ACGC

What it would cost to take over the entire firm (equity plus debt, less cash) per dollar of pre-interest, pre-tax, pre-depreciation operating earnings. Capital-structure-agnostic — directly comparable across heavily and lightly levered businesses, which a P/E can't do. The weakness: EBITDA ignores capex, so capital-intensive businesses look artificially cheap on this metric. Cross-check with EV/FCF when capex is meaningful.

Valuation expressed against the cash actually available to all capital providers after capex. Often more honest than EV/EBITDA when capital expenditure is meaningful relative to depreciation, because EBITDA ignores capex entirely while FCF reflects it. The cleanest single-number 'what would I pay to own this whole business?' valuation lens for capital-intensive firms.

Adjusts the numerator for debt and cash so heavily-levered or cash-rich companies become comparable on a revenue-multiple basis. Particularly useful for cross-industry valuation work where some firms run net cash and others carry meaningful debt loads. Same caveats as P/S: best read alongside gross margin to translate the multiple into expected steady-state earnings power.

The multiple equity analysts most commonly quote because it reflects expected earnings rather than the trailing window. Same caveats as trailing P/E plus one extra: the denominator depends on consensus estimates, which can be systematically optimistic going into a downturn or pessimistic at a cyclical trough. Worth cross-checking against trailing P/E and sell-side estimate trend.

Capital-structure-agnostic earnings yield. Pairs with Greenblatt ROC to compute the famous Magic Formula rank (the universe-rank of earnings yield plus universe-rank of return on capital). Pre-tax operating earnings divided by the full claim on the firm gives a cleaner cross-firm valuation comparison than P/E or earnings yield alone, because it strips out the distortions from leverage, cash, and tax structure.

An ABSOLUTE intrinsic-value signal, distinct from the relative multiples (PE, EV/EBITDA) which only compare a stock to its industry peers. Intrinsic value comes from the Residual Income Model: book value plus the present value of the residual income (earnings above a charge for the cost of equity) the firm is forecast to generate. This is the best-VALIDATED absolute value signal in the academic literature (Frankel & Lee 1998, replicated through 2026): the value-to-price ratio robustly predicts 1-3 year cross-sectional returns, survives every major factor model, and subsumes book-to-market. Because it is scored across the WHOLE universe (not within-industry), it complements the relative multiples rather than double-counting them. Pair it with a quality screen (Piotroski) to avoid value traps, and read the EPV decomposition to see whether a discount is unpriced earnings power or just speculative growth coming out of the price. One caveat: the model anchors on book equity, so for low-book, buyback-heavy, or asset-light firms (think Apple or Coca-Cola) book is a poor floor and the model can read durable franchises as wildly overvalued. Readings are clamped, and the metric is currently shadow-scored — shown for context, with zero weight in the fundamentals grade — pending validation.

Share price divided by per-share book value of common equity — what the market values the franchise at versus what the accountants say it's worth on paper. Most informative for asset-heavy businesses (banks, insurers, industrials) where book value approximates a liquidation floor; far less informative for asset-light franchises whose value sits in brand, software, or other intangibles that GAAP under-states or excludes entirely.

How many dollars of share price the market is willing to pay for one dollar of trailing-twelve-month earnings. The universal valuation anchor for profitable companies — useful for cross-sector comparison and as a quick read on whether the market expects earnings growth, decline, or a quality re-rating. Sensitive to one-off items in the denominator (write-downs, tax holidays, share buybacks); pair with EV/EBITDA when capital structure or non-cash charges look noisy.

Useful when earnings are negative, noisy, or one-time-distorted (early-stage growth, restructurings, cyclical troughs). Works best within an industry, not across — gross margin profiles vary so wildly that 1x P/S for a software company means something completely different from 1x P/S for a grocery chain.

Divides the trailing P/E by the year-over-year EPS growth rate (in percentage points). Below 1.0 is conventionally read as 'cheap relative to growth'; above 2 implies the multiple is well ahead of recent growth. Sensitive to which growth window you choose and unstable when earnings cross zero — flips sign or explodes when prior EPS is negative.

Peter Lynch's adjustment to PEG: adds the dividend yield to the growth rate in the denominator so that mature dividend payers don't get unfairly punished by a low growth rate alone. Sweet spot is 1.0 (P/E equals growth plus yield); below 0.5 often signals a broken growth assumption rather than genuine value; above 2 is over-paying.

