Tutorial 221 | Big Point Ruler

A Gold Pass member requested a set of tutorials and programs to create a “Big Point Ruler” on a chart —a visual tool showing how far the price would need to move to reach a target profit, such as $1,000, based on one contract (or any user-specified dollar amount and number of contracts).

To calculate this, it helps to know the point value — the dollar amount gained or lost for a one-point move in the futures contract. For the most common equity index futures, these values are:

 Symbol    Contract                      Multiplier        Tick Size        Tick Value    $ per 1-Point Move

ES                   E-mini S&P 500          $50 × index        0.25 points      $12.50               $50 per point
NQ                  E-mini Nasdaq-100   $20 × index        0.25 points      $5.00                  $20 per point
YM                  E-mini Dow Jones       $5 × index           1 point              $5.00                  $5 per point

For example:

On the @ES (E-mini S&P 500), a $1,000 move requires 20 points ($1,000 ÷ $50 = 20). The Big Point Ruler on an ES chart would therefore span 20 points.

On the @NQ (E-mini Nasdaq-100), it would take 50 points ($1,000 ÷ $20 = 50), so the ruler would be 50 points long.

and on the @YM (E-mini Dow Jones), it would take 200 points ($1,000 ÷ $5 = 200), so the ruler would be 200 points long.

The tutorial demonstrates how to draw and position the rectangle. The Charting Host object is used to detect if the chart is resized and the timer is used to refresh the chart every few seconds.

The syntax for these objects can be found by clicking on the object in the toolbox, selecting the object in the tool tray and then examining and copying the code from the designer generator code. Once the code is copied and pasted into the main program the object must be deleted from the tool tray. This is demonstrated in this tutorial.