Showing posts sorted by relevance for query larry williams. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query larry williams. Sort by date Show all posts

Sunday, June 9, 2024

Outside Bar Trading Setups | Larry Williams

In his book, 'Long-Term Secrets to Short-Term Trading', 2nd Edition, Chapter 7, Larry Williams provides price action patterns to profit. Larry Williams says that there are two daily bars that most confuse retail traders, the Inside Bar and the Outside Bar: 
 
» What the public 'sees' on their charts as being negative is most often apt to be positive for short-term market moves and vice versa. A case in point is an outside day with a down close. The day's high is greater than the previous day's high and the low is lower than the previous day's low and the close is below the previous day's low. This looks bad, like the sky is indeed falling in. In fact, the books I have read say this is an excellent sell signal, that such a wild swing is a sign of a market reversal in favor of the direction of the close, in this case down. [..] The problem is these outside day patterns do not occur as often as we would like! The next time you see an outside day with a down close lower than the previous day, don't get scared, get ready to buy ! « 

After an Outside Day with a Down Close lower than the previous day, BUY!
After an Outside Day with an Up Close higher than the previous day, SELL!

An Outside Bar is a bar that broke the previous bar's high and the previous bar's low. For related trading setups
Larry Williams specifically looked for outside bars on the daily time frame that closed below the previous daily low or closed above the previous daily high. After such a bar prints, a reversal in the price action should be expected. According to Larry Williams, Outside Bars only appear 7% of the time on the daily time frame.

This is what an outside bar with a down close looks like:


According to Larry Williams, this will be a buy set up in theory. Here we can see it looks bearish to the public eye because the close is below the low. This indeed can be a turning point. Enter long on the next daily open. The stop loss is below the low of the outside bar.
 
This is what an outside bar with an up close looks like:
 

This is a sell set up. It looks bullish to the public eye because the close is above the high. This indeed can be a turning point. Enter short on the next daily open. The stop loss is above the high of the outside bar. 
 
Targets should be logically related to buy side/sell side liquidity levels (previous highs and lows), Imbalances/Fair Value Gaps and/or 50% swing retracement levels. Consider only setups offering risk-to-reward ratios ≥ 1:2.
 
Don't expect every single Outside Bar setup to be a winner. Other setups and filters can nullify or optimize it (e.g. Oops Pattern, Smash Day, Day of the Week, trading in Premium or Discount, actual outside bar small range or large range, swing high or swing low recently broken, occurrence in 3 Day Cycle and 3 Week Cycle, close above/below 9-Day EMA, etc.). The video below shows Outside Bar Trading Setups on timeframes also smaller than the daily.


Tuesday, July 2, 2024

The Oops! Reversal Setup | Larry Williams

One of Larry Williams’ best-known setups is called Oops!: We are waiting for the market to open. We take as a reference the daily bar of yesterday, with its open, evolution and close. When the market opens, suppose a gap up occurs. A gap up takes place when the open is higher than the highest point that was reached on the previous day; a gap down occurs when the open is lower than the lowest traded point of the previous day.


When a market opens at a very high level and there is a gap up, it is very strong. So, we obviously suppose that it goes up. It will probably do it but, if for some reason it starts to fall and then reaches the highest level of yesterday, it is as if it said: "Oops!, I was wrong. I’m not strong, but weak." In this case, we open a short position at this level. We enter short because we imagine that the market (and the players in the market) realizes it isn’t that strong. Actually, the market is weak, so it will go down. 

To use this setup, we obviously need a stop-loss whose size depends on the market we are trading. How do we close this position? Larry Williams proposed a bailout exit he called "first profitable open". This consists in staying in the position until, on the following day or days, the market opens somewhere below the entry level (because we are short). When that happens, we close the trade. So, we keep the position until we get the profit or, obviously, when we are stopped out. We can also close the position at the end of the same day. The one suggested by Larry Williams is however the best one, although it sounds quite weird. Believe me, the first profitable open is a very effective close of the position.
 
This is the basic version of the Oops! Anyway, I know Larry Williams made some tweaks to it. The Oops! works, but today this specific setup is quite rare. The reason is that many markets trade for 23 hours a day now. So, it’s quite hard to have a heavy gap in just one hour. Maybe, you can have one after the weekend, but normally it’s not there.