Productivity of the asset base — how efficiently the firm converts assets into sales. Combined with net margin, this is the core of the DuPont decomposition: ROA = net margin × asset turnover. Two businesses can land at the same ROA via opposite paths: thin-margin / high-turnover (Costco, supermarkets) vs. fat-margin / low-turnover (luxury, software).

Lower is generally better for shareholder cash returns — less of every dollar of revenue gets reinvested in maintaining the asset base. But very low values can flag under-investment in a capital-intensive business, which catches up later via deteriorating capacity or competitiveness. Pairs with FCF margin to separate 'thin operating margin' from 'fat operating margin offset by heavy capex'.

Sanity-check on earnings quality — a ratio of 1.0 means every dollar of GAAP earnings shows up as free cash flow. Persistently below 1.0 means working-capital build or capex is consuming earnings; persistently above 1.0 is unusual and may flag accounting conservatism (heavy non-cash charges) or a one-time release. Trend matters more than absolute level.

Easier to compare than operating margin across firms with very different leverage and depreciation profiles, because it adds D&A back. Software platforms commonly run above 30%; capital-light service businesses cluster around 20%; capital-intensive industrials sit below 15%. The weakness: ignores the cash needed to maintain the asset base — pair with FCF margin for a complete profitability picture.

End-to-end conversion ratio: of every dollar of revenue, how much falls through to genuine free cash flow available to all capital providers? More honest than net margin because it accounts for the capex needed to maintain (and grow) the business. The single best indicator of whether the business is a quality compounder or a GAAP-earnings illusion.

Free cash flow the business throws off, divided by what the market currently charges for the equity. Treats the equity claim as a perpetual stream of free cash. More honest than earnings yield because it reflects the cash actually available to shareholders after all reinvestment. Cyclicals can swing below zero in a downturn — read with the trailing-cycle range.

Joel Greenblatt's reformulation of return-on-capital, designed to filter for businesses that earn high pre-tax returns on the tangible operating capital that actually generates EBIT. Excludes goodwill and acquired intangibles so that two firms with the same operating economics rank similarly regardless of acquisition history. Pairs with Greenblatt's Earnings Yield (EBIT/EV) to produce the famous 'Magic Formula' rank — quality stocks at value prices.

First-line profitability measure — how much revenue is left after the direct cost of producing it. Stable or rising gross margin signals pricing power and low input-cost exposure; falling gross margin is one of the earliest reliable signals of competitive pressure or commodity-input squeeze. Industry context is everything: 30% gross margin is excellent for a grocery chain and disastrous for a software company.

Operating margin minus interest, tax, and below-the-line items. Useful but noisier than operating margin: tax rate changes, debt-service shifts, and one-time items can move net margin year-over-year even when the operating business is unchanged. Always pair with operating margin and FCF margin — divergence between them is a tell about leverage, tax structure, or earnings quality.

Pre-capex version of cash conversion: compares operating cash flow directly to net income, before subtracting capex. Numbers persistently below 1.0 suggest accruals are doing the work (revenue recognised before cash collected, or expenses deferred). Numbers above 1.0 are typically driven by D&A exceeding true economic depreciation — a mild positive sign but not always meaningful.

Captures the leverage between revenue and operating profit — the core test of whether a business converts sales into income at the operating level. Independent of capital structure (excludes interest) and tax-jurisdiction noise. Trend matters as much as level: an improving operating margin indicates pricing power or operational efficiency gains; a falling margin signals input-cost pressure, wage inflation, or competitive erosion.

Capital-efficiency measure that ignores how the assets are financed. Useful for comparing within a sector but heavily biased by industry — banks and utilities run low ROA by design (huge balance sheets), software and franchise businesses run high ROA (asset-light). The DuPont decomposition links it to ROE: ROE = ROA × (assets / equity), so leverage inflates the gap between ROA and ROE.

Pre-tax cousin of ROIC using operating capital employed (long-term debt plus equity, approximately equal to total assets minus current liabilities). Damodaran publishes ROCE by industry annually, so it benchmarks cleanly against sector norms. Particularly useful for capital-intensive businesses where you want to see pre-tax returns on the long-term capital base.

The headline profitability metric. Net income divided by average book equity tells you how productive each dollar of shareholders' capital is. High sustained ROE compounds book value when the business can reinvest at a similar return. Two warnings: ROE rises mechanically with leverage (high D/E inflates ROE without making the business better), and aggressive buybacks can shrink the equity denominator faster than they shrink earnings, artificially boosting ROE even as fundamental returns are flat.

