How TTMT Scores a Signal Channel: What the Number Means

Every channel in the Explore directory can now carry a TTMT score: one number out of 5, shown to one decimal, with the rows it was built from printed underneath. Explore sorts by that score by default, highest first.

A single number on a signal channel deserves suspicion, so this post goes through what the score is made of, how much data a channel needs before it gets one, and what the score does not claim. The short version of the last part: it describes what has already happened on TTMT users' accounts, and it is not a recommendation to follow anyone.

Where the data comes from

Every figure on Explore comes from trades TTMT executed for its own users on their MetaTrader accounts. Nothing is a backtest, a provider's screenshot, or a self-reported result.

A trade here means one execution on one account, opened from a channel message and closed at the broker. Only closed trades count, so the figures never carry floating profit. If eight TTMT users follow a channel and one message executes on all eight accounts, that adds eight closed trades to the channel's sample. The counts are executions, not posts.

Demo accounts count alongside live ones. Each channel page prints the trader split three ways – combined, live only, and demo only – so you can see how much of a result rests on real money.

The scorecard has four rows

The score is the top line of a scorecard. Each row is rated from 1 to 5 and carries a word next to the number: Poor, Weak, Fair, Strong, or Excellent.

Signal quality

This row combines two things. Profit factor is gross profit divided by gross loss: above 1.00 the winners paid for the losers, below 1.00 they did not. The share of traders in profit is the number of distinct TTMT users whose net result on that channel over the last 90 days is above zero, against everyone who closed at least one trade from it in the same window. Each person counts once, whatever their position size.

The two together cover different failures. A channel can have a good profit factor because two large accounts did well, and a channel can have most followers slightly in profit while the pooled numbers are poor. I wrote more about the second measure in the post on what share of a channel's followers are in profit.

Signal quality is measured over the channel's whole history on TTMT. On a channel page, the row opens to show the figures behind it.

Consistency

Consistency looks at the last 6 full calendar months and asks what share of them were profitable. A month only counts if it had 5 or more trades, and the row needs 3 such months before it is scored.

This is the row that separates a channel with one enormous month from a channel that earns steadily. It is also the row a new channel cannot have, however good its first weeks were.

Side-operations risk

This row is not about the signals. It reads 5, "None on record", unless the channel carries an account-management warning. While a warning stands it reads 1, "Account-management offer on record", and it returns to 5 when the warning is removed.

It exists because good signals and a dangerous offer often live in the same channel. A provider with a clean record who also asks followers to hand over their MT5 login is a different proposition from one who does not, and a performance number alone would never show it. The reasoning is in why a good signal channel can still cost you your account.

Transparency

Transparency is listed and not yet measured. It reads "Not enough data" on every channel and is left out of the score. I would sooner show an empty row than fill it with a number I cannot defend.

How the rows become one number

The TTMT score is the mean of the rows a channel has enough data for.

Take a channel with Signal quality 4, Consistency 3, and Side-operations risk 5. Transparency is unmeasured, so the score is the mean of three rows: 4.0 out of 5. Give the same channel an account-management warning and the third row drops to 1. The score becomes 2.7, with the signal rows unchanged. Those figures are an illustration of the arithmetic, not a real channel.

That second case is deliberate. A warning does not delete the channel's trading record. It moves the channel down the default order, and the scorecard shows you exactly which row did it.

Below a minimum, a row is blank

A row that has not met its minimum reads "Not enough data" and is left out of the mean. A low number is never used to mean unknown.

This matters more than it sounds. A channel with twelve closed trades has not earned a 1, and it has not earned a 5 either. Scoring it at all would give a run of luck the weight of a track record. So the row stays empty, the reason is printed next to it, and a channel with no score yet sorts after every scored one.

The ranking pages apply a second, stricter bar on top. A channel is only listed in a ranking with at least 100 closed trades and at least 5 distinct traders in the last 90 days. Channels under that line stay on Explore with their figures shown.

What the score does not tell you

It is not your result. The numbers pool accounts running very different settings. Risk per trade, how many entry layers a trader runs, how they handle take-profits, their broker's spread, and their own stop adjustments all move the outcome. Two traders on the same signal can finish a month on opposite sides of zero.

It mixes demo and live. Demo fills are kinder than live fills. The trader splits on each channel page are there so you can check how much of the record is real money.

It covers only channels TTMT users have connected. The directory is a sample of what our users follow, not a survey of Telegram. A big trade count concentrated in two or three accounts is still a thin sample.

History does not expire. A channel that changed its strategy, its analyst, or its owner keeps the trades it produced before the change.

A human can correct a row. When someone on our team corrects a computed row by hand, the scorecard says "adjusted by TTMT". Side-operations risk cannot be adjusted.

I have an interest in this. TTMT sells the execution, not the signals, and people copying channels is how the company makes money. We take no share of a provider's subscription revenue and are not paid for a listing or a position in a table. You should still know the directory is built by someone who benefits when it looks useful.

How to use it when choosing a channel

Start with the score to narrow the list, then open the scorecard and read the rows. A 3.7 made of Strong signal quality and Weak consistency is a different channel from a 3.7 made of two Fair rows.

Check which rows are blank. A score resting on one measured row plus Side-operations risk tells you much less than one resting on all three.

Then look past the score. Win rate is still on the channel page, and it is worth reading next to profit factor: a high win rate with a profit factor under 1.00 is a channel banking small wins and taking large losses. Read the traders-in-profit count as a count, not a percentage, because 4 of 5 and 40 of 50 are not the same evidence. If a sort by something else suits you better, the sort control offers win rate, profit factor, trader win rate, activity, and popularity.

None of this replaces checking the channel itself. The nine checks for a real signal channel cover what no directory can see from trade records, and a demo account is still the right place to start a channel you have not traded before.

The full definitions, including how ties are broken and how a provider can ask for a correction, are on the methodology page. Past results do not predict future results, and nothing on Explore is financial advice.

Start a free 7-day trial at telegramtometatrader.com, or browse the channel directory and open a scorecard for a channel you already follow.