Monday, July 4, 2022

In Any Bar Chart Only 8 Possible Range Patterns | Larry Williams

Larry Williams presented a free session at the November 2014 Las Vegas Traders Expo in which he discussed 8 possible Range Patterns. He showed that from any bar to the next there are only 4 possible outcomes:

  1. Down Range: Last Bar's high is lower than prior Bar's high; and last Bar's low is lower than prior Bar's low.
  2. Up Range: Last Bar's high is higher than prior Bar's high; and last Bar's low is higher than prior Bar's low.
  3. Inside Range: Last Bar's high is lower than prior Bar's high; and last Bar's low is higher than prior Bar's low. On a Daily S&P500 Chart this occurs approximately 12% of the time.
  4. Outside Range: Last Bar's high is higher than the prior Bar's high; and Bar's low is lower than the prior Bar's low. On a Daily S&P500 Chart this occurs approximately 12% of the time.

Price action cannot occur in any other way. Within these 4 Range Patterns each last bar can either be an up bar or a down bar. So there are actually 8 possible Range Patterns:

1. Down Range, Down Day
2. Down Range, Up Day
3. Up Range, Down Day
4. Up Range, Up Day
5. Inside Range, Down Day
6. Inside Range, Up Day
7. Outside Range, Down Day
8. Outside Range, Up Day

Using these 8 patterns some powerful strategies can be created. Larry Williams presented back-tested statistics associated with trading these patterns using a simple entry and exit technique. He stressed that they were not the best entry or exit techniques but shown because they were easy to understand and program. This strategy is intended only to show where we have a bias or advantage in the marketplace.

  • Entry: At market close
  • Stop Loss: Based on $ Stop
  • Exit: First Profitable Opening

His message was that we could go home and verify using our own software. His results for testing this on the e-mini S&Ps from 2002 forward [to 2015] were as follows:


So, the Down Range, Down Close day [1.] offers the best potential short term 'long' setup based on net profit. This was the take-home message of the presentation.

Larry further dug into the Down Range, Down Close setup to uncover which day of the week offered the best trade: The stats support the 'Turnaround Tuesday' concept.


And further investigating by Trading Day of Month revealed that 1, 17, 19, 22 and 23 were the best days, showing 92% winners and $47,500 net profits with 107 trades.

It was also found that a Down Range Larger Range day was better than a Down Range smaller Range day. $205 Avg 80% Win, vs $33 Avg 85% win,

Also naked close was better than a covered close (naked close meaning that the close was outside of the previous day’s range). $155 Avg 83% Win vs $30 Avg 83% Win

And combining these two concepts:
Down Range, larger range, Covered close: $60 Avg, 83% Winners
Down Range, larger range, Naked close: $215 Avg, 85% Winners

References:

Monday, December 18, 2023

2024 US Stock Market Outlook │ Larry Williams

 
Larry Williams' 2024 projection for US Stocks:
 
First week of January to last week of February - UP
 Last week of February to last week of April - DOWN
 Last week of April to last week of Juli - SIDEWAYS-TO-UP
First day to last day of August - UP
First week to third week of September - DOWN  
  Third week to fourth week of September new high of the year - UP
Fourth week of September to first week of November - SIDEWAYS-TO-DOWN  
 First week of November to first week of December - UP
 First week to third week of December - DOWN
 Third week to last trading day of December printing the yearly high - UP
 
The December 2023 Low is a key price level in Q1 of 2024. 
 
Larry Williams identified June 2024 in the current decennial pattern 
 as "the sweet spot with 90% accuracy" to buy and hold until December 2025.
 
 

Reference:

Wednesday, April 24, 2024

S&P 500 Strength into May 1st & Weakness through Mid May | Larry Williams

Larry Williams expects U.S. stock market strength through May 1 (Wed) and weakness to follow through the middle of May.
 

That weakness could be followed by a relief rally into early June, then another leg down in July. “I am heavily short here,” he says. He expects a strong end of the year as a rally gets under way in early September. 

