Parabolic breakout detector
Flags a second straight breakout above recent highs that is more than 1.5 times as large in percent as the first.
The detector reads only the high prices; the close series only has to exist so the warm-up bars can be counted. On each bar it takes the highest high of the nine bars before it, and a bar whose high clears that level is a breakout, sized by how far in percent it cleared. It fires only when the bar just before was also a breakout of the eight bars before that bar, and this breakout is over 0.5% and more than 1.5 times the size of the previous one.
How to read it
- Markers sit on the candle whose high made the second breakout.
- The candle just before a marker also cleared the highest high of the eight candles before it.
- It only looks for upside breakouts; there is no mirror version for lows.
- Expect very few markers: on a month of SPY one-minute bars at default settings there were none.
What it outputs
- Accelerating breakout
- Drawn on candles where two straight breakouts above recent highs speed up: this breakout is over 0.5% and more than 1.5 times the one before. Nothing is drawn otherwise.
When it fires
On a bar whose high clears the highest high of the previous nine bars, when the bar before also cleared the highest high of the eight bars before it, and this breakout is over 0.5% and more than 1.5 times the previous one. It marks an upside push that is speeding up.
Settings
- window
- Sets how many bars must pass before the first marker can appear. Below 10 it never fires. From 10 up the breakout test always uses the last ten bars, so a larger value only delays the first marker and leaves later markers unchanged.
Pitfalls
- Rare at default settings: on about a month of SPY one-minute bars (20,160 bars) it fired zero times. The 0.5% and 1.5 times thresholds are hard-coded, so no parameter loosens them.
- Windows 1 to 9 never fire. For windows 5 to 9 a slice wraps to the end of the history and includes the current bar, so the second test can never pass.
- Only highs decide a breakout: a wick that spikes above the level counts even if the candle closes back below it.