Trade Ideas Review: Stock Scanner, AI, Trading Room Tested

This Trade Ideas review and test show it is by far the most advanced AI-driven trading software available to retail day traders. Trade Ideas has hundreds of strategies, scans, and automated trading algorithms with backtested performance results to satisfy the most demanding traders.

My testing will give you all the information you will need to make an informed decision on whether AI trade signals and auto-trading is right for you.

Trade Ideas Review Test Results & Ratings

Trade Ideas Rating	4.5/5.0
💸 Pricing & Software	★★★★★
🚦 Trading & Signals	★★★★★
📡 Scanning	★★★★✩
📰 News & Social	★★★✩✩
📈 Charts & Analysis	★★★★✩
🔍 Backtesting	★★★★★
🖱 Usability	★★★★✩

We independently research and recommend the best products. We also work with partners to negotiate discounts for you and may earn a small fee through our links.

Trade Ideas Review: Key Features

⚡ Features	Charts, Watchlists, Screening
🏆 Unique Features	AI Trade Signals, Trading Room
🎯 Best for	US Day Traders
♲ Subscription	Monthly, Yearly
💰 Price	$118-$228/mo
💻 OS	Web Browser, PC
🎮 Trial	Try the Live Trading Room Free
✂ Discount	-15% With Code “Liberated”
🌎 Region	USA

Trade Ideas Pros

• 3 AI Trading Algorithms That Beat the Market
• Get A Free Holly AI Stock Trade Every Week
• Fully Automated Backtesting
• Exceptional Stock Scanning
• Specific Audited Trade Signals
• Auto-trading With AI Signals
• Free Live Trading Room Access

Trade Ideas Cons

• Old School User Interface
• No Mobile App

What is Trade Ideas?

Founded in 2003, Trade Ideas is a web & desktop-based software platform for finding day trading opportunities. Historically specializing in real-time stock scanning, Trade Ideas now incorporates cutting-edge AI algorithms that backtest every stock in the USA & Canada for high probability trading opportunities.

To understand the platform, we first need to look at the pricing structure and what you get for your money.

Trade Ideas Pricing & Discounts

Trade Ideas offer a Standard Plan that costs $118/mo, including a live trading room, streaming trade ideas, and powerful scanning and charting. The Premium plan costs $228/mo, adding precise trade signals, 3 AI bots and auto trading.

Trade Ideas Standard Pricing & Savings

Trade Ideas Standard costs $118 per month, but you can save $348 with an annual subscription costing $1068, a 25% discount. Trade Ideas’ Standard plan includes a live daily trading room and the real-time streaming trade ideas scanner providing access to 40 pre-configured scans. Also included are ten simultaneous charts, chart trading, 500 price alerts, and 30 curated channels of ideas.

Trade Ideas Standard Features:

• Live Trading Room – Full access to the live trading room.
• Real-time Streaming Trade Ideas – Scanner providing access to 40 pre-configured scans.
• Simultaneous Charts – The ability to have ten chart windows open.
• Chart Based Visual Trade Assistant – The ability to trade directly from charts.
• Up to 500 Price Alerts – Price alerts to notify you when a stock meets your criteria.
• Channel Bar Curated Workspaces – Access to 30+ channels of ideas.

Trade Ideas Pro AI Cost

Trade Ideas Premium costs significantly more than Standard costing $228 per month, or you can save $468 by going for an annual subscription costing $2268. You get robust backtesting, the Holly AI system, and auto trading for this investment.

Trade Ideas Premium Features:

• AI Virtual Trading Analyst Holly – 3 different constantly evolving AI algorithms
• Chart Based AI Trade Assistance & Entry and Exit Signals
• Risk Assessment – Detailed information on the backtested performance of the recommended trade.
• Build and Backtest any Trade Idea – Extremely powerful point & click backtesting system.
• Autotrade w/ Brokerage Plus and AI – Advanced auto trading using Interactive Brokers.

Trade Ideas Coupon Code -15%

Use the Trade Ideas coupon code “Liberated” to get 15% off your first purchase, worth $468 when going for the premium service. This is a valid code provided to me as a Trade Ideas partner.

Get 15% Off Trade Ideas

Try the Live Trade Ideas Trading Room Free

Trade Ideas Platform

The Trade Ideas comes in two flavors, a full-blown desktop version, and a lighter web version. The Trade Ideas web service can be accessed from any PC or Mac and contains most of the desktop platform’s functionality. Serious traders will want to download and install the desktop platform because it is endlessly configurable and multi-monitor friendly.

To be honest, when you first open Trade Ideas on your desktop, the software feels extremely clunky and not user-friendly. Every element is actually its own separate individual window, so if you want to resize the view, you need to resize all eight windows. This seems such a hassle initially and seems to hark back to the age of Windows 98.