 

Sunday, July 10, 2022

3 Bar Patterns - The Smallest Fractals of Market Structure | Larry Williams

»  Any time there is a daily low with higher lows on both sides of it, that low will be a short-term low. We know this because a study of market action will show that prices descended in the low day, then failed to make a new low, and thus turned up, marking that ultimate low as a short-term point. A short-term market high is just the opposite. Here we will see a high with lower highs on both sides of it. What this says is that prices rallied up to the zenith of that middle day, then began to move back down, and in the process formed a short-term high. For our purposes in identifying short-term swing points, we will simply ignore inside days and the possible short-term points they produce.  «
 
This is how Larry Williams defined market structure. This concept is universal and applies to all bars of all time frames.
  • A Short-Term High (STH) is a bar with a high greater than or equal to the high of the bar to the left and greater than the bar high to the right. Neighboring bars should not be inside. If they are inside bars, the bars that follow them should be analyzed.
  • A Medium-Term High (MTH) has Short-Term Highs to the left and and to the right that are below the high of this bar.
  • A Long-Term High (LTH) has Medium-Term Highs to the left and and to the right that are below the high of this bar.

And for the lows it’s all vice versa: 

  • Short-Term Low (STL) = bar with higher lows on both sides
  • Intermediate-Term Low (ITL) = higher STL on both sides
  • Long-Term Low (LTL) = higher ITL on both sides

In other words: 3 bar patterns are the smallest fractals and building blocks of market structure. Since price is always either in consolidation, in an uptrend or in a downtrend 3 successive price bars must form either a directional pattern (higher highs, higher lows or vice versa), a continuation pattern (inside bar) or a reversal pattern (outside bar, pin bar, head & shoulder, M&W patterns) (see also HERE):

  
Reference:

Sunday, June 9, 2024

An Outside Look at Inside Days | Larry Williams

First, lets define what constitutes an inside day. An Inside Day is exactly the opposite of an Outside Day. That is, today’s high is less than yesterday’s high and today’s low is greater than yesterday’s low. Hence the terminology inside day, as all of today’s price range or trading activity took place inside of yesterday’s range. An inside day is usually thought to be an indication of congestion. A price could not exceed the previous day on the upside nor could it break below the previous day’s low on the downside.

 » Inside Days are one of the most reliable forecasting patterns to occur in the marketplace. «
 
Chartists and authors have not paid very much attention to the inside days over the years. They have made note of them, but this is the first time, to my knowledge, that anyone has made a serious study of the impact of inside days. And, wouldn’t you just know it … inside days are one of the most reliable forecasting patterns to occur in the marketplace!

  » In a study of nine major commodities covering 50,692 trading sessions, I noted 3,892 inside days,
suggesting we will see these days appear about 7.6 percent of the time. «
Larry Williams, 1998.

There does seem to be some validity to this. The following chart shows what happens when we have an inside day with a down-close while prices are lower than they were 10 days ago. In the Standard and Poor’s, 71% of the time you were higher the next day. This may not even be as significant as the fact that 71% of the time you were higher 20 days after this occurrence. In the Value Line, price is higher 50% of the time after the occurrence, and in Treasury Bonds it’s higher 75% of the time. The pattern in Silver was not nearly as bullish, which surprises me because I had used this trading technique in Silver with some success … which just goes to show you! In Silver, on 36% of the time you were higher 20 days following the occurrence of the pattern. Soybeans were higher 57% of the time, Bellies 50% of the time and the Swiss Franc, where so far we have not found a pattern that forces prices higher, you were up only 22% of the time.

'Inside Days in the S&P 500' - Toby Crabel, 1990.

For a moment though, let’s take a look at just the occurrence of an inside day. What happens when we simply have an inside day with a down-close? Does that, on its own merit, forecast any significant market activity? The results are on the next few pages [of 'The Future Millionaire's Confidential Trading Course']. What can you find?

Then there’s the other side of this coin. What happens if we have an inside day with an up-close? Does this forecast positive action? It appears that it does to some extent. Study the tables for yourself. I have gone to the computer to give you the results for almost all possible configurations of the inside days. While, quite frankly, much of the data suggests random-gibberish-behavior, others are relationships that you can find and successfully trade with. What you need to focus on here is not that the patterns will always work for you, but that patterns, like methods, systems and tools, will give you the much needed odds that lead to successful speculation.
 
