Tin tức & phân tích thị trường

In the world of trading, few stories are as famous as the one behind the Turtle Traders. The Turtle experiment was simple in concept — could absolute beginners, given nothing but a set of rules and two weeks of training, beat the markets?The results of the experiment were extraordinary. Even today, four decades later, many of their principles still echo through our algorithm-dominated trading world.In this article, we’ll revisit the original Turtle strategy, examine how it worked, and explore how this legendary approach could be reimagined for modern traders.

Who Were the Turtles?

The Turtle Traders were the product of a famous bet between trading legend Richard Dennis and his partner William Eckhardt. Dennis believed that trading could be taught; Eckhardt thought that the ability to trade was a set of skills that you are born with. To settle the debate, Dennis placed an ad in the newspaper and selected a group of everyday individuals, none of whom had any prior trading experience.These recruits underwent a two-week crash course in trading, during which they were taught a complete, mechanical system. It was based on trend-following logic, relying on breakouts, strict entry and exit rules, and position sizing based on market volatility. The idea was simple — eliminate emotion, follow the rules, and let the trends do the work.The experiment was a runaway success. As a group, the Turtles reportedly achieved an average annual return of 80%, managing millions in capital and building one of the most talked-about trading systems in history.

Turtle Trading Rules and Instruments

Entry Rules:

The Turtles followed mechanical entry rules based on the concept of trading with the trend. The initial entry criteria were:

1. Enter a long position if the price breaks above the 20-day high.
2. Enter a short position if the price falls below the 20-day low.
3. For a more conservative approach, a second strategy of a 55-day breakout was used as an alternative.
4. Orders were placed using buy/sell stop orders triggered by the breakout.

Markets Traded:

The system was applied across a wide range of liquid futures markets:

• Currency Futures: EUR/USD, JPY/USD, GBP/USD, CHF/USD, CAD/USD
• Commodity Futures: Gold, Silver, Crude Oil, Heating Oil, Corn, Wheat, Soybeans, Sugar, Cocoa, Cotton
• Stock Index Futures: S&P 500, Nikkei 225, Dow Jones (DJIA)
• Interest Rate Futures: U.S. Treasury Bonds, Eurodollars

The Importance of Volatility:

They used the Average True Range (ATR) of a 20-days, termed “N”, in many of their calculations to account for the impact of volatility.

Pyramiding (accumulation): Adding to Winning Trades:

The Turtles were also taught to scale into winning trades. This method, known as pyramiding or accumulation, involved adding to a trade if the price moved in their favour. If N (ATR) was 40 points, they would add 0.5 × the Average True Range to the trade. For example, accumulation of a new position would be actioned at 20 and then again at another 20, adding up to a maximum of four positions: the original trade plus three additional entries.

Exits and Risk Management

Initial Stop Loss:

Each trade was initiated with a stop loss placed 2N away from the entry price. This ensured that no single trade risked more than 2% of the account balance.

Trailing Stop:

As the trade progressed and additional units were added, the stop loss was dynamically adjusted using the most recent entry as a reference.The trailing stop for all positions was 2N on the latest (most recent) added position. If the stop was hit, all positions in that trade were closed simultaneously, locking in gains and controlling downside risk.

How Have Markets Changed Since the 1980s?

1. Algorithmic and high-frequency trading (HFT) now dominate markets, often resulting in faster and more erratic price movements.
2. Trading costs (commissions, spreads) have significantly decreased, enabling more frequent entries and tighter stops.
3. Trend persistence has diminished. Markets often reverse more quickly, making it harder for long-trend strategies to succeed without adaptation.
4. Forex and futures markets are more liquid, making it easier to execute large positions with less slippage.
5. Futures markets have seen changes in volume and type, enabling a greater selection of asset choices.
6. Stock indices tend to exhibit more mean reversion, demanding smarter trend filters.
7. Breakouts from common levels are less reliable, often resulting in quick reversals due to stop hunting and market manipulation.
8. A greater need for confirmation signals before acting on a breakout.
9. ATR-based sizing remains relevant but may benefit from more dynamic scaling.
10. Rigid stop-loss rules (like 2× ATR) are more likely to be hit due to shorter trend durations.

