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Updated 2025-06-04·Editorial policy·Trading system

What is Carry Trade?

Carry trade borrows low-yield currency or asset and invests higher-yield, profiting from spread if unchanged.

Formula

Daily swap income = $100,000 × 4% ÷ 365 = ~$11/day 60-day carry income = $11 × 60 = $660

Indian market context (NSE)

Reference levels: Nifty 50 at 24,300, Reliance Industries at ₹1,300, Bank Nifty futures at 55,000 (lot size 30). Examples below show how Carry Trade shows up on Indian index, equity, and futures books — update to live quotes in your journal.

Nifty 50 perspective

Carry Trade on Nifty (24,300): backtest includes 9:15 liquidity and expiry-day behaviour; edge on index may vanish outside 10:00–14:30 window.

Reliance Industries perspective

Carry Trade on Reliance (₹1,300): liquidity is deep but event gaps dominate — strategy rules need explicit earnings blackout weeks.

Bank Nifty futures perspective

Carry Trade on Bank Nifty futures (55,000): high beta suits shorter holds; overnight carry trade must state NRML risk and gap plan in writing.

How to validate

  • Validate Carry Trade only after costs — gross win rate can hide negative expectancy.
  • Use walk-forward windows (e.g. last 60 / prior 60 trades) for stability.
  • Retire or refactor the tag if Carry Trade expectancy turns negative with 50+ trades.
  • Ensure no overlapping tags duplicate the same trades.

How to track in TradeLyser

  • Define Carry Trade in Strategy Board with entry/exit/skip criteria.
  • Enforce single-tag discipline — no secondary discretionary entries.
  • Review expectancy, win rate, and avg R monthly on the tag only.
  • Archive tag version when rules change; do not blend old and new trades.

Best practices

  • One playbook page per Carry Trade strategy with non-negotiable rules.
  • Paper trade rule changes for two weeks before live size.
  • Track costs explicitly on high-frequency Carry Trade variants.
  • Compare versioned tags after each rule amendment.

Common pitfalls

  • Adding discretionary trades under the Carry Trade tag.
  • Scaling up after one lucky week of Carry Trade results.
  • Ignoring brokerage drag on high-frequency variants.
  • Retiring a tag without exporting final statistics.

How to use this in TradeLyser

Macro notebook only unless you actively trade carry — tag FX/rates exposure.

Related terms

FAQ

Carry on Nifty?

Indirect via global flows — note risk-off days.

Retail carry common?

Less than FX carry — know product.

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