Don’t Get Fooled by Old Signals! Mastering Signal Timing in Freqtrade

This article was produced by the Quantitative Trading Lab at https://www.itrade.icu. Visit for more benefits. In strategy development, the timeliness of signals has a huge impact on results. Freqtrade provides several parameters to help you precisely control signal timing and data processing frequency, preventing premature or delayed signals from causing missed opportunities.

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⏳ ignore_buying_expired_candle_after — Ignore Expired Buy Signals

ignore_buying_expired_candle_after = 30  # unit: seconds

• Controls how long (in seconds) a buy signal remains valid after a candle has closed.

• For example, if set to 30, signals from a closed candle are still accepted within 30 seconds.

• Beyond this time, buy signals based on the closed candle are ignored, preventing outdated signals from triggering wrong entries.

Use cases:

• Prevent frequent trades caused by outdated signals in highly volatile markets.

• Fine-tune response time for high-frequency strategies to avoid missing optimal entries.

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⏰ process_only_new_candles — Execute Logic Only on New Candles

process_only_new_candles is a boolean parameter in Freqtrade strategies that controls whether functions like populate_indicators run only when a new candle is completed. Default is True.

Example

class MyStrategy(IStrategy):
    process_only_new_candles = True  # Run only after new candle closes

    timeframe = '5m'
    stoploss = -0.1
    minimal_roi = {"0": 0.05}

    def populate_indicators(self, dataframe, metadata):
        # Indicators calculated only once per 5m candle
        dataframe['rsi'] = ta.RSI(dataframe, timeperiod=14)
        return dataframe

• Controls whether indicators and signals are computed only after a candle is fully closed.

• Default True: avoids noisy signals from incomplete candles.

• If False: indicators are recalculated during candle formation, useful for high-frequency data needs but may increase false signals and CPU load.

Behavior Comparison

Value	Behavior
True	Executes only after each candle closes
False	Continuously recalculates, signals may change frequently

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✅ Summary Table

Parameter	Description	Recommended Default
ignore_buying_expired_candle_after	Set expiration for old candle buy signals	0 (disabled) or as needed
process_only_new_candles	Run logic only on closed candles to avoid noise	True (recommended)