> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://help.hydravision.ai/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://help.hydravision.ai/products/asset-profiler/scope-and-limits.md).

# Scope and Limits

Asset Profiler is deliberately narrow, and knowing where its edges are makes the parts inside them much more useful.

## What it doesn't tell you

Short page, worth two minutes. Asset Profiler is deliberately narrow, and knowing where its edges are makes the parts inside them much more useful.

{% hint style="warning" %}
**The common misreading.** That the Profiler has already taken your strategy into account. It hasn't. It models one simple case on purpose, so the answer stays comparable between assets and between traders.
{% endhint %}

### It models a fixed grid

The Profiler assumes evenly spaced positions. Dynamic grids are much harder to model, and any model would carry assumptions that don't hold for everyone.

This matters less than it sounds. A dynamic grid still uses the minimum step as the smallest gap allowed between two positions. The gap can be wider when re-entry conditions don't allow an entry, but never tighter. So the floor the Profiler gives you is the right floor either way. What changes is how often you actually sit at it.

### It models the simplest PCL close

Hydra Vision traders run many different PCL strategies. Modelling all of them would produce a number that fits none of them.

So the Profiler models the base case: the most profitable position needs to viably clear a losing position on the anchor side of the grid. Two positions, one close. Everything the report says about retrace distance and waiting time is measured against that.

Real grids are deeper than two positions. In practice a shallow grid needs roughly one and a half to two steps of retrace to work through, and a deeper one two and a half to four. That scale is a rule of thumb, not something the Profiler calculates. Keep it in mind when you read the retrace figures. The report provides the unit, and your strategy will decide the multiple.

### It ignores stop-loss exits

Positions that close via a stop loss, Multi Trail for example, are a by-product of the strategy you chose, not a property of the asset. They're deliberately out of scope.

The same goes for SmartEntry re-entry signals. Modelling those per asset would mean guessing at your settings, and the answer would be more subjective than useful. Test runs are the right way to find those.

### It says nothing about volume

The Profiler does not recommend lot sizes, volume progressions, or risk per position, and it never will. That's a deliberate line, and Hydra Vision does not cross it.

### It doesn't predict profit

The verdict describes whether the asset's movement and costs can support a grid at all. An asset can be comfortably **Tradeable** and still lose you money, because what happens next depends on your strategy, your timing and the market, **none of which the Profiler can see**.

### It describes one account, not the asset everywhere

Most of a profile comes from your account's trading terms, not from the market: the spread you are quoted, the commission, whether swap is charged and how much, and the contract size. The same symbol at the same broker can be a different proposition on an ECN, an STP and a cent account, and different again at another broker. In a set of real profiles of one currency pair over the same months, the market measurements agreed within about 3%, but the Minimum Step Size range, the verdict and the carry runway were different on every account. See [Comparing Assets](/products/asset-profiler/comparing-assets.md#the-same-asset-on-four-accounts) for the figures.

A profile therefore applies to the account and symbol it was run on. On any other account, including another account type at the same broker, its numbers no longer describe the costs the grid will meet. The Profiler saves each profile in a folder named after the account, which keeps them apart.

### What the report does cover

To be clear about the other side of the line, the report is a reliable guide to:

* the range of step sizes the asset can support, and which end of it is constrained by what;
* what a pair of positions costs to open, in ticks and in dollars;
* how far price has to come back, and how long that has historically taken;
* what holding costs per day, and which side of the market pays it;
* how much the session you trade in changes your costs.

### What to do with this

* Treat the step range as a starting neighbourhood, not a setting. When it does go into **Minimum Step Size**, the value comes from the line under the range, and [Ticks, pips and price](/products/asset-profiler/ticks-pips-and-price.md) explains its unit.
* Expect to need more retrace than the two-position figure if you run deep grids.
* Nothing here replaces a back test. It does, however, replace the innumerable back tests you'd spend finding the right area to test in.