STEADYTRADE
Strategy backtests · past-window simulation, not investment advice
BTC/USDTETH/USDT

DCA · BTC/USDT

Buy a fixed amount on a fixed schedule, never sell. The baseline every other strategy must beat.

Total return
1058.6%
10,000 → 115,856
vs buy & hold
+528.7%
over the same period 529.9%
Max drawdown
76.5%
10,000 → 4,484
Longest underwater
846
846 days · 96% of the period
Settings that beat it
13 / 16
of 16 parameter settings tested
Win rate
—
n=0
This beat simply buying and holding.

Over 2018-01-01 → 2026-09-23 it returned 1058.6% against 529.9% for buying once on the first day and never touching it — 528.7% better. Across the whole parameter grid, 13 of 16 settings beat the benchmark; the median setting returned 793.2%.

It spent 846 days below its previous high at the longest stretch — 96% of the whole period under water.

Price & fills

Equity

account equitybuy & holddashed = starting capital

49 fills. Signals are taken on the close and filled at the next open.

A 0% risk of ruin here is a property of the test, not a safety rating. These runs are long-only spot with no borrowed money, so there is no margin call and nothing can force the position closed. The account cannot be wiped out — it gets stuck holding the asset instead. Capital deployed (49×) and max drawdown (76.5%) are the numbers that carry the risk on this page. The same rules run on margin would be a different measurement, and this figure would not stay at zero.

Outcome distribution

A single return is one chosen start date. These are 95 runs of the same rules with the start shifted forward 30 days at a time.

Worstp10p25Medianp75p90BestLosing starts
-50.9%-34.5%-10.9% 25.4%56.2% 99.9%382.0%33%

Does it survive its own parameters?

The headline above uses one parameter setting. Here is every setting tested: 16 combinations, median 793.2%, best 1243.5%, worst 422.1%. 13 of them beat buy & hold.

Parameter grid

DCA run across its own parameter range over the full period. The same rules flip from profit to loss depending only on the numbers you picked — which is why a single headline return is meaningless on its own.

intervalBars 1intervalBars 7intervalBars 14intervalBars 30
amountPct 0.01793%1212%856%465%
amountPct 0.02684%1059%1200%814%
amountPct 0.05505%777%914%1243%
amountPct 0.1422%637%722%839%

Hover a cell for trade count and drawdown. “·” = invalid combination (fast ≥ slow).

Year by year

Year201820192020202120222023202420252026
Return-49%16%196%3%-35%56%51%-14%16%
Max DD56%44%13%31%41%14%16%29%13%
Trades000000000

What it is

Reference — Glowwiki: 분할매수 (정액적립식)
The definitions and formulas below follow that article. It states its own limit plainly:
“실제 수익으로 이어지는지는 이 문서에서 다루지 않음.”
That is the question this page answers.

Note from the reference: The harmonic-mean advantage is stated against buying a constant NUMBER of units each period — not against a lump sum invested up front. Those are different comparisons and are commonly confused.

Standard retail accumulation method; described by U.S. SEC investor education material. Also known as DCA, periodic investment.

Formulas

Units accumulated
U = Σ (A / pᵢ)
A = fixed amount per interval
Average cost
P̄ = (n · A) / U
The harmonic mean of the purchase prices — always ≤ the arithmetic mean

Established

Conventional reading

Listed as convention, not as established fact.

Sources

  1. Dollar-Cost Averaging — U.S. SEC — Investor.gov (en)
  2. Dollar cost averaging — Wikipedia (en)
  3. 분할매수 (정액적립식) — Glowwiki (ko)

Assumptions

Period2018-01-01 → 2026-09-23
Parameters{"intervalBars":7,"amountPct":0.02}
Fees0.10% taker + 0.05% slippage, both legs
Starting capital10,000 USDT · long-only spot, no leverage
Rolling test365 bars × 95 start dates
Input hash7d4e48ddec64d151

Other strategies · BTC/USDT

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