Squeeze breakout up event
Marks the first one-minute close above the upper Bollinger Band right after a squeeze, when the bands sit inside the Keltner channel.
A squeeze is when the Bollinger Bands sit inside the Keltner Channel, which happens when price has gone quiet and its range has narrowed. The Keltner Channel is an EMA of close with bands set kc_mult times the average true range. This indicator marks the first bar where the previous bar was in a squeeze and this bar's close is above the upper Bollinger Band, so it only looks for upside breaks.
How to read it
- Only markers appear on the candles. No line is drawn, and the squeeze itself is not shown.
- A marker means the close pushed above the top band just after a squeeze: a breakout attempt, not a confirmed move.
- With defaults on SPY one-minute bars for September 2026 it marked 77 breakouts, about 3.7 per trading day.
What it outputs
- Squeeze breakout up
- A marker on the candle where an upward breakout out of a squeeze happens. Every other bar is empty.
When it fires
On the first bar of an upward breakout that follows a squeeze: the previous bar was squeezed and this close is above the upper Bollinger Band. Read it as volatility compressing and price pushing out of the top of its range, not as a forecast.
Settings
- bb_window
- Bars in the Bollinger mean and spread. Longer makes the bands slow and smooth, so breakouts and squeezes change less often. Shorter makes them track recent bars, so both react within minutes.
- bb_mult
- Bollinger width in standard deviations, and the breakout line itself. Raising it lifts the upper band, so fewer breakouts and squeezes count. Lowering it brings the band in. Below zero the upper band drops under the mean and the signal loses its meaning.
- kc_ema
- Length of the Keltner midline, an EMA of close. Shorter lets the channel hug price and move with each bar. Longer keeps it steadier and lagging, which changes how often the bands sit inside it.
- kc_atr
- Bars in the average true range that sets the Keltner width. Shorter lets the channel widen and narrow with each bar's range. Longer smooths it, so the squeeze test changes more slowly.
- kc_mult
- Keltner width in ATR units. Raising it widens the channel, so the Bollinger Bands sit inside it more often and more squeezes count. Lowering it narrows the channel and cuts squeezes, so fewer breakouts qualify.
- confirm_days
- Consecutive bars the breakout must hold before it marks. At 1, each first close above the band marks. At 3, the marker waits for the third bar of the run, and each of those bars must follow a squeeze bar.
Pitfalls
- Only the upper band is tested. Nothing checks volume, follow-through or the wider trend, so a marker can be a one-bar poke that reverses at once.
- A sustained run above the band gets one marker at its first bar, so the chart does not show how long the breakout held. Use confirm_days to demand a longer hold.
- bb_window and bb_mult set both the squeeze and the breakout line, so changing them moves both conditions at once.