Measures how productive the actual operating capital base is, independent of capital structure. Strips out the effects of cash, leverage, and below-the-line items so you see the underlying economic engine. The benchmark is the firm's weighted-average cost of capital (WACC) — sustained ROIC above WACC creates value, sustained ROIC below WACC destroys it. The single most important profitability metric for long-term compounding.

Bottom-line growth on a per-share basis — captures both operating progress and any net buyback effect. The denominator uses the absolute value of prior EPS so a turnaround from negative to positive earnings reads with the conventional sign rather than producing arithmetic nonsense. Pair with revenue growth to separate real franchise expansion from buyback-driven per-share lift.

Top-line growth — the cleanest way to see whether the franchise is expanding. Best read alongside margin trend: revenue rising while margin compresses is often discount-driven volume rather than real growth, and can mask underlying weakness. Compare to industry peers — what looks weak in absolute terms can be best-in-sector if the industry is contracting.

The single best operations-quality metric. Negative CCC means the firm is funded by suppliers — the customer pays before the supplier needs to be paid (Apple, Costco, Amazon at scale). Long CCC ties up working capital and forces operating-loan dependence. Combines three sub-metrics: days inventory outstanding, days sales outstanding, days payable outstanding.

How long the average sale sits as a receivable before becoming cash. Earnings-quality flag: receivables growing faster than revenue is one of the cleanest tells for revenue recognition stretching — Beneish flagged exactly this pattern as a primary fraud indicator. Industry context matters: B2B / project businesses run longer DSO than retail, but the trend is more important than the level.

DuPont productivity measure. Combined with margin, it tells the asset-light vs. asset-heavy story: low turnover with high margin is the luxury / branded model, high turnover with thin margin is the supermarket / discount model. Very high turnover in retail can also flag stockouts (lost sales) — the metric reads best industry-relative, not absolute.

Direct cash income from holding the share. Stable dividend yield over time often signals capital discipline and predictable cash generation; abnormally high yield is frequently a warning that the dividend isn't covered by free cash flow and may be cut. Always read alongside payout ratio and FCF coverage.

Net income divided by market cap, expressed as a percent. Lets you compare equity earning power directly to bond yields: a 6% earnings yield is the equity-side analog to a 6% coupon, with the difference that earnings can grow (or contract) while a bond coupon is fixed. The standard 'is the equity risk-premium adequate?' framing.

Sustainability check on the dividend yield. Below 30% means the dividend has substantial room to grow; 30–60% is the conventional sweet spot for a mature payer; above 85% is stretched and frequently precedes a cut. REITs and utilities run higher than the broad market by design — REIT payouts above 80% are normal because the structure requires distributing most income.

Captures the full cash return to shareholders — dividends plus share repurchases, expressed as a percentage of market cap. Buyback-heavy issuers (Apple, Alphabet) hide their real cash return behind a low headline dividend yield; total shareholder yield surfaces it. Increasingly the right lens for evaluating capital-return quality, especially for tech-era large-caps that prefer buybacks to dividends.

CCI measures how far the current typical price ((H+L+C)/3) sits from its rolling SMA, normalized by the mean absolute deviation. Originally built for commodity cycles by Donald Lambert; widely used as a generic momentum / overbought-oversold gauge on any asset. CCI is unbounded but ±100 is the conventional 'normal range' edge — readings beyond that are interpreted as strong directional thrusts or stretched extremes depending on context.

+1 while CCI is below -100 (oversold); -1 while CCI is above +100 (overbought); 0 inside the ±100 band.

+1 = oversold (stretched below the typical-price mean, mean-reversion buy bias), -1 = overbought (stretched above), 0 = inside the ±100 band.

Designed to buy oversold pullbacks within an established uptrend (price above the regime moving average). Uses a 2-period RSI rather than the standard 14 to make it hyper-responsive to short-term swings. The default exit_method is RSI-threshold based: hold while RSI(2) is below the configured exit threshold and exit when RSI(2) crosses above exit. The book-style SMA exit is also supported by setting exit_method=sma with exit_ma.

+1 when price is above regime_ma and RSI(2) drops below oversold; held while inside the trade; back to 0 when the configured exit_method fires.

