summary: running IB across the NY and London sessions on a single ticker is 2 separate chart tabs, 2 separate alerts, and session-specific filter tuning — here's the full walkthrough, and the gotchas that trip people up on the first go.

the IB (initial balance) algo runs on 2 sessions: NY (9:30–10:30 ET) and London (3:00–4:00 AM ET). there's no Asian IB — that's an ORB-only session. if you want both NY and London IBs running on the same ticker, the setup is 2 chart tabs, 2 indicator instances, and 2 alerts.

the setup is mechanical once you've done it once. the part that trips people up is assuming you can stack both sessions on a single chart. you can't — each session needs its own chart tab, its own indicator instance, and its own alert.

this article walks you through the whole thing from scratch. if you're running ORB on 3 sessions as well, the pattern is identical — see running ORB on 3 sessions — NY, London, and Asian walkthrough.

make sure you've got the basics in place first. if any of these aren't done yet, start with setting up TradingView for edgeful algos.

if you're running the 2 sessions on different broker accounts (e.g., a personal account and a prop firm account), you'll need a separate strategy per account. see running multiple algos — rules and conflicts.

here's the piece most people miss on their first attempt — you cannot put 2 IB indicators on a single chart, one configured for NY and one for London. TradingView alerts lock to the indicator instance and the chart symbol at the time of creation. if you try to layer NY and London on one chart, the alerts collide and you'll get duplicated or missed fills.

the clean setup: one chart tab per session, one IB indicator per tab, one alert per tab. 2 tabs total.

they can both be on the same ticker (e.g., MES) — the separation is just at the chart tab level.

do this 2 times — once for NY, once for London. the steps are identical for each session.

in TradingView, click the plus icon at the bottom of the screen to open a new tab. load your futures symbol (e.g., MESH2026 for March Micro E-mini S&P). use the specific front-month contract, not the continuous symbol (MES1!) — continuous is for backtesting only, except for Topstep accounts.

for the full reference on continuous vs. front-month and handling rollovers, see futures contract rollovers.

[SCREENSHOT NEEDED: TradingView with 2 chart tabs labeled NY and London at the bottom]

open the indicators panel → invite-only scripts → add the IB algo indicator to the chart.

open the indicator settings (double-click the indicator name on the chart) and set the session dropdown to the session this chart tab is for. on your NY tab, select NY (9:30–10:30 ET). on your London tab, select London (3:00–4:00 AM ET).

this is the single most important setting on this page — it tells the algo when to calculate the initial balance and when to allow entries.

while you're in the settings, pick your variant: standard IB or breakeven stop IB. the variant can differ across your 2 chart tabs if you want — e.g., breakeven stop on NY, standard on London. for a full breakdown of the variants, see using the initial balance (IB) algo.

this is where most people lose the London session — they copy the filter min/max values from NY and reuse them on London. those values don't transfer.

IB sizes are structurally different across sessions. London IBs tend to run smaller than NY IBs on the same ticker, so a filter range tuned to the NY distribution will go silent on London because almost no London IBs fall in that range.

for each session, pull up the IB by-levels report on edgeful for that ticker + session combination and rebuild your filter range against that distribution. the full procedure (with the inclusive-min / exclusive-max gotcha) is in no trade visualized on your chart — specifically the re-tune filters when you change sessions section.

right-click the indicator on the chart → Add alert. in the alert dialog:

for the full alert setup detail, see setting up TradingView alerts for algo automation.

this takes 5 seconds and saves you an hour every time something goes wrong. name your 2 alerts with the session baked in:

when the TradingView alert log fires — or doesn't — the session is the first thing you need to identify. generic names like "IB alert" or "MES alert" force you to open each alert and check its settings to figure out which session it belongs to. don't do that to yourself.

for how to read the alert log, see reading the TradingView alert log.

go back to step 1 and do it one more time. when you're done, you should have:

before you walk away, confirm each session can actually fire. the easiest way is to wait for a session to go live and watch the alert log.

do this for each session over the course of its active hour. if one session fires and the other doesn't, the issue is almost always either filter tuning (the range is silently excluding every IB on that session) or an alert that got left in a stale state after you changed a setting.

you changed a setting and the alert stopped firing. TradingView alerts lock to indicator settings at the moment of creation. any change — session, variant, filter range, risk parameters — requires deleting the alert and recreating it.

the London session never fires. 9 times out of 10 this is filter tuning. the IB by-levels report for London on that specific ticker will show you the actual distribution — tune against that, not against your NY range.

you see ORB levels but no IB levels on one session. check the indicator — it's easy to accidentally leave an ORB indicator on a chart tab you meant for IB. open the indicator list and confirm each tab has the IB algo indicator applied, with the right session set.

the contract rolled and now neither alert fires. both alerts are tied to the same expiring contract symbol. you have to delete and recreate both on the new front month. see contract rollover: why your algo silently stopped trading.