Sri Lanka — Trading Hours - Choosing When to Send the Order
Convert your local time into server time, read the average spread and the average movement for the hour, then use the ratio between them to decide whether that hour is worth entering in. Measured on the MetaTrader 5 feed.
Open Exness Account →Choosing when to send an order is a two-column comparison. Read the average spread for the hour you are considering and the average movement in that same hour, then divide one by the other: more movement per pip of spread means the hour offers more to work with relative to what entering costs. Avoid the rollover hour unless the position is meant to be there, because the spread widens sharply around it.
Step 1 - read the two columns for the hour you are considering
A trading hour is attractive when the market moves a lot relative to what entering costs. The last column divides the average hourly movement by the average spread in that hour — more movement per pip of spread means the hour is cheaper to trade relative to its opportunity, before strategy and news are considered.
BTC/USD hour by hour (measured)
| Hour (server) | Avg spread (pts) | Avg movement (pts) | Movement per pt of spread |
|---|---|---|---|
| 00:00 | 1000 | 38697.1 | 39× |
| 01:00 | 1000 | 41032.6 | 41× |
| 02:00 | 1000 | 37368.6 | 37× |
| 03:00 | 1000 | 33934 | 34× |
| 04:00 | 1000 | 28714.4 | 29× |
| 05:00 | 1000 | 43354.6 | 43× |
| 06:00 | 1000 | 31611.1 | 32× |
| 07:00 | 1000 | 30559 | 31× |
| 08:00 | 1000 | 52917.7 | 53× |
| 09:00 | 1000 | 33019 | 33× |
| 10:00 | 1000 | 34368 | 34× |
| 11:00 | 1000 | 30074 | 30× |
| 12:00 | 1000 | 81545.9 | 82× |
| 13:00 | 1000 | 58464.9 | 58× |
| 14:00 | 1000 | 72075.3 | 72× |
| 15:00 | 1000 | 56622.6 | 57× |
| 16:00 | 1000 | 55829.7 | 56× |
| 17:00 | 1000 | 43020.4 | 43× |
| 18:00 | 1000 | 41203.9 | 41× |
| 19:00 | 1000 | 37254.9 | 37× |
| 20:00 | 1000 | 32412.1 | 32× |
| 21:00 | 1000 | 46467 | 46× |
| 22:00 | 1000 | 37940.4 | 38× |
| 23:00 | 1000 | 44865.3 | 45× |
Spread here is the average of the quotes captured in that hour over the last day, and movement is the average high-to-low of the same hour over recent sessions. Hours are platform server time, so convert once from your own clock before picking a row.
Step 2 - see where the day tightens and where it widens
| Instrument | Tightest avg spread | Widest avg spread | Biggest hourly movement | Movement-per-cost peak |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BTC/USD | 1000 at 07:00 | 1000 at 07:00 | 81545.9 at 12:00 | 12:00 |
| ETH/USD | 100 at 07:00 | 100 at 07:00 | 2845.4 at 12:00 | 12:00 |
Spread is quoted in pips on forex and in points elsewhere. The movement-per-cost peak is simply the hour with the most movement for each pip of spread, which is a sizing hint rather than an entry signal.
Step 3 - decide whether the stop can clear the rollover
In this sample the widest BTC/USD hour was 07:00 server time, where the average spread ran about 1× the typical hour. This is the daily rollover window — swaps are applied, liquidity providers reset, and quotes briefly widen. Positions held with tight stop-losses through this hour can be stopped out by the spread alone. The most active hours by tick count were 06:00, 16:00, 17:00, 19:00.
Where these hourly figures come from
- Spread by hour: every captured quote on Exness's own MT5 feed, bucketed by server hour (last 24h).
- Movement by hour: average H1 candle range over the last 7 sessions, from the same feed.
- The ratio compares movement to entry cost only — it is not a prediction of direction.
- Figures refresh on a schedule and vary day to day.
Hourly spread and hourly movement are captured in-terminal from the platform feed and recomputed on a schedule. Read them at the hour the order will actually be sent rather than as a property of the instrument.
Open Exness Account →Why the rollover hour deserves its own rule
The daily rollover is the one hour where a widening spread is structural rather than incidental: swaps are applied, liquidity providers reset, and quotes briefly stretch. A position carried through it with a tight stop-loss can be stopped out by the spread rather than by the market moving.
The practical rule is short. Either be out of the widening window, or be in it with a stop that has room for the spread the table shows for that hour. Deciding which before the order is sent is the entire point of reading the hour first.
What the hourly figures can and cannot tell you
They describe recent behaviour of one instrument at one hour, measured from the platform feed: spread as the average of the quotes captured in that hour, movement as the average high-to-low of the hour over recent sessions. They are useful for sizing and for stop placement.
They are not a forecast. A pattern that held over a quiet week will not survive a scheduled release, and the figures refresh on a schedule and vary day to day. Read them as a default that news overrides.
Turning an hour into an entry rule
The output of this page should be a sentence you can act on, not a chart you look at. Something like: enter this instrument between these two server hours, avoid the rollover window, and if an entry has to happen inside it then widen the stop by the amount the spread stretches there.
Written down once, that rule survives longer than any single reading, because it is about the shape of the day rather than about a particular number. Re-check the figures when the rule stops matching what the platform shows.
Picking the hour to send an order
- Convert your local time into platform server time first. Every hour in the tables below is server time, not local time.
- Find the hour you are considering and read two numbers: the average spread and the average movement in that hour.
- Read the ratio column. It divides movement by spread, so a higher figure means the hour is cheaper to enter relative to how far the market usually travels in it.
- Check where that hour sits against the rollover window, where quotes briefly widen as swaps are applied and liquidity providers reset.
- If a stop-loss is tight and the hour is a widening one, either move the entry to a different hour or widen the stop and reduce the volume.
- Re-check on the day. These are averages over a recent window, and a news release will override any hourly pattern.
The ratio compares movement with entry cost only. It says nothing about direction and is not a signal.