How Could the Turtle System Be Used Today?

Although the principles underpinning the turtle systems remain valid for trading today, some tweaking of the original criteria and parameter levels would be worth exploring.

Entry Modifications:

Requiring confirmation from trend filters, such as price being above the 200 EMA or RSI values above 55, or perhaps looking for confirmation on larger timeframes, could reduce false signals and improve win rates.Additional volume filters, including relative volume, OBV, and average volume, may add value to decision-makingIncorporating indicators developed since the turtle experiment, such as other variations of the ATR and RSI, Bollinger bands, and Keltner channels, may be worth consideration for the confluence of the basic trend following structure.

Exit and Risk Enhancements:

In the turtles experiment, the ATR was static once the initial trade was entered; the N value remained fixed for that position and all subsequent accumulated positions. Arguably a dynamic ATR instead of a fixed level may be worth consideration to adjust to changing volatility over time.This especially makes sense if you are considering adding additional confluence from other indicators for the initial position.

Trade Like a Turtle

Using the original Turtle approach could be considered a checklist for good practice. Especially when it comes to rule-based system designs, risk management, emotional discipline in execution, and equal attention to entry, accumulation, and exit.Consider testing a “Turtle-inspired” strategy using current instruments and enhanced filters before taking it live. The spirit of the Turtle experiment lives on not just in its rules, but in the key message that trading can be taught. You can learn it, but success depends on sticking to a well-thought-out plan and adhering to the golden rules of trading that still apply today.

Most traders obsess over entries, indicators, and setups, but often overlook a simple factor — the time of day that you trade.Time of day affects volatility, liquidity, and when new information enters the market. Ignoring it can turn good setups into frustrating inactivity, or even losses, while embracing it can help you trade with the market, not just the setup.

Why Time of Day Is Important

Markets are not equally active during the whole period they are open. Price action is driven by human behaviour, either on an individual or organisational level. Behaviour commonly follows routines:

• Economic data is released at scheduled times
• Institutions trading during business hours
• Retail traders are more active during specific sessions — in terms of volume and location.

This invariably creates rhythms in the market. By learning to trade with these rhythms, your trades will often require less confirmation, you improve stop placement, and have cleaner follow-through on trading ideas.

The Global Trading Clock

The trading day is broadly broken into three main sessions: Asia, Europe, and the US. Each has its own “character,” and benefits vary based on which time zone best aligns with your strategy.

1. Asia (Tokyo)

10pm –7am GMT: Markets are generally quieter except JPY and AUD FX pairs and index CFDs. Common characteristics include:

• Lower liquidity
• Range-bound behaviour
• Risk of false breakouts

Reversion strategies may do well in such market conditions as well as setting up highs and lows, which may be useful references for sessions later in the day.

2. Europe (London)

7am–4pm GMT: Increased volatility and volume are seen during the European session across many asset classes. The opening of the LME can influence metals prices, and US futures may respond accordingly to increased volatility. Common characteristics include:

• Large institutional flows
• Strong trends can begin
• Overlaps with NY for 2 hours 

Breakout strategies using Asian session highs or lows as reference (or previous days' US session) may outperform. And trend continuation and reversal approaches on the back of new data coming out of Europe may also be common. The two-hour crossover with the subsequent US session can also be an important change in market conditions.

3. US (New York)

12pm–9pm GMT: Volatility spikes may occur at US equity market open and significant data releases with global asset class impact are often released at 8.30am US Eastern time. Common characteristics include:

• Major economic releases
• US equity open creates short-term momentum
• Slower into the late session 

Fast moves might be prevalent early in the day, suggesting short-term momentum-supported new trend set-ups may outperform. Reversals around the middle of the day are also not uncommon.The Federal Reserve interest rate decisions are always in the early afternoon in the US, which can flip market sentiment.