+1 = pullback-buy state active, -1 = pullback-short state active (symmetric rule in a down regime), 0 = flat.

The Coppock Curve is a weighted moving average of the sum of two rate-of-change measures, originally designed as a long-horizon, buy-only bottom indicator for equity indices. This screener applies it to daily bars and adds a bearish state for symmetry: a cross up through zero is the classic long-term buy tell, a cross down through zero flags a bearish momentum cycle.

+1 while the Coppock Curve is above zero; -1 while it is below zero; 0 only at exactly zero.

+1 = bullish zero-line cross (classic long-term buy), -1 = bearish zero-line cross.

Compares price pivots against the MACD histogram (MACD line minus signal line) at those same bars. Bullish divergence: price makes a lower low, histogram makes a higher low — momentum is improving beneath the surface. Bearish divergence: price makes a higher high, histogram makes a lower high. Slower than the MACD signal cross but a richer confirmatory tell — the histogram captures momentum acceleration, not just direction.

+1 at the right-hand pivot of bullish divergence; -1 at right-hand pivot of bearish divergence; 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish divergence, -1 = bearish divergence.

Fires on the bar where the MACD line (EMA12 minus EMA26) crosses through the signal line (EMA9 of MACD). Bullish when MACD crosses up through signal, bearish when it crosses down. Far more commonly used as a trade trigger than divergence — see macd_divergence for the slower confirmatory tell. Whipsaws in chop; cleanest when combined with a trend-regime filter.

+1 on bullish cross (MACD crosses up through signal); -1 on bearish cross (MACD crosses down through signal); 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish MACD-signal cross, -1 = bearish MACD-signal cross.

When price prints a lower low while RSI prints a higher low at those same pivot bars, momentum is improving even though price is still falling — a classic bullish divergence that often precedes a reversal up. The bearish mirror fires when price makes a higher high but RSI prints a lower high, telegraphing exhausted upside. Divergences are confirmation tells rather than precise timing signals — best used as a 'something is changing under the surface' alert, not a trade trigger on their own.

+1 at the right-hand pivot of a (lower-low price, higher-low RSI) pair; -1 at the right-hand pivot of a (higher-high price, lower-high RSI) pair; 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish divergence, -1 = bearish divergence, 0 = no divergence at this bar.

The 14-period Relative Strength Index is the canonical Wilder momentum oscillator, bounded 0-100. Readings below 30 mark oversold conditions and above 70 mark overbought. This signal flags time spent at those extremes: bullish while RSI is at or below 30 (a mean-reversion bounce bias), bearish while it is at or above 70. The 30/70 thresholds are standard practice layered on top of the TA-Lib primitive.

+1 while RSI(14) is at or below the oversold threshold (default 30); -1 while it is at or above the overbought threshold (default 70); 0 in between.

+1 = oversold (bullish mean-reversion bias), -1 = overbought (bearish), 0 = RSI in its mid-range.

ROC is the simplest momentum oscillator: (close − close_N_ago) / close_N_ago × 100. It's unbounded, sign-bearing, and reads as 'how much price has moved in absolute % terms over the lookback'. A configurable threshold (default 5%) separates ordinary fluctuation from strong directional thrusts. Useful as a coarse momentum cross when you want a less smoothed signal than RSI or MACD.

+1 while ROC is above +threshold (strong bullish thrust); -1 while ROC is below −threshold (strong bearish thrust); 0 inside the ±threshold band.

+1 = ROC above +threshold (bullish thrust), -1 = ROC below −threshold (bearish thrust), 0 = ROC within ±threshold.

Bullish when %K crosses above %D while both lines are below the oversold threshold (typically 20); bearish when %K crosses below %D while both are above overbought (typically 80). Filters out mid-range stochastic crosses, which whipsaw in chop. Best used at well-defined ranges and at trend extremes.

+1 on bullish cross in oversold; -1 on bearish cross in overbought; 0 otherwise.

+1 = oversold bullish cross, -1 = overbought bearish cross.

Stochastic RSI applies the stochastic oscillator formula to RSI values rather than price, producing a faster, more sensitive 0-100 momentum read. Readings below 20 are oversold and above 80 overbought. The signal latches bullish when FastK crosses above FastD while in the oversold zone and stays on until FastK drops back below FastD; the bearish mirror latches on a cross down in the overbought zone. More reactive than plain RSI, so best filtered by trend context.

