Time zones: how Ink reads your file's clock

Ink's trading days run on New York time, so Ink stores every trade's time in New York time. Getting this right matters: it decides which day a trade lands on, your session stats, and your daily loss.

#Tradovate files

A Tradovate CSV has no time zone in it — the times are the clock of the computer it was exported on. When you import one, pick that time zone at Times in this file are in. Ink:

• converts every fill to New York time, applying daylight saving for each date (Dubai is 8 hours from New York in October and 9 in January);
• shows your first trade's time before you import — if it reads Not when you took it?, change the time zone first;
• remembers the time zone for that account next time.

If the clocks changed during the night you traded and two fills fall in the repeated hour, Ink can't tell their order from the file alone. It refuses the file rather than guess.

#TopstepX files

TopstepX writes each time with its own offset, so there's nothing to choose — Ink converts them to New York automatically.

#Which day a trade belongs to

• Calendar, period cards and week totals: the New York day the trade closed.
• Prop rules (daily loss, consistency, end-of-day drawdown): the account's session, 6pm–5pm ET on futures — a trade closed Tuesday at 6:30pm ET counts toward Wednesday's session. CFD & Forex accounts start at 5pm ET: see The trading session.

#Older Tradovate imports

Trades imported from Tradovate before Ink asked for the time zone may be shifted. If an account still has some, the Import page shows a Timezone fix note when you pick it — time-based insights stay hidden for that account until it's fixed. Delete that account's trades (Accounts → the account → Delete all trades) and re-import your Tradovate files with the right time zone, or fix them one by one in the trade editor. Deleting removes all trades on the account — manual ones, notes and screenshots too — so only do it if you still have the files for everything.