Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Hairy Top

I mentioned the Hairy Top (and bottom) formations before, and noticed a picture perfect example on Monday's open. I've shown both the 2 and 5 minute bars to demonstrate the fractal nature of the pattern but the 5 minute chart is the most dramatic.
If you've followed me for a while you know I like to fade the open gaps and look for reversal signals 9:35 to 9:45 on 5 minute bars, with a tighter reversal window 9:38 to 9:42 on 2 minute bars.
The gap at the open was only .21, which increases odds of a reversal and a continuation of Friday's slide.
I find Monday the most difficult day of the week to trade, as all the commercials that laid off risk over the weekend are looking to establish new positions for the week and those dynamics can be daunting (and frustrating)(and costly) to decipher.
Nevertheless, when setups like his occur I'm inclined to take them although, as I mentioned in the weekend update, I've always got an eye on the exit door.
So. . .here we go. . . . (on 5 minute bars)
The opening bar carries through the PP pivot but fails to close above it . . net rating=negative, but this is the first bar of a Monday so little weighting.
Second bar carries back through PP retraces, but manages to close above PP. . net rating=positive.
Third bar is a spinning top closing right on PP with a higher high and a low = previous bar. Time for a direction to be signalled.
Fourth bar opens on the PP, shows a little strength (hair), then plunges through the PP to hit a low for the day . . net rating=very negative, and a trigger to get short supported by the parabolics.
The exposed hair above the PP line was a great tell of the impending weakness, although when weakness finally played out it happened very quickly.
S1 was clearly the first target of support on this trade, and in classic fashion the Qs made it there in picture perfect form at 11:20 before reversing.
If you're not watching the pivots for intraday trades, you're missing a great, recurring trading edge.

4 comments:

Marc said...

Is the term Hairy Top/Bottom something you made up? It's a great description and also valuable trading indicator. I combine this with the TICQ and a volume based trend indicator and my odds seem to improve greatly.

Thanks,
Marc

sysin3 said...

I love the hairy / fuzzy tops and bottoms descriptions.

Might even help this old fool make some coin.

Maybe even Cucca, since he's old and hairy ;-)

bzbtrader said...

Marc,
I came up with "hairy tops" and "hairy bottoms" as kind of a joke about 5 years ago when I was running a training session for some prop traders. I don't know anyone else that uses the term, although other traders have applied different names to the same patterns.

filip said...

Hairy top on ES daily?

http://screencast.com/t/KP3Z7iRgr