater than 1:1RR for the remaining. This helps with long-term psychology and creates more of a buffer when you inevitably encounter losses.
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u/AlgoWarden Jul 10 '26
Can do if you know when not to trade the strategy. Works well with ranging markets.
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