The whole library
13 articles
Clear filtersMACD
Moving average convergence divergence plots the gap between two exponential averages. It is unbounded, which makes it a trend indicator wearing an oscillator's clothes.
Bollinger Bands
A moving average with bands set a number of standard deviations away. The bands widen and narrow with volatility, which is the whole point of them.
ATR: Average True Range
A plain measure of how far a security moves in a period, price gaps included. It has no direction, which is what makes it useful for sizing and for stop placement.
The Stochastic Oscillator
Where the close sits inside the recent high-low range, expressed 0 to 100. It asks a different question from RSI and reaches extremes far more readily.
VWAP
The volume-weighted average price is what the average share traded at over a session. It is an execution benchmark first and a chart reference second.
Fibonacci Retracements
Horizontal levels drawn at conventional fractions of a prior move. Their mathematical justification is weak and their practical relevance comes from how many people draw them.
Pivot Points
Reference levels computed mechanically from the prior period's high, low and close. Their appeal is that they are fixed in advance and identical for everyone.
Relative Strength Against the Market
How a stock performs against a benchmark rather than in isolation. A stock down three percent on a day the index fell six has outperformed, and the chart alone does not show it.
Keltner and Donchian Channels
Two envelope constructions that answer different questions: one is built from average range, the other from the highest high and lowest low over a window.
Parabolic SAR
A trailing stop that accelerates. It is always in the market, always on one side, and it flips when price reaches it.
CCI and Williams %R
Two more oscillators. Both normalise price against a recent range, which is what almost every oscillator does, and the differences are in the arithmetic rather than in the information.
Money Flow Index
RSI with volume weighting. It is one of the few oscillators that introduces an input other than price, which is the whole of its claim.
Divergence, Across Indicators
Price makes a new extreme and an indicator does not. It is the most cited observation in chart reading and one of the weakest, for a reason that follows from the construction.