Rules
- Signal on the close of a candle, entry at the open of the next one.
- Regular divergence between price and RSI(14): pivots 5/5 bars, 5–60 bars apart. The signal fires when the last pivot is confirmed, 5 bars after it.
- Long on bullish divergence (price lower low, oscillator higher low); short on bearish.
- Stop-loss beyond the last pivot by 0.5 × ATR(14).
- Take-profit at 2 R.
- Exit on the close of bar 30 if neither level is hit.
- An opposite signal closes the trade at the next open and reverses.
- If stop and target are both touched in one candle, the stop counts.
- Fees 0.1% per side, slippage 0.05% on market fills.
The idea
A regular divergence is a disagreement between price and momentum: price makes a new extreme, RSI does not. A lower low in price with a higher low in RSI says sellers pushed price further with less force — a hint that the move is tiring and may turn.
The catch is timing. A swing low is only a swing low after price has moved away from it. Here a pivot needs 5 bars on each side, so the divergence becomes known 5 bars after the second low — by then part of the bounce is already gone. Every signal on this page is placed on that confirmation bar, exactly where a trader could have acted.
Chart
Pick a trade in the table to centre the chart on it. Hollow circles are pivots where they formed; filled ones mark the bar the pivot became known — the signal can only fire there.
Results
| Side | Trades | Win rate | Profit factor | Avg trade | Net P&L | Max drawdown |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | 3 | 0% | 0 | -39.04% | -78.12% | −78.12% |
| Long | 1 | 0% | 0 | -25.84% | -25.84% | −25.84% |
| Short | 2 | 0% | 0 | -45.63% | -70.49% | −70.49% |
Monthly P&L
| Year | ene. | feb. | mar. | abr. | may. | jun. | jul. | ago. | sep. | oct. | nov. | dic. | Year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | -47.90% | · | -47.90% |
| 2022 | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | -25.84% | · | -25.84% |
| 2021 | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | · | -43.37% | · | -43.37% |
Three real trades from the backtest
Worst loser · #1
Borderline case · #3
By timeframe
Where it breaks
On 1h the strategy did worst (-96.33% over 717 trades); the best timeframe was 1d (-77.52%). Buy & hold over the same history: +3,800.70%.
Divergences fight the trend. In a strong trend RSI stays stretched and keeps printing “divergences” while price keeps going; the stop behind the pivot is hit again and again. Lower timeframes add many more signals, and fees plus slippage on each of them eat whatever edge there is.
Common beginner mistakes
- Drawing the divergence after the fact: on a finished chart the pivot is obvious, in real time it is known only `right` bars later. That delay is exactly what this backtest enforces.
- Picking the pivots that fit: lines from any high to any high will always find a divergence. Fixed pivot rules and a fixed distance window remove the choice.
- Ignoring costs: a small edge per trade disappears when a strategy trades hundreds of times a year.
- Trusting a handful of trades: fewer than 30 trades say almost nothing about a strategy.
Open now
Long Entry 76.9585 · 2026-07-13 · Stop 53.1592 · Target 124.5569 · +44.17%
Trades · 3
| # | Side | Entry | Stop | Target | Exit | Result | Net | R | Bars | Show |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | Short | 2024-04-22 148.7356 |
219.4972 | 7.2123 | 2024-11-11 219.6070 |
Stop-loss | -47.90% | -1.01R | 30 | |
| 2 | Long | 2022-10-03 32.0760 |
23.8457 | 48.5366 | 2022-11-07 23.8338 |
Stop-loss | -25.84% | -1.01R | 6 | |
| 1 | Short | 2021-10-18 160.0299 |
228.9260 | 22.2379 | 2021-11-01 229.0404 |
Stop-loss | -43.37% | -1.01R | 3 |
Spec v1 · engine 1.1.0 · 319 candles 2020-08-10 — 2026-09-14 · data hash 34fbb60b59a9
Binance spot data. The coin list is today's, so delisted coins are missing (survivorship bias is not corrected).
Educational material, not investment advice. Past results of a mechanical strategy do not predict future results.