Reference appendix
Momentum & oscillators
Indicators measuring the speed and strength of price moves, usually scaled to a fixed range, to flag overbought, oversold, and shifting momentum.
How these fit together
These all compress recent price action into a bounded number, which is what makes them comparable across securities and easy to read at a glance — and what makes them fail in the same way. In a strong trend every one of them pins at an extreme and stays there, which is why an overbought reading is not a sell signal and why a trend filter is not optional. They also form a clear sensitivity ladder, and stacking two indicators from the same rung mostly produces the same signal twice. The more durable reading across the whole family is divergence: price making a new extreme that the oscillator does not confirm, meaning the latest push had less force behind it than the last one.
- Sensitivity ladder: StochRSI → stochastic → RSI → MACD → TRIX, fastest to slowest
- MACD's zero-line cross is a 12/26 EMA crossover — the same event as on the moving-averages page
- RSI and MFI differ only by volume weighting — when they disagree, volume is not confirming
- Pair one oscillator with one trend tool, not two oscillators, which mostly repeat each other
- Oscillator + ADX below 20 → the environment 70/30 signals are designed for
- Divergence is the reading most traders trust above the extremes themselves
- In strong trends use 80/20 instead of 70/30 to cut the false calls
Relative strength index
RSIstudiedA 0–100 momentum oscillator comparing the size of recent gains to recent losses. Readings above 70 are typically read as overbought, below 30 as oversold.
Fast stochastic oscillator
Fast StochstudiedCompares the current close to the high-low range over a lookback period, on a 0–100 scale, using the raw, most sensitive version of the calculation.
Slow stochastic oscillator
Slow StochstudiedThe same close-vs-range comparison as the fast stochastic, with extra smoothing applied to reduce whipsaws.
Stochastic RSI
StochRSIuntestedApplies the stochastic oscillator's formula to RSI values instead of raw price, making an already-sensitive indicator even more reactive to short-term momentum shifts.
Moving average convergence/divergence
MACDstudiedThe difference between a fast and a slow EMA, plotted against a signal line (usually a 9-period EMA of that difference). Crossovers are read as shifts in momentum.
Commodity channel index
CCIstudiedMeasures how far price has moved from its statistical average, used to identify cyclical turns and overbought/oversold extremes across virtually any asset.
Momentum
MOMstudiedThe simplest momentum reading — just the difference between the current price and the price n periods ago — showing whether price is accelerating up or down.
Rate of change
ROCstudiedMomentum expressed as a percentage change over the chosen lookback period, rather than a raw price difference.
Smoothed rate of change
SROCuntestedRate of Change calculated on a smoothed (EMA) price series instead of raw price, filtering out some of ROC's noise.
Williams percent range
Williams %RstudiedA momentum oscillator similar to the Stochastic Oscillator but scaled −100 to 0, measuring the close relative to the recent high-low range. Near 0 signals overbought, near −100 oversold.
Ultimate oscillator
UOuntestedCombines short-, medium-, and long-term price momentum into one weighted reading, designed to reduce the false divergence signals that single-timeframe oscillators can give.
Awesome oscillator
AOuntestedThe difference between a 5-period and 34-period SMA of the midpoint price ((high+low)/2), used to gauge momentum shifts independent of the closing price.
Acceleration/deceleration
ACuntestedThe difference between the Awesome Oscillator and its own moving average — aiming to show momentum changes even before they show up in AO or in price.
Chande momentum oscillator
CMOuntestedA −100 to 100 momentum reading based on the sum of recent gains versus losses — conceptually close to RSI, but calculated without RSI's internal smoothing, so more sensitive.
True strength index
TSIuntestedA momentum oscillator built from two layers of EMA smoothing applied to price changes, aiming to filter noise while still reacting reasonably quickly.
Relative vigor index
RVIuntestedCompares the close-to-open change against the high-to-low range, on the idea that strong uptrends tend to close well above where they opened (and vice versa). Plotted against a signal line for crossovers.
Relative vigor index simple moving average
RVIMAuntestedA simple moving average of the Relative Vigor Index, typically used as that indicator's own signal line.
Inertia
InertiauntestedA smoothed version of the Relative Volatility Index, fitted with a linear regression, meant to show whether a trend has enough underlying “inertia” to keep going.
Dynamic momentum index
DYMIuntestedA variation of RSI whose lookback period automatically shortens or lengthens based on recent volatility, instead of using a fixed period.
Intraday momentum index
IMIuntestedApplies RSI-style logic to a security's open and close prices within each session, blending candlestick analysis with momentum.
Kairi relative index
KRIuntestedThe percentage difference between the current price and its moving average, used to spot how far price has stretched away from its trend.
Forecast oscillator
FOSCuntestedThe percentage difference between the actual closing price and the value the Time Series Forecast predicted — showing how far off the linear-regression forecast has been.
High-low oscillator
HLOuntestedPlots the difference between a period's high and low (or, in market-breadth contexts, the count of stocks making new highs vs. new lows) to gauge the strength of a move.
WaveTrend
WaveTrenduntestedA momentum oscillator built from a smoothed price-channel calculation, designed to flag overbought/oversold zones and momentum shifts earlier than RSI or Stochastics.
WaveTrend with crosses
WaveTrend+XuntestedThe WaveTrend oscillator with its internal line crossovers explicitly marked, highlighting buy/sell signal points directly on the chart.
How to read the evidence tag
Every entry here carries one of three tags. The tag rates the evidence behind the claim the entry makes — not how popular the tool is, how old it is, or how confident the people teaching it sound. Close to half of the entries on this site sit on the weakest tier — including every one of the eighteen Smart Money Concepts, which are drawn here in the same ink as Wilder’s ADX and deserve to be told apart from it. That is the honest position rather than an oversight.
- defined33 entries
True by arithmetic. This entry describes a calculation or a piece of terminology, and makes no claim about what price will do next. Nothing here can be wrong except a typo.
- studied56 entries
The predictive claim attached to this entry has been tested in peer-reviewed research. Being on this tier does not mean it works — across the literature these edges are typically small, unstable between markets and periods, and often gone after costs.
- untested87 entries
Widely taught and widely believed, but no published test of the claim was located while building this page. Treat it as a description of what traders do, not as evidence that doing it pays.
The line between studied and untested is drawn by whether a peer-reviewed test of the specific claim could be found, and those tests are listed on the Sources page under “Evidence and base rates”. If you know of a published test of something tagged untested, the tag is wrong and should change — that is the point of labelling it at all.