Five different user formula formats are available:

1. Q formulas or Quote formulas: Define specific market spreads such as the energy "crack" spread, the soybean "crush," gold/silver ratio, interest rate spreads, butterfly spreads, Eurodollar strips, and many others. You can convert London Metal Exchange quotes into COMEX equivalent prices. More than 200 formulas are supplied. To observe any spread, open a new chart and type in the Q number and the spread chart is displayed.
2. Conditions: Define specific technical situations such as high-volume bars, study criteria met (for example, RSI > 75), reversal bars, and so on. Conditions are used to color or place markers over price bars. More than 30 conditions are supplied.
3. User values: These are similar to conditions but they return specific values that are used within other formulas and functions.
4. Custom studies: Develop indicators based on specific technical market actions using inputs you select from the toolbox within the Formula Editor. Name the study and add it as a button to your study collection displayed on the toolbars.
5. Trading systems: CQG offers a set of backtesting modules including an entry signal evaluator, trade system optimizer, and backtesting capability.    CQG trading systems are well suited for users who want to test procedures and technical setups on historical data.