But, there is a good reason for this design. Like I, if you operate multiple monitors and large screens, you have endless flexibility and window configuration options.  Also, even though they are fully separate windows, they can be linked and unlinked together to provide a fluid experience.

So although it is clunky and some of the most important functions are hidden behind right-click menus in certain windows, you start to get used to the design after a few hours.

Trade Ideas Scanner

The Trade Ideas scanner is at the heart of the system and uniquely provides access to over 40 different and innovative market scans. The scanner includes long and short strategies, volume breakouts, premarket price moves, and price pivot action.

By clicking New -> Alerts, you get access to the Alert Config Window, which gives you immediate access to over 40 different trading scans. You can see all the in-built scans categorized into Bullish, Bearish, or Neutral in the screenshot below. Depending on the overall market direction, you can easily select a potential strategy for the day.

One scan I find particularly impressive and innovative is the “Unusual Social Mentions Scan.” The Trade Ideas AI engine is constantly scanning StockTwits for surges in mentions of particular stocks, so if you click load settings, you will be immediately presented with a list of stocks spiking on social media.

Of course, you can customize any of the scans featured here or even create your own alerts from scratch.

Trade Ideas Scanner Cost

The Trade Ideas scanner costs $118 per month or $1068 annually and is included in the standard Trade Ideas service. Use the Coupon code “Liberated” to save a further 15% off this price.

Trade Ideas Channels

Trade Ideas provide over 30 curated channels that highlight theme-based trading opportunities that the team believes present outsized profit opportunities. The channels cover social media buzz, earning opportunities, and multiple industry plays.

A snapshot of Trade Ideas channels:

• EV Related: Trading strategies in the Electric Vehicle Industry.
• The Small Exchange: interested in small-cap businesses, then this is your channel.
• Social Media: Stocks buzzing with positive and negative sentiment on social media. You can go with the crowd or against it.
• Earnings Plays: The channel to play the very lucrative earnings announcement momentum.
• Weed Watchers: For those interested in the fast-growing medicinal cannabis market.
• Enjoy the Show: A Channel that cycles through all the hottest trade setups of the day.
• Trade the Gaps: Highlighting trades exhibiting the clear technical analysis price gap pattern.
• Many Other Channels; China, Biotech’s, Penny Movers, ETFs, Defense, Banks

Trade Ideas Backtesting

The Trade Ideas platform has a powerful backtesting system, which is not only easy to use, but you do not need to have any programming knowledge. A point-and-click backtesting system is rare in this industry; the only other good software with this capability is TrendSpider.

I have run many backtests with Trade Ideas, but the one I wanted to focus on was a backtest of the “Unusual Social Mentions Scan”; this is a good test of the wisdom of crowds.

I wanted to focus on was a backtest of the “Unusual Social Mentions Scan”.  This is a good test of the wisdom of crowds.

As you can see in the backtest result above, the crowds are not very wise as the backtest shows that the system loses 70% per year. This helps me draw three conclusions.

1. Do not listen to people on social media.
2. Trade Ideas provides an excellent and unique insight into stock market crowd sentiment.
3. You may have a winning system if you do the opposite of what people suggest on StockTwits.

Overall I rate the backtesting system a 5/5 Stars.

Trade Ideas AI Video

Get A Free Stock Trade Idea Every Week From Holly AI

Trade Ideas Pro AI

The AI algorithms developed by Trade Ideas are the main reason you would want to sign up. The Pro AI system is three AI bots called Holly, Holly 2.0, and Holly Neo. Together, the Holly AI bots represent the most innovative trading AI available to retail investors today.

I had a lengthy zoom session with Sean Mclaughlin, Senior Strategist over at Trade Ideas, to delve into how the AI works, and I was very impressed. This company is laser-focused on providing traders with the best data-supported trading opportunities.

Holly is 3 AI Systems Applying Over 70 Strategies Differently.

Holly AI

Holly AI is the original incarnation of the algorithms. Holly applies 70 different strategies to all the stocks on the US stock exchanges; 70 strategies multiplied by 8,000+ stocks means millions of backtests every day.

Only the strategies with the highest backtested win rate over 60% and an estimated risk-reward ratio of 2:1 will be suggested as potential trade the following day.

Holly 2.0

Holly 2.0 is a more aggressive version of Holly AI, presenting more aggressive day trading scenarios for you to choose from. Trade Ideas operates three key trading styles with each AI engine, conservative, moderate & aggressive.  Holly 2.0 is aggressive.

Holly Neo

Holly NEO is a newer AI seeking to trade real-time chart patterns. Holly Nea utilizes a mix of long and short trades based on stock price pullbacks and stock price breakouts.

