Pad Non-Trading Days

AmiBroker provides an option in the View menu, to Pad non-trading days. When this option is enabled, AmiBroker creates artificial bars for any days when the market was closed. These artificial bars will have the OHLC values set to the closing price of the last real trading day.

The purpose of this feature is to allow for time-based indicators, like cycles, to analyze the chart data on the basis of calendar days rather than market days. In the case of cycles, the prevailing theory is that cycles are active, regardless of whether or not the market is open. If this is true, it means to generate an accurate cycles analysis, you should enable the Pad non-trading days option.

In our testing, we’ve been able to achieve excellent results, regardless of whether or not the option is enabled. PrescienTrader is capable of adapting to either scenario. If artificial bars exist on the chart, there will be more bars per time period, so PrescienTrader will tend to report slightly longer cycle frequencies, compensating for the additional bars. The shape of the Prescient Line may change dramatically when you toggle the option on or off, but both analyses will be valid.

You can make a valid argument for either approach. If cycles continue while markets are closed, it makes sense to analyze cycles in calendar days, rather than market days. The counter-argument is that by adding artificial bars, you’re literally adding noise to the chart and this noise often shows up in the analysis. After enabling Pad non-trading days, you may need to increase the Confidence and/or the Harmonic Filter settings, to compensate for the added noise.

This is really a matter of personal preference. We suggest you try it both ways and use whichever method works best for you.