The Intra-Session Rhythm

It is not only session-to-session changes that can often be seen on price charts. Within each session, price often has a tendency to move in waves. So, as a general rule, you may see:

• Early session: bursts of volatility and institutional positioning
• Mid-session: consolidation or retracements
• Late session: thinning liquidity, profit-taking, fakeouts

Why Most Traders Miss This

During strategy development, many strategies are tested on charts without considering what time the setup occurred.A 15-minute candle during the London open isn’t the same as one during the Australian lunch break.So, if you start taking breakouts in low-volume periods, trading reversals just before news, or entering trends during midday doldrums, these may have less chance of meeting the goals for that particular trade.

How to Use Time of Day as a Filter Practically

1. Mark Your Session Windows

On your chart, visually block out the London open, NY open, and overlap. Use vertical lines or shading — this will help you historically see what happens at these key times.*Note: We are developing a free indicator for this that you can place on a chart. Email [email protected] if you are interested.

2. Backtest by Session

You can split potential trades by session ‘time blocks’ that look back over time. Strategy types often work better during specific hours:

• Breakouts work 7am–10am GMT
• Mean reversion thrives 2am–5am GMT
• Reversals occur more often post-3pm GMT

Using your existing setups (or even previous trades), look at a sample to see what may have happened. 3. Add Time as a Trade FilterOnce you have some evidence from, test out simple rules like:

• “Only take trend trades between 7am–11am GMT”
• “No breakout entries after 3pm NY”

If you can code (or have access to someone who can), then you can backtest this quickly to see the impact of these filters.

4. Know the News Calendar

Most high-impact data is released at predictable times — make knowing what is happening and when part of your daily trending agenda. These contribute to the characteristics of a session, but also may flip what is standard on its head. Reference in your plan the major data points and how you are going to manage potential entry setups.

Trade With the Market — Not Just the Setup

The best trades don’t just have good structure; they also happen at the right time.Logically, if you want cleaner trade setups, high-probability entries, and improved consistency, then aligning your trading strategies with the market clock makes sense.It’s a simple shift that most traders ignore — perhaps to their detriment. Finding the best time of day to trade for your trading strategy could be one of the things that helps develop your trading edge.

There is an apparent enthusiasm among traders nowadays to add indicators to charts that resemble modern art more than market analysis. RSI, MACD, moving averages, stochastic oscillators, Bollinger Bands, volume profiles, and so many more. While these tools do have their place in some strategies, many traders forget the fundamental truth: price is the source, everything else is a reaction.Learning to read price as a narrative, showing a sequence of events that reveals the intentions and psychology of both buyers and sellers, can offer the trader a level of understanding that no single or even multiple indicators can give.

Indicators Are the Supporting Act — Not the Main Show

Don’t take from the opening that I think for one moment that Indicators are inherently bad. They can be helpful when used correctly as a way to offer some confluence to what the current price may be suggesting.But by design, most indicators are lagging. They take price and/or volume data and apply mathematical formulas to summarise or smooth the past.Moving Averages tell you where the price has been over the period of the MA setting. RSI shows whether the recent move has been relatively strong, even if it doesn’t tell you why. MACD illustrates the relationship between two moving averages and whether it's changing, but not necessarily market intent.Indicators are descriptive, not predictive. They are great at confirming bias but may not produce desired outcomes when used as your primary decision-making tool.

Price Action is a Language

Every candlestick is a snapshot of a battle occurring between buyers and sellers over a fixed point in current time. The shape and size of each bar contain a message.A large bullish candle (close near the high) indicates strong buyer control during that bar.A long wick above the body shows attempted movement upward but failure to hold — in other words, a rejection at higher prices.A doji (small body, long wicks) suggests indecision — neither side in control.And of course, the reverse is the case for a bearish candle.These are not random. They reflect the psychology of where market participants are now and can imply a degree of confidence, hesitation, exhaustion, or even reversal pressure.

Key takeaway:

There could be merit in starting each trading session by scanning the last 5–10 candles on your timeframe and asking: Who was in control? Are they still in control? And is there evidence that this may continue or be changing on THIS candle?”These simple questions can dramatically shift your perspective from reaction to anticipation.

What is Market Structure?