+1 latches when FastK crosses above FastD while FastK is below the oversold threshold (default 20), and holds until FastK falls back below FastD; -1 latches when FastK crosses below FastD while FastK is above the overbought threshold (default 80), and holds until FastK rises back above FastD; 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish oversold cross still latched, -1 = bearish overbought cross still latched, 0 = no latched cross.

TRIX is the one-bar rate of change of a triple-exponentially-smoothed closing price. The triple smoothing strips out short-term noise, so TRIX oscillates slowly around zero. A cross up through zero marks momentum turning positive (bullish); a cross down through zero marks it turning negative (bearish). Smoother and lower-frequency than most momentum oscillators, which trades responsiveness for fewer whipsaws.

+1 while TRIX is above zero; -1 while TRIX is below zero; 0 only at exactly zero.

+1 = TRIX turned positive (bullish momentum), -1 = TRIX turned negative (bearish momentum).

Larry Williams' Ultimate Oscillator blends buying-pressure ratios over three lookbacks (7/14/28) into a single 0-100 reading, designed to reduce the false extremes that plague single-period oscillators. Below 30 is oversold and above 70 overbought. The signal flags time spent in those zones: oversold reads bullish (mean-reversion bounce bias), overbought reads bearish.

+1 while the Ultimate Oscillator is at or below the oversold threshold (default 30); -1 while it is at or above the overbought threshold (default 70); 0 in between.

+1 = oversold (bullish), -1 = overbought (bearish), 0 = oscillator mid-range.

Reports whether the close sits within the configured proximity (default 1%) of the rolling 252-bar high or low. New-highs and new-lows are universally watched screening filters — momentum and breakout strategies start from here, and the broad market's new-high / new-low spread is a foundational breadth indicator.

+1 while close is within proximity of the 252-bar high; -1 while close is within proximity of the 252-bar low; 0 mid-range.

+1 = near 52-week high, -1 = near 52-week low, 0 = mid-range.

The DI ordering only counts while the ADX line confirms a real trend (ADX >= adx_min, default 25); in weak-ADX chop the signal stays neutral.

+1 while +DI > -DI and ADX >= adx_min (default 25); -1 while -DI > +DI and ADX >= 25; 0 while ADX is below 25 or the DI lines are tied.

+1 = +DI leading with ADX-confirmed trend strength, -1 = -DI leading with ADX-confirmed trend strength.

Aroon measures how recently the highest-high and lowest-low occurred inside the lookback (default 25 bars) and reports the difference as a single -100 to +100 oscillator. Positive values mean the most recent high is fresher than the most recent low (uptrend); negative values mean the opposite. Crosses through ±50 are commonly used as trend-onset / trend-loss alerts. Less reactive to whipsaws than price-only momentum oscillators.

+1 while the oscillator is above high_threshold (default +50), -1 while it is below low_threshold (default -50), 0 in between.

+1 = uptrend state (oscillator above +50), -1 = downtrend state (oscillator below -50), 0 = no clear trend tilt.

Turtle-style breakout signal: enters long when price exceeds the highest high of the prior lookback window, short when price drops below the lowest low of the prior window. The channel is shifted to the prior bar to avoid lookahead. Holds the position state for a fixed number of bars. Cornerstone of trend-following strategies — works best in directional regimes and gets chopped up in range-bound markets.

+1 when the bar high exceeds the prior N-day high, held for hold_bars; -1 when the bar low breaks the prior N-day low, held for hold_bars. Ambiguous bars that exceed both sides are ignored on daily OHLC data.

+1 = long breakout state, -1 = short breakout state.

Composite trend system: bullish when the tenkan crosses above the kijun, price is above the cloud (Kumo), and the close is above its level from 26 bars ago (Chikou-style momentum confirmation).

+1 on bullish trigger conditions, -1 on bearish, 0 otherwise.

+1 = full Ichimoku bullish setup, -1 = full bearish setup.

The Parabolic SAR (Stop and Reverse) plots a dot above or below price; when price crosses the SAR, the trend side flips and the dot jumps to the opposite side. The flip event itself is the trade trigger. Works well in clean trends, gets whipsawed in chop.

+1 on flip from above-price (bearish) to below-price (bullish); -1 on flip the other way.

+1 = bullish flip, -1 = bearish flip.

