Strategy Session: OOPS Swing Pattern

Strategy Session: OOPS Swing Pattern

Nov 30, 2005

This strategy session revisits a set-up devised awhile ago that I’ve picked up again and revised to better model the intended strategy. The strategy comes from an interesting article, “The OOPS Pattern“, from http://www.guerillatradingnation.com/ – a site that features ‘proven strategies for small investors’.

The author notes the following caveats:

  • First you will only need to follow the market for the first hour or so of the day. The reliability of the strategy is less after 12 noon EST.
  • Second, this will provide you with the discipline to trade only high probability setups.
  • Third, it will provide you with a daily routine to execute in order to find and research the OOPS stocks that will be played the next day. (Using Trade-Ideas’ End of Day scans, I’ll describe how this can be done.)

And we’ll add the following caveat which we’ve said before: remember that these set-ups are sketches meant to give you an idea how to model your own trading plan. Use this ‘as is’ or modify it to your own liking as many others do. Know, however, that Trade-Ideas.com and all individuals affiliated with this site assume no responsibilities for your trading and investment results. The indicators, alerts and all other features are for research purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice.

The Strategy
As the author states,

    We are looking for stocks that have been in an upward trend but have experienced a recent pullback. We need the stocks to be in an upward trend because this indicates that the stock is under accumulation. There is interest out there. Very often, when institutions accumulate stocks, they will pause, and even sell, for several days in order to shake out the small investors and avoid the price running away from them. It is important that the market as a whole is heading in the same direction as your trade. At the very worst, the market should be flat. Never take a position counter to what the general market is doing.

    How Its Modeled
    The set-up includes the following conditions:

    • Average daily volume > 0.5M Shares
    • Share price > 20$
    • Above the 50 day MA
    • Preferably above the 20 day MA
    • The 50 day MA must be pointing upward
    • It is very important that the last day be a wide range bar (WRB), meaning, a bar wider than usual, that closes at the low, or very close to the low of the day

    Here is the picture we drawing with these filters:

    The alerts we select as triggers within this filtered universe are stocks that: run upwards at a higher than usual rate, break out of their 5, 15, or 30 minute opening ranges, reverse their gap downward (fill the gap), OR begin hitting daily highs resistance. After noon EST we stop evaluating new opportunities and just manage the ones already entered.

    Who Could Benefit
    The author clearly states that the OOPS Swing Pattern is for swing traders and that the opportunities that meet its criteria can last for 1 to 8 days. Those who paper trade or anyone else who wants to test this before using capital might also find this strategy useful. If you are looking for an active alert window that publishes alot of results to choose from throughout the day – this is NOT for you. If you examine the History of this strategy, you’ll see an average of only 20 alerts published per day.

    Footnotes:
    Original OOPS Swing Move post here.
    Link to “The OOPS Pattern” article here.
    Read the original article’s FAQs (important) here.
    Using End of Day scans to preview what to look for in the next day’s session:
    Copy the list of stocks from these relevant scans into an Excel column or Word table and look for which stocks show up in multiple lists: