Squeeze breakout down event
Marks a close below the lower Bollinger band on the bar right after a squeeze, a downside break from compression.
A squeeze means the Bollinger bands (20-bar mean of close, plus or minus 2 standard deviations) sit entirely inside the Keltner channel (20-bar EMA, plus or minus 1.5 times the 10-bar average true range). The indicator marks a bar when the bar before was in a squeeze and this bar closes below the lower Bollinger band. The name suggests a breakout from a sustained squeeze, but the code only checks the single bar before the close.
How to read it
- Markers sit on the candle whose close broke below the lower Bollinger band.
- Look for a narrow, flat stretch of candles just before the marker, but the indicator only checks the one bar before the break.
- At default settings it marked about 3 bars per trading day on SPY one-minute bars in September 2026, so markers are common, not rare.
What it outputs
- Squeeze breakout down
- Marks the candle that closes below the lower Bollinger band right after a bar in squeeze.
When it fires
Fires on the first bar of a run where the bar before was in a squeeze and this close is below the lower Bollinger band: a downside break from compression. With confirm_days above 1, it fires on the bar that completes that many in a row. It flags the break, not a trade.
Settings
- bb_window
- Bars in the Bollinger middle line and spread. Shorter windows make the bands react quickly and jump with each candle; longer windows smooth them and move slowly.
- bb_mult
- Bollinger band width in standard deviations. Raising it widens the bands, so squeezes are rarer and a close must fall further to break the lower band: fewer markers. Lowering it does the reverse. Negative values flip the bands and break the test.
- kc_ema
- Length of the EMA the Keltner channel is centred on. It moves the channel's middle line, which changes where the squeeze test lands. Shorter follows price closely; longer lags it.
- kc_atr
- Bars of average true range that set the Keltner channel's width. Shorter windows make the width jump with recent volatility; longer windows keep it steady. A wider channel makes squeezes more likely.
- kc_mult
- Keltner channel width in average true ranges. Raising it widens the channel, so the Bollinger bands fit inside more often and more squeezes qualify: more markers. Lowering it narrows the channel and cuts markers.
- confirm_days
- Bars in a row the condition must hold before a marker. At 1 the marker sits on the first break candle. Each extra bar also needs the squeeze to hold on the bar before it, so higher values fire less often and mark later.
Pitfalls
- Only the bar before needs to be in a squeeze, so a one-bar squeeze counts. The indicator does not check how long or how tight the squeeze was.
- confirm_days counts bars, not days: on this one-minute chart, 3 means three minutes in a row.
- Negative bb_mult or kc_mult is accepted by the parameter range but flips the bands, so keep both multipliers positive.