I have not exhausted all possible ways of looking at inside days with down-closes, though I have looked at the majority of the relationships one can study. There are others. As an example, what happens if the prices are higher, or if prices are lower following an inside day five days later. Does that mean that the down trend will continue? One could also ask the questions about an outside day following an inside day. Is this a particularly bullish pattern? (It is.) As you can see, your opportunity for research here is unlimited. If you have a computer, some data, and a desire to study the markets, here is fertile ground for you to come up with your own great ideas.

Monday, July 1, 2024

Buy & Sell Signals | Larry Williams

 Buy Signal: Dump, dump, (dump), go sideways and pump a bit, one more small dump, then the pump.
Sell Signal: Pump, pump, (pump), go sideways and drop a bit, one more small pump, then the dump.

»  If I've seen prices in a big downtrend, they move sideways, then drop again, but immediately come back up, back into that trading range, that's a buy signal. Why? Because during that trading range, there was accumulation going on. The fact that it broke down fills a lot of long positions. Professional money will buy there, and if it immediately comes back, then that nails it. They've been buying and I want to get long the market.  «

 
See also:

Wednesday, May 29, 2024

The Three-Bar High/Low System | Larry Williams

At one point in my career, I had over 30 consecutive winning trades using this next short-term trading strategy. You will first have to calculate a 3-bar moving average of the high and a 3-bar moving average of the lows. (Each bar represents the time period displayed on your chart. Use 5-minute charts for lots of signal, or 15-minute charts if you want a little less hectic trading career.) This is automatically done on all quote machines, although “in the old days” I did it by hand. You can have the old days!
  • You will first have to calculate a 3-bar moving average of the high and a 3-bar moving average of the lows.
  • The strategy is to buy at the price of the 3-bar moving average of the lows — if the trend is positive, according to the swing point trend identification technique — and take profits at the 3-bar moving average of the highs.
  • Sell signals are just the opposite. This means you will sell short at the 3-bar moving average of the highs and take profits at the 3-bar moving average of the lows. It is downright foolish to do this unless there is a reason to take only short sales. Our reason might well be that our swing point reversal system has told us the trend is down. Then, and only then, sell the high and cover at the lows.
Now let’s try to make some order out of all this.
 
 
Figure 9.5 shows the addition of the 3-bar mowing averages and the swing lines. I have marked the points where trend changes; we switch from buying the lows to shorting the highs following these reversals. The 3-bar high and low entry points are also shown. The game goes like this; trend reversal up so we buy the 3-bar low line and take profits at the 3-bar high and await a pullback to the 3-bar low. If the 3-bar low would create a trend reversal for selling, however, pass on the trade. Sells are just the opposite; await a trend reversal down, then sell all the 3-bar highs and take profits at the 3-bar lows.
 

Figure 9.6 has all the trend reversals marked off, so you can begin paper trading by looking for the buy and sell entries and exits. I suggest you walk through this chart to get a sense of how one can trade this very short-term approach. Note these are 15-minute bars, but the concept will work on 5-minute to 60-minute bars as well.

Sunday, November 12, 2017

90% Bullish Larry Williams Trading Setup for S&P500 Futures


One of Larry Williams' Long-Term Secrets to Short-Term Trading is about an Outside Day with a down close [Day 1] followed by an Inside Day [Day 2]. This is a very reliable bullish short term trading setup: Bought the next day at the open [Day 3], this setup is profitable in the S&P500 90% of the time. Expect the ES/Emini to rise above Day 1 (HERE).

Monday, May 30, 2022

Daily Range = Accumulation + Manipulation + Expansion + Distribution (AMD)

Accumulation (A) of positions generally occurs during the Asian session. The accumulation is characterized by being a consolidation.

Manipulation (M) usually occurs at the opening of the London session (sometimes at the NY open). It consists of taking the price to the opposite side of the true directional Expansion of the rest of the day.

Distribution (D) occurs when Market Makers liquidate (exit) their positions.

