Unit Sizing
What a Unit means in Turtle-style trading and how it standardizes risk across markets.
A Unit is a standardized block of position risk. Instead of asking “how many contracts should I buy?”, the system asks “how much position represents one defined risk unit?”
Conceptual formula
The exact formula depends on the instrument, but the logic is:
Unit size = account risk budget / market volatility value
The volatility value may include N, contract multiplier and price unit. The goal is to make one Unit in one market comparable to one Unit in another.
Small accounts
Small accounts may not be able to size perfectly because of minimum order sizes. In that case, the trader must decide whether to skip the signal, reduce the market universe or accept that risk will be less precise.
Precision should not be faked. If the minimum tradable size is too large, the risk is too large.