Computes the period-bar log-return spread (ticker minus SPY) and ranks the spread against its trailing 252-bar quantile. SPY = SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust ('SPDR' = Standard & Poor's Depositary Receipts), the standard proxy for the US large-cap market. Ranking against the trailing window means the same threshold works in both gentle bull markets and high-volatility regimes — the metric is calibrated against the ticker's own history, not a fixed cutoff.

+1 while the ticker-vs-SPY spread ranks at or above the high_pct percentile (default 0.8 — the top 20%) of its trailing window; -1 while at or below low_pct (default 0.2 — the bottom 20%); 0 otherwise.

+1 = clear outperformance regime, -1 = clear underperformance regime.

The Vortex Indicator builds two oscillators (VI+ and VI-) from the relationship between the current bar's range and the prior bar's high/low, normalized by true range. When VI+ crosses above VI-, an uptrend is taking hold (bullish); when VI- crosses above VI+, a downtrend is (bearish). A trend-onset crossover tool that reacts to fresh directional movement.

+1 while VI+ holds above VI- for at least confirm_bars (default 3) consecutive bars; -1 while VI- holds above VI+ for the same span; 0 while leadership is tied or not yet confirmed.

+1 = confirmed VI+ leadership (uptrend state), -1 = confirmed VI- leadership (downtrend state).

While price is above its 200-day MA (uptrend regime), buy when today's close is the lowest in 7 sessions; exit when today's close is the highest in 7 sessions. A simple, robust short-term mean-reversion system — works because pullbacks within an uptrend tend to be shallow and quickly retraced. Symmetrically, the bearish variant short-sells 7-day highs in downtrends.

+1 on entry (new 7-day low closing above the 200-day MA), held until a new 7-day high; -1 on the mirror short entry (new 7-day high closing below the MA), held until a new 7-day low; 0 when flat.

+1 = pullback-buy state active, -1 = short-fade state active (7-day high below the 200-day MA), 0 = flat.

Bullish engulfing: a down candle followed by an up candle whose real body fully covers the prior real body. Bearish engulfing is the mirror. This implementation also checks prior_trend_window so the body engulfment is treated as a reversal after a move, not just another wide candle inside noise.

+1 when an up real body engulfs the prior down real body after a downtrend; -1 when a down real body engulfs the prior up real body after an uptrend.

+1 = bullish engulfing reversal, -1 = bearish engulfing reversal.

Identifies the most recent significant swing high and low, projects the standard Fibonacci levels (23.6%, 38.2%, 50%, 61.8%, 78.6%) across the swing, and fires only when price rejects off one of those levels back in the prior-trend direction. In an active uptrend the trigger fires when a bar's low pierces a Fib support by up to 0.5 ATR and closes back above it; in a downtrend the mirror case fires at Fib resistance. A 2×ATR swing-range floor suppresses emission inside noisy consolidations where every level sits within one ATR of every other. Only the first touch fires: the bar that arrives at a level after at least 3 bars away is the event — price sitting at a level does not re-fire day after day. Fibonacci levels are self-fulfilling support/resistance — heavily watched by chart-driven traders, so rejections at them tend to act as decision points whether the underlying ratios mean anything or not.

+1 in an uptrend when the bar's low pierces a Fib support (within atr_mult x ATR) and the close finishes above it; -1 in a downtrend when the bar's high pierces a Fib resistance and the close finishes below it. First touch only: fires only when none of the prior clear_bars (3) bars were at a level. 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish rejection at Fib support, -1 = bearish rejection at Fib resistance, 0 = no rejection event.

Bearish head-and-shoulders: a left shoulder, a higher center peak (head), and a right shoulder of comparable height to the left, broken by a decisive close below the neckline (the line connecting the two intervening troughs). The inverse pattern — three troughs with a deeper middle and an upward neckline break — is bullish. The neckline break must come within 60 bars of the right shoulder — a pattern that lingers unbroken expires rather than firing on a late, far-extrapolated line cross. Among the most-watched and most-cited topping/bottoming patterns in classical chart analysis.

+1 when the close breaks up through the neckline of a confirmed inverse H&S; -1 on the downside neckline break of a standard H&S. The break must occur within 60 bars of right-shoulder confirmation — unbroken patterns expire.

+1 = bullish inverse H&S confirmed, -1 = bearish H&S confirmed.