This AMD-Principle is represented in every bar of every time-frame (monthly, weekly, daily, 4 Hour, etc.) with a price value at which it starts trading (opening price), the highest price value (high), the lowest (low), and  a value of the time it ends trading (close). The AMD-Principle can be observed in all financial markets - Forex, stocks, indices, commodities, bonds, etc.


Michael J. Huddleston a.k.a. The Inner Circle Trader:
“The origin behind this idea was inspired by my mentor Larry Williams.
He made a point in one of his lectures that he wished he knew
how traders could be buying below the open on an up day or sell above the open on a down day.
And I took that as a personal challenge, and spent the first quarter of my 25 years
of my career as a trader mastering just that concept.
I felt that it was enough for me to work towards cracking that code.
And I think I've done it.”
 
References
 
See also:

Wednesday, May 29, 2024

My “New Reversal Day” Discovery | Larry Williams

The most common reversal day is simply one where prices sell off substantially, almost always down limit, only to reverse and close up for the day. Such a day appears in the following diagram [A + B].

 
A series of top and bottom reversals are also shown for your observation. Notice, in each case, how a temporary reaction against the main trend was ended when we had the flush-out day with prices selling off drastically, then recovering, to close up for the day. A reversal day is even more significant the longer the correction has been in effect.
 
MY NEW REVERSAL DAY DISCOVERY

Our second form of reversal day, and one I’ll bet you’ve never even heard about, starts with prices heading sharply lower and closing, sharply lower prices might end up limit down, or just 
off sharply but, in any event, prices take a beating and are down handsomely for the day [C].

» When prices should go lower, but don't, buy ! «

The trend reversal is indicated the next morning when prices open a good deal higher than the previous day's close. Such unusual strength is indicative of a key reversal for the market. What happens, in essence, is that prices fail to follow through with the previous day's slide. This type of action is most unusual since lower prices forecast lower openings about 85% of the time. Lower prices, with substantially higher openings, are a sure thing that a new move has begun.

It is particularly significant if prices close down the limit, and the next day open slightly up. Limit moves should beget more limit moves. A reversal of this pattern points to a market opportunity.

A special point of interest here is that an extremely strong signal is generated any time you have two reversal days with the second one higher, for a buy, lower for a sale. This is an unusual display of strength. I cannot recall when such a signal did not produce profits.

 
 
 "New Reversal Days" in the NQ — April-May 2024 (daily bars)

Wednesday, June 12, 2024

Swing Points as Trend Change Indication | Larry Williams

A trend change from up to down occurs when a short-term high is exceeded on the upside, a short-term trend change from down to up is identified by price going below the most recent short-term low. Figure 8.1 depicts such trend changes in a classic manner, study it well because reality comes next! Here are a couple of pointers on this technique. Although the penetration of one of these short-term highs, in a declining market, indicates a trend reversal to the upside, some penetrations are better than others.

 Figure 8.1 — Classic patterns of trend change.

» There are only two ways a short-term high or low is broken. «
 Figure 8.2 — Breaking a short-term high or low.

There are only two ways a short-term high or low is broken. In an up trending market, the low that is violated or fallen below will be either a low prior to making a new rally high, as shown at (A) in Figure 8.2, or a low that occurs after decline of a high that then rallies making a lower short-term high; it then declines below the low prior to the rally that failed to make a new high, as shown at (B). The better indication of a real trend change is the violation of the low shown at (A). By the same token, a trend reversal to the upside will occur in one of the two following patterns: In (A), the rally peak prior to a new low is violated to the upside, or in (B), the market makes a higher low, then rallies above the short-term high between those two lows. In this case, again, the (A) pattern is the better indication of a real trend reversal.

Figure 8.3 — T-bonds (15-minute bars)

With that in mind, look at Figure 8.3, which shows a 15-minute bar chart of the September Bonds in 1989. The major trend moves were adequately captured by this technique. [...] You can use this technique two ways. Some traders may simply buy long and sell short on these changes in trend. That's a basic simplistic approach.