While individual candles can show immediate intent, structure reveals progression.A trend is never a continued straight line; market structure is the pattern of swing highs and swing lows that form the underlying skeleton of a trend.An uptrend forms higher highs (HH) and higher lows (HL).A downtrend forms lower highs (LH) and lower lows (LL).A range is where highs and lows are roughly equal, showing balance between buyers and sellers.Structure tells you where traders are likely to place orders and whether a trend may continue.There may be stops placed below swing lows, creating potential support. There may be profit targets at prior highs, creating potential resistance.Breakout or breakdown movement may be triggered if there is a break of these structural key levels, e.g., a break of a previous swing high may suggest continuation.

Key takeaway:

Try to map out the most recent swing highs/lows on your chart. Ask the question: Are we building a structure to continue, or is there a potential pause point where the market may decide to shift direction? And how should this impact my decision to enter a trade or stay in an open trade?This framing, based on current market structure, helps you align with momentum rather than chase it.

Volume: The Emotion in the Story

While price tells you what is happening, volume gives a sense of how much conviction is behind it. Volume adds depth and credibility to the story of price. Although there are those who would be reluctant to use tick volume with Forex and CFD trading, there is still potential legitimacy in testing this in your trading. As it is leading, not lagging, volume with price (arguably) acts as an important market gauge. High volume on a breakout = genuine interest with evidence of market convictionLow volume breakout = potential trap. Lack of participation means the move may fail.Effort vs. Result = if price moves very little despite high volume, it suggests absorption — large opposing orders are sitting there.

Volume as a Visual Lie Detector?

Sometimes price action looks bullish, but volume says otherwise. For example, A bullish engulfing candle that forms with lower-than-average volume is often a false signal. A reversal candle that forms with a volume spike often suggests a strong shift in sentiment.To use this practically, consider a volume average line to highlight when it may be time to act (or time not to).

How to Practice Your Trading Story Creation

Through the key fundamental principles covered above, you can start training how to create a market story.

Daily Market Story Exercise:

1. Strip off all indicators apart from volume!
2. Look at the last 10–20 candles.
3. Say out loud or write the story you see in front of you — e.g., “Price was rising but slowed near resistance. After a rejection candle, sellers stepped in with conviction as evidenced by the candle formation and volume. Now it’s testing the prior support zone…”

Do this each day, and you’ll build the ability to trade based on understanding of what market psychology is telling you rather than just guesswork.

When to Use Indicators — and When to Walk Away

As stated before, indicators aren't useless but can play an important part in confirming or disputing your market story. They work well when they confirm what price action already suggests, smooth out trends or help define zones, and help filter conditions (e.g., only trade long above 200 EMA).If you find yourself staring at indicator crossovers or waiting for an RSI line to tick over 30 without looking at price, you are reading the footnotes, not the full plot.Use indicators in the background, not the foreground of your decision-making.

Summary

Price is not just data, it’s market dialogue. It’s the collective voice of every trading participant in the market NOW. It demonstrates emotion, logic, and intention. When you learn to read the price like a story, you start anticipating rather than reacting. You reduce overtrading with a focus on price action that is compelling, not just suggestive. And arguably, your interaction with the market becomes clearer, simpler, and potentially far more powerful.

1. Inflation Uncertainty

While recent data has shown core inflation moderating, core PCE is on track to average below target at just 1.6% annualised over the past three months.Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell made clear that concerns about future inflation, especially from tariffs, remain top of mind.“If you just look backwards at the data, that’s what you would say… but we have to be forward-looking,” Powell said. “We expect a meaningful amount of inflation to arrive in the coming months, and we have to take that into account.”While the economy remains strong enough to buy time, policymakers are closely monitoring how tariff-related costs evolve before shifting policy. Powell also stated that without these forward-looking risks, rates would likely already be closer to the neutral rate, which is a full 100 basis points from current levels.

2. The Unemployment Rate anchor

Powell repeatedly cited the 4.2% unemployment rate during the press conference, mentioning it six times as the primary reason for keeping rates in restrictive territory. At this level, employment is ahead of the neutral rate.“The U.S. economy is in solid shape… job creation is at a healthy level,” Powell added that real wages are rising and participation remains relatively strong. He did, however, acknowledge that uncertainty around tariffs remains a constraint on future employment intentions.If not for a decline in labour force participation in May, the unemployment rate would already be closer to 4.6%. Couple this with the continuing jobless claims ticking up and hiring rates subdued, risks are building around labour market softening.