When price comes within an ATR-relative band of a key moving average (typically 50- or 200-period) and reverses without closing through it, the MA is acting as support (in an uptrend) or resistance (in a downtrend). The cleanest trend-continuation entry — buy the pullback to a rising MA, sell the rally to a falling MA. The proximity band is sized as 0.5 × Wilder ATR(14), so a high-volatility name and a quiet utility get proportionally-scaled bands instead of a fixed percentage that fires constantly on one and almost never on the other. A rejection only counts when the prior 3 bars all traded clear of the band — price must approach the MA from a distance and get turned away; a stock simply riding along its MA does not fire. Failure of the rejection (a clean close through) is itself meaningful and often signals a regime change.

+1 when, after the prior 3 bars traded clear above the MA band, the bar's low tags the band and the close holds above the MA; -1 when, after 3 bars clear below the band, the bar's high tags it and the close stays below.

+1 = bullish MA rejection (support held), -1 = bearish MA rejection (resistance held).

Finds two or more pivot highs (tops) or lows (bottoms) within a price tolerance and minimum bar separation. Confirmed multi-bottom is bullish — the price level repeatedly defended is acting as support, suggesting a base. Multi-top is bearish — the level repeatedly rejected is acting as resistance, suggesting distribution. Pattern strength rises with the number of touches and the time between them.

+1 at confirmation of a multi-bottom (price retests prior low and holds); -1 at confirmation of a multi-top.

+1 = multi-bottom (support pattern), -1 = multi-top (resistance pattern).

Morning star (bullish): a large down real body, a small-body middle candle (the star) below the first body, and a bullish third candle that closes back into the first body by the configured penetration. Evening star is the bearish mirror at a top. The three-candle structure is more reliable than a single doji because it includes follow-through confirmation.

+1 on confirmed morning star; -1 on confirmed evening star. middle_body_max controls the star body's maximum size; penetration controls how far bar three must close into bar one's body.

+1 = morning star (bullish reversal), -1 = evening star (bearish reversal).

Two consecutive non-overlapping windows where the second window's high is above the first's high AND the second's low is below the first's low (an outside range). Reads as a reversal signal off the prior trend: an outside-range bar that closes against the prior direction is a structural shift in supply and demand, not noise.

+1 if prior trend was down and current outside-range closes higher than it opens; -1 in the symmetric down-reversal case.

+1 = bullish outside reversal, -1 = bearish outside reversal.

Fits a trendline through pivot points and flags decisive closes through the line. Distinguishes a clean break (close violates the line) from a wick-test (intra-bar tag that closes back inside the trend). Trendline breaks are early-warning regime-change signals — the prior trend's structure has been violated, and the next leg may move in the opposite direction.

+1 on the first close above the trendline fitted through recent pivot highs (resistance); -1 on the first close below the line fitted through pivot lows (support). Line slope is not restricted — a close above an upward-sloping resistance line also fires.

+1 = bullish breakout above resistance line, -1 = bearish breakdown below support line.

A wedge is a price compression where two trendlines converge. Rising wedge (both lines sloping up but the upper less steep than the lower) typically resolves down — price runs out of room as buyers exhaust. Falling wedge (both lines sloping down with the lower less steep) typically resolves up. Compressions resolve eventually; the direction is what the wedge predicts.

+1 on every bar a falling wedge is in place (bullish bias); -1 on every bar a rising wedge is in place (bearish bias). The signal marks the wedge state itself — it does not wait for a breakout.

+1 = falling wedge active (typically resolves up), -1 = rising wedge active (typically resolves down).

A/D is OBV's smarter cousin: each bar contributes a fraction of its volume based on where the close sits inside the bar's high-low range (close near high = full positive volume, close near low = full negative). Builds a running cumulative line whose slope reads as 'is money flowing in or out under the surface?'. Diverging from price the same way OBV does — but typically smoother because the per-bar weight already discounts indecisive (mid-range close) bars.

+1 when the A/D line crosses above its lookback-period SMA from below (fresh inflow); -1 when it crosses below from above (fresh outflow); 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish A/D regime onset, -1 = bearish A/D regime onset, 0 = no fresh cross.

CMF takes the same close-location-in-range volume weighting that drives A/D, sums it across a 20-bar window, and divides by total volume in that window — yielding a normalized score between -1 and +1. Above +0.05 typically reads as net accumulation, below -0.05 as net distribution. Unlike the unbounded A/D line, CMF's normalization makes cross-ticker comparison meaningful.