Tuesday, December 26, 2023

2024 S&P 500 Election Year Seasonal Pattern │ Jeff Hirsch

 2024 is an Election Year and the sitting President is running for office again. 
In this constellation the S&P 500 typically tends to (1.) trend higher from early January into mid February;  
(2.) decline into late March; (3.) rise up for the rest of the year, especially after elections.
Also take note of Larry Williams' re-election pattern.
 
The S&P 500's average annual return during Election Years is 11.6%. Since 1833 the fourth year in the Decennial Pattern has been up 13 vs 6 times down with an average annual return of 5.22%. Over the past 30 years, January gains have occurred 17 times (57%), while losses numbered 13 (43%), barely better than the flip of a coin. In bull markets, New Moons are bottoms, and Full Moons are tops. In bear markets, New Moons are tops, and Full Moons are bottoms. More often than not, stocks will rise from around the 7th to around the 14th calendar day of a month, fall from the 14th to the 20th, and rise from the 20th to the 25th.
 
In 1967 Yale Hirsch published the first Stock Trader’s Almanac and presented the Four Year Presidential Election Cycle as an significant and predictive indicator of stock market performance. The outcomes are relatively steady, regardless of the president’s political leanings in office at the time, and the year after each presidential election marks the start of a new four-year stock market cycle. Considering annual returns of each year in the four year cycle, the Pre-Election Year (2023) is considered best, and  the Election Year second. The most predictive period of the year is November 19th to January 19th. Wayne Whaley coined it a 'Turn of the Year (TOY) Barometer'. If the return of this 2-month period is greater than 3%, a bullish signal is given, and the market is very likely to do well over the following 12 months. If the return is 0-3%, the signal is considered neutral; and if the return is negative, the signal is bearish, and returns very poor. Currently the S&P 500 still trades some 6% above the November 19 level.
 

The 250 year US empire live cycle concluded in 2023. Demise by folly overstretch. Uni-polar global supremacy is over, and Russia, China and Iran stronger than ever. A multi-polar world of worlds now knows how to deal with a paper-tiger gone mad. All star-spangled striped monsters check-mated, defeated and unveiled 24/7 along the many battle fronts on the globe. Project Ukraine lost. Now supervising genocide in Palestine. Yemen's Ansar Allah controls the Bab al-Mandab and launches full front attacks against the hegemon. An emerging Muslim alliance will liberate the Holy Land. Iran may shut down the Gibraltar strait any moment. The Taliban will enter Jerusalem and flatten Tel Aviv. Zionist Saudis and emirs doomed. Revolutionary Shia will root them out. The fever pitch increases. As some discard all this as hysteria and Islamist war propaganda, the dollar hegemony is rapidly melting away under the world island's rising sun. 2024 will be a remarkable 'election year'. W.D. Gann projected 'major panic, breadlines, soup kitchens, despair, and unemployment' into the US of 2024. And US astrologer L. David Linsky sees the home-front ready for more mayhem, upheaval, war and regime change. Plenty of opportunities along the lines and times in the above seasonal roadmap for 2024.
 
 
The Kitchin Cycle and the Benner Cycle are bullish for all of 2024 and 2025 (historically the fifth year outperforming all other years in the decennial pattern). In the current decennial cycle Larry Williams identified June 2024 as "the sweet spot with 90% accuracy" to buy stocks until December 2025.
 
 
 
 
 
In January 2024 the Sensitive Degrees of the Sun are:
Jan 02 (Tue) = Earth at perihelion = positive = high
Jan 06 (Sat) = negative = low
Jan 19 (Fri) = negative = low
Jan 30 (Tue) = positive = high

The Turning points in the Geocentric Bradley Barometer are (+/-1 CD):
Jan 04 (Thu) = Low
Jan 13 (Sat) = High
Jan 22 (Mon) = Low
Jan 29 (Mon) = High

The SoLunar Rhythm during January 2024: 

 
Additional References:
Seth Golden (Dec 26, 2023) @ X
 
 Last time the S&P 500 was up 9 consecutive weeks was in 2004 and before that two 9-week win streaks in 1989 and in 1994,
before that a 12-week win streak in 1985. The next years' returns were:
1986 = 14%
1990 = -4.5%
1995 = 34%
2005 = 3%