3. Autumn Meetings are Live

While avoiding firm forward guidance, Powell hinted at a timeline:“It could come quickly. It could not come quickly… We feel like the right thing to do is to be where we are… and just learn more.”This suggests the Fed will remain on hold through the July meeting, using the summer to assess incoming data, particularly whether tariffs meaningfully push inflation higher. If those effects prove limited and unemployment begins to rise, the stage could be set for a rate cut in September.

The US has entered the Israel-Iran war. However, despite an initial 4 per cent surge on the open, oil has settled where it has been since the conflict began in early June — around US$72 to US$75 a barrel.Trump claims the attacks from the US on Iranian nuclear facilities over the weekend are a very short, very tactical, one-off. This is something his base can get behind — some really big conservative players do not want a long-contracted war that sucks the US into external disputes.Whether this will be the case or not is up for debate, but there is a precedent from Trump's first presidency that we can look to. Iran had attacked several American bases in 2019, as well as attacking Saudi Arabia's most important oil refinery with Iranian drones. There wasn't a huge amount of damage; it was more a symbolic movement and display of capabilities by Iran.Initially, Trump didn't react — it took pressure from Gulf allies like the UAE and Israel for him to respond, which saw him order the assassination of the head of the Iranian Defence Force, Qasem Soleimani. This led to an Iranian response of ‘lots of noise’ and ‘cage rattling’, but minimal real action events, just a few drone attacks. Trump is betting on the same reaction now.If Iran follows the same patterns from the previous engagement, the geopolitical side of this is already at its peak.As of now, Iran is not going after or destroying major Gulf energy capabilities. Nor have there been any disruptions to the shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. In fact, apart from a posturing vote to block the Strait, Iran has not made any indication that it is going to disrupt oil in any way that would lead to price surges.Additionally, despite the U.S. military equipment buildup in the region being its highest since the Iraq war, critical Iranian energy infrastructure is running largely unscathed.This all suggests that the geopolitics and the physical and futures oil markets remain disconnected. Oil will spike on news rumours, but the actual impacts in the physical realm to this point remain low. Of course, this could change in future. But, for now, the risk of seeing oil move to US$100 a barrel is still a minority case rather than the majority.

Position management is one of the most overlooked skills in trading. The shiny new entry setups seem to proliferate our social media channels, while position management receives little airplay.Yet it can be what separates a trader who rides price moves with clarity on when to take action, from one who repeatedly watches their unrealised profits simply vanish.In this article, we break down both sides of position management — scaling in and scaling out — and explore practical ways you can blend these tactics into your existing strategy.

What Are ‘Scaling In’ and ‘Scaling Out’?

Scaling in means opening your full intended position size in planned stages instead of all at once when you first see a potential set-up. This allows you to test your idea with smaller risk first, then add size as the trade proves itself. Done well, it’s like gradually moving with the “market breath” as it shows evidence of a continued move.Scaling out means taking profits off in “chunks” as the price reaches certain levels — locking in some realised profit gains rather than waiting for an all-or-nothing technical exit. Through banking gains progressively, you also reduce risk, leaving less at the mercy of the next Truth Social post or sentiment-changing event.

Why Do This?

At first glance, this may sound unnecessarily messy. Why not just get in and get out — keep it clean?Real markets rarely move in a straight line, even with the strongest of trends. Trends invariably develop in waves, and reversals can often happen quickly, irrespective of instrument or timeframe.

Benefits of Scaling In

• Risk Control: By starting small, you’re not overcommitted too early. If the setup fails, your loss is smaller.
• Confirmation: Adding when a trend continues to be confirmed helps align your exposure with demonstrated market momentum. Price action is king, and this should dictate what we do and when we do it.
• Confidence Booster: Committing in smaller steps feels less intimidating, particularly when combined with a trail or scaling-out strategy.

