Does your edge survive 100 trades?
Enter your win rate, average winner, and risk per trade. The calculator shows your expectancy and simulates 1,000 possible equity curves to estimate your drawdown risk. Free, no signup.
Every change simulates 1,000 runs of 100 trades with a fixed percentage of equity risked per trade. Losses are 1R by definition.
Expectancy per trade
+0.26 R
Expected account change per trade
+0.3 %
Median account after 100 trades
×1.28
Chance of a 30% drawdown
0 %
Gray lines show 24 sample runs, the highlighted line is the median of all 1,000. Same inputs, very different outcomes. That spread is variance, and it is why a handful of trades proves nothing.
These numbers assume you know your real win rate and average winner. Most traders guess. A journal measures.
See how Clarveo measures itWhat trading expectancy means
Expectancy is the average amount you can expect to win or lose per trade, measured in R, where 1R is the amount you risk on a single trade. It combines win rate and average winner into one number. Positive expectancy means your rules produce a profit on average. Negative expectancy means no amount of discipline will save the system.
Expectancy = win rate x average win (R) - loss rate x 1R
A 40% win rate can be profitable and a 70% win rate can lose money. What decides is the ratio between winners and losers. Win rate feels good; expectancy is the number that pays.
What risk of ruin tells you
Risk of ruin is the probability that an account hits a drawdown so deep that recovery becomes unrealistic before the edge has time to play out. Even a profitable system loses often. Risk too much per trade, and a perfectly normal losing streak can take you out of the game.
The simulation above runs your numbers 1,000 times and counts how many runs hit your chosen drawdown at least once within 100 trades. Risk per trade is the strongest lever: the same edge can compound calmly or blow up, depending only on position size.
Frequently asked questions
- What is a good expectancy per trade?
- Anything reliably above 0R after costs is workable. Many consistent retail traders operate somewhere between 0.1R and 0.3R per trade. The exact number matters less than knowing it from your own data instead of guessing.
- What win rate do I need to be profitable?
- There is no fixed number. Profitability depends on the combination of win rate and payoff ratio. With 2R average winners, roughly 34% is break even before costs. With 1R winners you need more than 50%.
- How is risk of ruin calculated here?
- By Monte Carlo simulation: 1,000 runs of 100 trades each, with a fixed percentage of equity risked per trade. A run counts as ruined when it hits your chosen maximum drawdown from its peak. This is an estimate under simplified assumptions, not a guarantee.
- Where do I get my real win rate and average winner?
- From your trade history. A trading journal computes both from your actual fills. Clarveo imports trades from your broker and keeps these numbers current, so you test your edge with data instead of memory.
This calculator is an educational tool. It models simplified assumptions (constant win rate, constant payoff, fixed fractional risk) that no live trading system matches exactly. It is not investment advice and no outcome is promised.