MT5 investor password and your trading journal

Read-only access, what it shows, and whether a journal needs it. A local app can read MT5 without either password.

Every MetaTrader 5 account can have two passwords: the main password, which lets you trade, and the investor password, which lets someone look but not touch. Traders search for it when they want to share results, join a signal or copy service, or let a tool read an account without risking a trade. This page explains what the investor password is, what it allows, how it relates to a trading journal, and what AI Trading Journal needs, which is neither password.

What the investor password is

The investor password is a read-only password for a trading account. Broker help pages describe it the same way: it lets a person see the account, including open positions and trade history, without being able to place, change or close trades. Pepperstone's support page, for example, says that no trades can be placed or modified when logging in with it. It is often used to show an account to a possible investor, to share performance, or to let a tracking service read the account.

It is not created automatically by every broker. Some give you one at account opening and some expect you to set it yourself. Setting or changing it usually happens from the account's password settings in the terminal, or from the broker's client area. Menus differ, so use your broker's own instructions.

What someone can see with it

• Balance, equity and margin figures for the account.
• Open positions and pending orders.
• The trade history, depending on the broker's settings.
• What they cannot do: open, modify or close a trade, or withdraw money. Broker policy decides the details.

Read-only is not the same as private. Someone with the investor password can see a lot about your account. Treat it as sensitive, give it only to someone you trust and change it if it has been shared widely. The page on checking that a journal is legit covers why you should be careful what you hand to any tool.

Do you need it for a journal?

It depends on how the journal gets your trades. Some online services connect to your account from their own servers. To do that they need the account number, the broker server and a password, and they usually ask for the investor password so that they cannot trade. That means your credentials leave your computer.

AI Trading Journal works another way. It runs on your Windows PC and reads the MetaTrader 5 terminal that is already open and logged in. It does not ask for the main password or the investor password, and it does not log in to your broker. Your journal is saved in your Documents folder and your trades are not sent to the developer's servers. If you connect Notion, which is optional, your trades are copied to your own Notion workspace with your own integration token.

What about a terminal logged in with the investor password

Logging a terminal in with the investor password shows the history in that terminal, and the journal reads what the terminal shows. In principle that should work, but we have not tested the app with an investor-password login, so it is a point to check yourself during the free 7-day trial before you rely on it. The app never needs to trade, since it only reads closed history. If you simply want to be safe on a shared computer, logging in with the investor password is a reasonable habit regardless of the journal.

Prop firm accounts

Some prop firms give you both passwords and some give only the trading credentials, so check your firm's instructions. The page on the prop firm MT5 login guide explains the login steps and the scams to watch for, such as fake download pages and messages asking for your password. Never type either password into a website you reached from a message. See also the broker and prop firm pages for how the app reads each kind of account.

Safe habits with passwords

• Do not reuse the main password anywhere else.
• Give the investor password, never the main one, to anyone who only needs to look.
• Change the investor password when you stop sharing the account.
• Be cautious with online connectors. Ask where the credentials are stored, who can see them and how to revoke access.
• Prefer a local tool when you do not want credentials to leave your computer. That is why a local trading journal is a design choice, not just a feature.

A worked example (hypothetical)

A trader wants a second person, a mentor, to review their month of trades. They set an investor password in the broker's client area, give the mentor the account number, server and that password, and the mentor logs in on their own terminal and sees positions and history. The mentor cannot trade. After the review the trader changes the investor password, which ends the access. For their own tracking, the same trader keeps a local journal on their PC that needs neither password, so nothing about their login travelled anywhere.

How to set or change it

On the desktop terminal the investor password is set from the account's password change option, where you choose the read-only password instead of the main one. Some brokers let you do it in their client area instead. The exact menus differ between builds and brokers, so follow your broker's own help page, and write the new password in a password manager rather than a note on your desktop. If you ever lose it, you can usually set a new one, which also ends the access of anyone who had the old one.

Copy trading and signal services

Services that copy trades or publish performance often work by logging in with the investor password so they can watch the account without being able to trade it. That is a sensible use of the feature, but it is still a login to your account from someone else's server. Before you hand it over, find out who runs the service, what they can see, how they store the password and how you cancel. Prefer a service that explains this plainly. A service that insists on the main password for a read-only purpose deserves a hard second look.

Limits

• What an investor login can see depends on the broker and the platform build, so use your broker's instructions.
• We have not tested AI Trading Journal with a terminal that is logged in using only the investor password.
• AI Trading Journal reads closed history and does not place, modify or close trades.
• This is general information, not security or financial advice.

Frequently asked questions

Related guides

• A local trading journal for MT5
• P&L calendar for MT5
• Trade notes, ratings and screenshots
• Trading progress and goals
• Back up your journal and move it to a new PC
• An offline trading journal for Windows
• How to set monthly trading goals
• Import your whole MT5 history
• How to tag trades
• Trade screenshots for your journal
• All trading journal comparisons