• Pullback Long – Seeks to identify trades where the stock price is down and seeks to move up on higher volume.
• Breakout Long – Stock price breaks out through a key resistance or to new highs.
• Pullback Short – identifying a short pullback opportunity in price.
• Breakdown Short – a shorting opportunity where upward momentum breaks down.

Trade Ideas Buy & Sell Signals

During testing of Trade Ideas, I was impressed that Holly visually shows you every buy and sell signal on a chart. The charts depict in-play trades and historical trades, making it easy to understand the strategy and potential.

I have highlighted a trade recommended by Holly AI (Holly Grail) in the chart below. This trade for Cleveland Biolabs (Ticker: CBLI) made a 25% profit within 4 hours. Not how the buy and sell signals are depicted on the chart.

The Facts About Trade Ideas AI

Trade Ideas provides services to institutions and retail investors, recommending 3 to 10 trades per day which last from a few minutes to a few hours. The Trade Ideas AI engine returns at least 20% per year without leverage and has beaten the market over the last three years.

• Trade Ideas has large institutional clients and is a legitimate business.
• Trade Ideas recommends, on average, about 3 to 10 trades per day.
• Each trade duration is from a few minutes to a few hours.
• You need to be an active day trader to take advantage of Trade Ideas.
• Trade Ideas returns approximately 20% per year.
• Trade Ideas has, in the last three years, beaten the S&P500.
• You need to be able to short and go long to take advantage of the trading strategies.
• Depending upon your leverage, trading style, and trades you take, you could make more than 20% or even make a loss.
• TI is Day Trading Software; you will need to hold a minimum balance of $25K in your brokerage account to actively pattern day trade in the USA.

Trade Ideas Holly Performance

Upon downloading and analyzing 65 days of trades, I can confirm the performance numbers claimed by Trade Ideas. The performance of Trade Ideas Holly AI is publicly available and impressive.

To assess the performance of any system, one has to compare it to an underlying benchmark. Holly Grail AI has out-performed the S&P 500 since 2019 by 10%, and Holly 2.0 beat the market by 31%.

Holly AI Performance	Starting Capital Jan 2019	Ending Capital Oct 2020	Total Return	% Per Year
Holly Grail (AI)	$50,000.00	$71,186.00	42%	23%
Holly 2.0	$50,000.00	$80,510.00	61%	33%
Holly Neo	$50,000.00	$71,186.00	42%	23%
S&P 500	$50,000.00	$66,000.00	32%	17%

Table – Independent Performance Audit: Comparing $50,000 invested in the S&P 500 versus day trading with Trade Ideas.

Interestingly Holly did not suffer the huge losses incurred in the S&P 500 during the Corona Crash from March to April 2020.

Get 15% Off Trade Ideas

Try the Live Trade Ideas Trading Room Free

Trade Ideas Chart Technical Analysis

The one area in which I felt let down was the ability to perform my own technical analysis. Most technical analysis software, backtesting, and charting platforms offer at least 50 different technical analysis tools. Trade Ideas does not play that game. With TI, you simply get the following tools.

• Average Volume
• Exponential Moving Average (EMA)
• Relative Strength (RSI)
• Simple Moving Average (SMA)
• Volume Weighted Average Price
• Text Notation
• Trendlines

The lack of indicators is not a good look for Trade Ideas compared to MetaStock, which offers over 300 indicators and drawing tools, or TradingView with 160 indicators and chart types. To counter that argument, one could suggest that the design remit of TI removes the need for you to perform your own technical analysis by running all the backtests and finding all the opportunities for you, which is unique.

In any case, a few more technical analysis tools would help improve the product.

Trade Ideas Trading Room

I have often joined the Trade-Ideas trading room; skilled trader Barrie Einarson is the moderator and will answer any of your questions. Barrie also shares his screen so you can see his trades, see how he trades, and learn from him.  Many trading rooms can cost you a lot more than the entire Trade Ideas Pro subscription, which is an extremely valuable part of the value proposition. You can join the trade ideas trading room now to test it out.

Is Trade Ideas Worth The Money?

Yes. Trade Ideas is worth the money if you are an active pattern day trader willing to trade at least three times per day. Trading an account value of over $25K will help you profit after paying the Trade Ideas subscription cost.  

Trade Ideas is a professional company developing strategies to enable traders to beat the market for close to two decades. Trade Ideas is worth the subscription if:

1. You are an active day trader.
2. You want to become a full-time day trader.
3. You can maintain a minimum trading account balance of $25,000 (if you are a US resident).
4. You have a $0 Zero Commissions Broker.
5. You want to have the power of AI on your side to beat the market.

As a partner of Trade Ideas, I requested a discount for all our readers. Use the discount code “Liberated” to get 15% off your first purchase, worth $340 when going for the premium service.

Get 15% Off Trade Ideas

Try the Live Trade Ideas Trading Room Free