Poor Highs, Poor Lows and Single Prints
Are poor highs, poor lows and single prints revisited more often than a control at the same distance?
Poor extreme: the row of the high or the low holds two or more 30-minute periods. Single prints: the longest inner stretch of two or more one-period rows. The control for extremes is the highs and lows that are not poor at the same distance from the close; for single prints, a stretch of the same size across the close.
One of our guides' tables on the same thing the indicator measures, with its sample and its date range.
Poor extremes across 29 futures: how often they are exceeded, against non-poor extremes at the same distance from the close
ES, NQ, RTY, YM, NKD, GC, SI, HG, PL, PA, CL, NG, ZC, ZW, ZS, 6E, 6J, 6B, 6A, 6C, 6S, 6N, 6M, ZT, ZF, ZN, ZB, BTC, ETH
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| Market | Poor extreme · exceeded in the next session | Control | Reading | Exceeded within 5 sessions | Control | Reading | Cases |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ES | 55.2% | 54.8% | same as chance | 79.0% | 77.6% | same as chance | 1,231 |
| NQ | 59.1% | 57.3% | same as chance | 81.7% | 78.5% | same as chance | 1,165 |
| RTY | 59.8% | 57.1% | same as chance | 80.6% | 79.0% | same as chance | 655 |
| YM | 56.1% | 54.9% | same as chance | 79.0% | 78.4% | same as chance | 1,235 |
| NKD | 53.6% | 53.2% | same as chance | 77.2% | 76.4% | same as chance | 997 |
| GC | 57.2% | 54.6% | same as chance | 79.2% | 78.4% | same as chance | 1,139 |
| SI | 53.6% | 54.1% | same as chance | 78.1% | 78.7% | same as chance | 1,240 |
| HG | 53.9% | 54.0% | same as chance | 77.5% | 78.1% | same as chance | 1,346 |
| PL | 54.8% | 55.1% | same as chance | 78.0% | 78.2% | same as chance | 1,366 |
| PA | 54.4% | 53.2% | same as chance | 76.6% | 76.5% | same as chance | 1,766 |
| CL | 58.2% | 55.8% | same as chance | 78.2% | 77.9% | same as chance | 913 |
| NG | 56.5% | 56.1% | same as chance | 78.5% | 78.6% | same as chance | 1,026 |
| ZC | 55.8% | 55.1% | same as chance | 79.3% | 77.6% | same as chance | 1,302 |
| ZW | 54.5% | 55.9% | same as chance | 76.3% | 77.6% | same as chance | 1,007 |
| ZS | 59.5% | 56.4% | same as chance | 82.4% | 77.9% | same as chance | 962 |
| 6E | 54.7% | 54.4% | same as chance | 77.5% | 78.4% | same as chance | 1,415 |
| 6J | 57.0% | 53.9% | same as chance | 79.7% | 78.1% | same as chance | 1,503 |
| 6B | 56.3% | 53.7% | same as chance | 79.9% | 76.7% | same as chance | 1,541 |
| 6A | 52.7% | 54.0% | same as chance | 77.5% | 78.1% | same as chance | 1,527 |
| 6C | 56.6% | 55.1% | same as chance | 78.6% | 78.4% | same as chance | 1,437 |
| 6S | 54.9% | 54.1% | same as chance | 77.7% | 77.7% | same as chance | 1,366 |
| 6N | 51.6% | 53.0% | same as chance | 78.4% | 77.3% | same as chance | 1,491 |
| 6M | 55.8% | 51.9% | same as chance | 77.8% | 76.2% | same as chance | 1,568 |
| ZT | 49.1% | 48.2% | same as chance | 75.2% | 73.9% | same as chance | 3,846 |
| ZF | 53.9% | 52.8% | same as chance | 77.5% | 77.7% | same as chance | 1,996 |
| ZN | 54.7% | 52.1% | same as chance | 79.3% | 76.8% | same as chance | 2,131 |
| ZB | 53.6% | 53.1% | same as chance | 77.9% | 76.8% | same as chance | 1,787 |
| BTC | 50.0% | 51.3% | same as chance | 76.6% | 76.4% | same as chance | 638 |
| ETH | 49.9% | 52.1% | same as chance | 75.5% | 76.6% | same as chance | 363 |
n = 39,959 · 2010-07-02 to 2026-10-16 · historical futures data
Regular session of each future (9:30-16:00 ET; the Nikkei, 9:00-15:15 Tokyo), from the start of its 1-minute history (2010 for most; grains from 2013, CL and NG from 2015, RTY and BTC from 2017, ETH from 2021) to 16-Oct-2026, profile of 30-minute periods and a 70% value area. Prices adjusted at contract changes. Poor extreme = the row of the session's high (or low) holds two or more TPOs, no tail. Exceeded = a later session trades beyond that extreme. Control = the highs and lows that are not poor, at the same distance from their session's close measured in ATR (20-session average true range): five distance bins, each weighted by its share among the poor extremes. Cases = poor highs and lows. Reading: the difference with the control, with the control's variance by bin, and a cell only counts as different if it survives a false-discovery control (Benjamini-Hochberg at 5%) over every comparison of the table; otherwise 'same as chance'. No cell differs from its control: same as chance. If the level's column and the control's look alike, the level does not draw price more than any other at that distance. It is what happened, not a signal.
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Key Levels and Setup State fix each level when its period or window ends; only the table updates inside the bar. The Session Profile of the session in progress changes until the close, and a finished session's profile no longer changes.
The data of the chart you open them on. The historical frequencies are embedded in the indicator and say up to which date they were measured and over how many sessions.
Because a historical percentage describes how much and how often the market moved in the past, not where it will go today. That is why every figure comes with its sample and none of them suggests trades.
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