PnL (also written P&L) stands for profit and loss: how much money a trade, a day or an account made or lost. In trading it comes in two pairs that cause most of the confusion. Realized PnL is from positions you have closed; unrealized PnL is from positions still open. Gross PnL is before commissions and fees; net PnL is after them. Most arguments about “what did I actually make?” come down to which of those four numbers is on the screen.
What PnL means in trading
For one trade, PnL is the price move times what each point is worth, times your size. For a short, flip the sign of the move.
PnL = (Exit price − Entry price) × Point value × Contracts
Buy 2 ES at 5600 and sell at 5612.50. That is 12.5 points × $50.00 a point × 2 contracts = +$1,250.00. Stocks work the same way with a point value of $1 a share. The futures calculators have the point and tick value for every common CME contract.
Realized vs unrealized PnL
Realized PnL is locked in: the position is closed and the result can't change. Unrealized PnL, sometimes called open or floating PnL, is what an open position would make if you closed it at the current price. It moves with every tick.
Say you buy 3 MES at 5600, sell 1 at 5610, and hold the other 2 with the market at 5605:
| Part of the position | Type | PnL |
|---|---|---|
| 1 sold at 5610 | Realized | +$50.00 |
| 2 still open, market at 5605 | Unrealized | +$50.00 |
| Total | Both | +$100.00 |
If the market drops back to 5600 before you close, the realized +$50.00 stays and the unrealized part goes to zero. Only the realized number tells you what a trade decision produced, which is why a journal measures closed trades.
Futures handle open positions differently. The exchange marks every open position to the daily settlement price and moves the gain or loss in cash between accounts each day. So an open futures position's PnL shows up in your cash balance overnight, even though the trade isn't finished. Your broker's balance includes it; a list of closed trades does not.
Gross vs net PnL
Gross PnL is the price move alone. Net PnL is what is left after commissions and exchange, clearing and regulatory fees. On a swing trade the gap is small. On a day of short scalps it can be the whole profit.
On MES, exchange, clearing and NFA fees come to $1.12 a round trip. Add a broker commission of, say, $0.50 a side and each trade costs $2.12. A day of 20 trades that nets 48 ticks gross is +$60.00 gross, $42.40 in costs and +$17.60 net. A one-tick winner, +$1.25 gross, is -$0.87 after costs.
ExpectancyIQ decides wins and losses on net PnL, so a trade only counts as a win if it made money after costs. On paid plans, the performance report also charts gross PnL against costs by month, split into commission, exchange, clearing and NFA, so you can see how much of your edge goes to fees.
Why your broker's PnL and your journal's PnL differ
The same trades can produce two different totals. These are the usual reasons:
- Open positions. The broker includes unrealized PnL and daily settlement; a journal only counts closed trades until the position is flat.
- Fees. Some statements show PnL before fees and list fees on a separate line. Compare gross with gross and net with net.
- Where the day starts. CME futures days run from 5pm to 5pm Central, not midnight to midnight, so a trade at 6pm Central on Sunday is part of Monday's trading day. Daily PnL grouped by calendar date won't match a broker that uses the session.
- How fills become trades. Scale in and out of a position and there are several ways to split it into trades. Totals match, but per-trade PnL and win rate can differ, which is covered in why your broker's win rate doesn't match your journal.
- Deposits and withdrawals. PnL is not the change in your balance. A deposit raises the balance without any profit, a payout lowers it without any loss. If the balance is off but PnL matches, read why your broker balance and journal balance don't match.
Does your PnL come from an edge?
Two traders with the same PnL can have very different strategies: one wins small and often, one wins rarely and big. To tell whether your PnL comes from an edge, look at expectancy per trade and check your risk-reward ratio against your win rate. The expectancy calculator turns your average win, average loss and win rate into dollars per trade. Definitions of the other metrics are in the glossary.
ExpectancyIQ imports closed trades from your broker's CSV, so every figure in it is realized PnL, with gross, costs and net kept apart on each trade. The trading dashboard shows net PnL for today, this week and this month, grouped by the futures session, and the calendar view shows PnL day by day. How each number is calculated is on the methodology page. This article is educational, not financial advice.