+1 when CMF crosses up through +0.05 (net accumulation onset), -1 when CMF crosses down through -0.05 (net distribution onset), 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish flow regime onset, -1 = bearish flow regime onset, 0 = mid-band (no decisive flow tilt).

Trends backed by declining volume tend to lose conviction. The signal compares the slope of price against the slope of volume over a rolling window: if price keeps moving but volume is shrinking, fewer participants are committed to the move. Often precedes a stall or reversal because the move is running on inertia rather than fresh capital.

+1 once price has been falling on a negative volume slope for 3 consecutive bars (weak decline / potential bullish reversal); -1 once price has been rising on a negative volume slope for 3 consecutive bars (weak rally / sell-into-strength warning). One- or two-bar wobbles stay neutral.

+1 = weak downtrend (decline on falling volume; seller exhaustion, bullish reversal candidate), -1 = weak uptrend (rally on falling volume; buyer exhaustion, sell-into-strength warning).

Alexander Elder's Force Index multiplies the bar-over-bar price change by volume and smooths the result with a 13-period EMA, combining direction, extent, and conviction of a move into one oscillator. While the smoothed Force Index is above zero, buyers are exerting net force (bullish); while it is below zero, sellers are (bearish). Because it weights price moves by volume, it distinguishes conviction-backed moves from thin ones.

+1 once the smoothed Force Index has held above zero for 3 consecutive bars; -1 once it has held below zero for 3 consecutive bars; 0 while a fresh sign flip is still unconfirmed; NaN during EMA warmup.

+1 = net buying force (EFI held above zero for 3 bars), -1 = net selling force (EFI held below zero for 3 bars), 0 = sign flip not yet confirmed, NaN = EMA warmup period.

OBV cumulates signed volume — adds volume on up days and subtracts it on down days. Rising OBV reflects accumulation, falling OBV distribution. Same pivot-pair divergence rule as RSI/MACD: when price makes a new low but OBV doesn't, big-money has stopped selling at the lows. When price makes a new high but OBV lags, the rally lacks volume confirmation — distribution may be quietly underway.

+1 at right-hand pivot of (price lower-low, OBV higher-low); -1 at right-hand pivot of (price higher-high, OBV lower-high).

+1 = bullish OBV divergence, -1 = bearish OBV divergence.

Identifies bars whose volume is well above their recent average AND whose body is small relative to the bar's true range. The classic 'climax' shape: an exhaustion bar where heavy participation produced very little net price change, often marking short-term turning points after a directional run. Bullish climax (capitulation) prints near the low of the bar; bearish climax (distribution) prints near the high.

+1 (long-side capitulation) when the climax bar prints near its low; -1 (distribution) when it prints near its high.

+1 = capitulation/selling climax near the bar low (potential reversal lower-to-higher), -1 = distribution/buying climax near the bar high (potential reversal higher-to-lower).

Enters +1 when close ≤ lower band, holds until close ≥ middle band. Symmetric short-side state. Captures reversion-to-mean trades inside Bollinger bands — the trade is the move from the band back to the centre, not the breakout. Best in trending-but-noisy regimes where pullbacks cleanly retrace to the midline.

+1 enter on close ≤ lower band, exit on close ≥ middle. -1 enter on close ≥ upper, exit on close ≤ middle.

+1 = long mean-reversion held, -1 = short mean-reversion held, 0 = flat.

Fires on the bar where the close returns inside the bands after the prior close was outside. Long reentry from below the lower band is a mean-reversion long trigger; short reentry from above the upper band is a mean-reversion short trigger. The reentry — not the initial breakout — is the actual signal, because it confirms the move is reversing back toward the mean.

+1 when prior close < lower band and current close inside; -1 when prior close > upper band and current close inside.

+1 = long-side reentry from oversold, -1 = short-side reentry from overbought.

Keltner Channels wrap an EMA centerline (default 20 bars) with bands at ±N × ATR (default 2 × ATR(10)). Compared to Bollinger Bands, the ATR-driven width is smoother and less prone to the 'rubber band' contraction-then-expansion that can mislead Bollinger Squeeze readers. Breakouts through the upper/lower band frequently mark trend-continuation thrusts when the centerline slope agrees.

+1 when close pierces the upper band from below (bullish thrust), -1 when close pierces the lower band from above (bearish thrust), 0 otherwise.

+1 = bullish band break, -1 = bearish band break, 0 = inside the channel.