I'm back from vacation and looking forward to providing you with many successful and profitable breakouts in 2014. To start the year, I'm introducing a new watchlist which promises to be very profitable called "Squeeze Play". Read more about it below.

Although the major indexes got off to a shaky start, at least the NASDAQ has recovered, and all trend indicators remain positive. This week brought some strong breakouts. In the last two days, we've seen ITMN gain 17.6%, FPRX gain 10% and PRCP gain 14.5%.


There were several outstanding breakouts over the holiday period. TNXP broke out from an HTF pattern on December 26 and has gained 67%. CCIH has gained 43% since breaking out from a CWH pattern on January 3. Also on January 3, FLML broke out from a CWH and has since gained 30%.

Squeeze Play

We have added a new watchlist of stocks that forming the right side of a cup and are also in a squeeze.  We call the new watchlist "Squeeze Play" and it is accessed from the Mine for Candidates > Long Positions > Squeeze Play menu choice. The watchlist is described in more detail below.

Intraday Charts

Intraday charts on any stock are now available when you select a BoWChart from the top right hand corner of the page. After the main chart loads, there is an intraday button in the top right of the chart window.

What is a Squeeze

A "squeeze" occurs when the volatility of a stock falls to below its recent levels. A fall in volatility usually means that the stock is in a period of consolidation or trending in a narrow range. When that period ends normal volatility will return resulting in a breakout to the upside or downside.

We detect a "squeeze" when the 2 standard deviation Bollinger Band (BB) narrows to within the Keltner Channel (KC). Bollinger Bands are very susceptible to volatility changes while Keltner Channels are a smoother, trend following, indicator. Consequently, the narrowing of the BB to within the KC gives us a convenient means of algorithmically recognizing a drop in volatility.

While the BB are within the KC, we say the "squeeze is on". For trading purposes, we are interested in the moment when the squeeze comes off, meaning that the upper and lower BB move outside the KC again, which signals a breakout. Of course, the breakout can be to the upside or downside, but for our Squeeze watchlist we are interested only in breakouts to the upside.

A squeeze can occur while a stock is trending up or down. For our squeeze watchlist, we are only concerned with stocks trending up.

This graphic shows four possible situations in which a squeeze can occur and then come off. In scenarios A, B and C, CRAY would not have appeared on the SQZ watchlist because it was not ascending the right side of a cup, nevertheless A, B and C illustrate the circumstances under which a squeeze can occur. In scenario D, CRAY would have been on the watchlist and an alert would have been issued.

Selecting Stocks for Our Squeeze Watchlist

When we select stocks for our cup-with-Handle (CwH), Double Bottom (DB) or Head and Shoulders Bottom (HSB) patterns, we first look for stocks that have formed  the left side of a cup and are starting to ascend the right side. This behavior is common to all three patterns and we place these stocks on an internal watchlist we call Basewatch. To select stocks  for the Squeeze (SQZ) watchlist, our algorithms examine  each stock on Basewatch to determine if the squeeze is on for each stock. To remove the likelihood that the stock could breakdown from the squeeze we also look at the momentum of the stock and the slope of the momentum curve. If both momentum and the  slope of the momentum curve are positive, then these stocks go on the SQZ watchlist.



Determining Breakout Price

For the squeeze to come off and give a buy signal, the upper BB value must be above the upper KC
value. So while in a squeeze we can calculate the price at which the stock must close at the next session to lift the upper BB above the upper KC. This price now becomes the breakout price.

Squeeze Alerts

As with our other watchlists, we monitor the real-time price during the next session and issue an alert if the breakout price is reached.