Benefits of Scaling Out

• Lock in Cash Flow: Taking some profit at logical points locks away real money while giving the rest of your position room to run, helping overcome any feeling of fear of missing out – FOMO — as discussed in a recent article.
• Reduces Pressure: We have all seen a big open position profit swing back. Donating your profit back to the market this way places you in a high-stress situation. Further trading decision-making may be less sharp as a result. Such stress is far less if you’ve already banked part of your profit, and you gain confidence from a good decision.
• Flexibility: You’re not forced to perfectly time the absolute high or low. You capture the ‘meat’ of the move in stages. The time when a trade is most likely not to continue in a desired direction is right at the very start of a trend, where we often see false breakouts, or near the end, where momentum is starting to drop. Why not take advantage of this?

Errors with scaling (how you can mess it up)

The potential benefits of scaling in and out are clear; however, you can still run into issues if you misuse them.Here are three scenarios where many traders may see it fail:

1. Averaging Down: Adding more to losing positions, hoping to ‘get back to break-even,’ is a classic but not uncommon trap. Scaling in should always be based on the underlying concept, adding to price move strength, never to weakness.
2. Random Additions: Adding size just because a trade is profitable, without clear levels or criteria for action, often backfires. It can lead to scaling at the wrong time or overdoing the next scale in lot size, as overconfidence takes over.
3. No Clear Plan: Many traders who believe in the scaling out concept have every intention to do so, but in the absence of clear criteria. Having an unambiguous, specific price action-based approach is vital. Without such guidance, trading logic may be easily replaced by emotional decisions.

Like all parts of your trading, the best results are usually obtained through articulating this part of your strategy within your written plan. Constantly adjusting scale-in or scale-out points mid-trade causes overthinking and inconsistency. The whole point is to reduce second-guessing with what to do and when to do it, not add more.

Examples of ‘Scaling In’ Approaches

Example 1: Break-and-Retest approach

Scenario: A resistance level breaks decisively.Action: Enter 50% of your planned size at the breakout.Confirm: If price pulls back and holds above the broken level, add the remaining 50% on a bullish confirmation candle.Why: You get initial exposure early, but most size goes in once you have more evidence that the breakout is valid.

Example 2: Trend Building approach

Scenario: In a clear trend with identifiable pullbacks.Action: Enter the initial lot size on the setup confirmation. After a retracement pullback, add more on a breach of the recent pre-retracement swing high. Why: Rather than dumping all your capital at the first sign of pause (and there are signals which may indicate this is likely a pause rather than a reversal), you are riding the trend leg by leg, using market structure to guide your positioning.

Examples of ‘Scaling Out’ Approaches

Example 1: Predefined Profit Milestones based on risk

Example: Plan to take off 50% at 1R (one unit of risk) or an ATR multiple and trail the rest over breakevenWhy: You secure a profit cushion while letting the remaining position run for higher returns.

Example 2: Approaching Known Levels

Example: Scaling out just before major resistance levels for longs (or support levels for shorts).Why: Price often reacts to previous price consolidation levels. Taking partial profit nearby locks in gains before potential reversals. Market participants observe these levels, and there may be limit orders that may cap the likelihood of a move through the next key level.

Example 3: Weakening Momentum

Example: If you see a slowing on momentum indicators (e.g., smaller histogram bars or signal line histogram cross) or reversal candle pattern on a smaller timeframe, close a portion rather than the whole trade.Why: If you’re wrong about the trend ending, the remainder might still offer further upside benefit.

Tips for Mastering Scaling

Here are three underpinning principles to help you master scaling:

1. Always plan scale points before you enter a trade — not on the fly.
2. Never add to losing trades. Scale in only as confirmation builds and criteria are met.
3. Journal your trading: Compare the results of trades with and without scaling to see its impact. Make this an ongoing exercise to offer some evidence to refine your initial system.

Final Thoughts

Scaling in and scaling out are not the holy grail, but if acted on well, are sharp tools for traders who want to manage trades that are in tune with the underlying market.Handled with care, they help you ride trends more smoothly, protect open position profit, and reduce the mental anguish every trader can face when the market moves unpredictably in a fully open position.The bottom line is you don’t need to catch every pip or point, just enough to make sure that you give yourself a better chance to grow your account consistently than you may be doing now.