Triangles and ranges
Converging, flat and widening swings — and the close that ends each one.
Read ascending, descending and symmetrical triangles as sequences of swing highs and lows that converge, draw their edges from swings that exist rather than from the shape you expect, and say which close would end each one. Recognise a rectangle as the trading range you already know, and a broadening top as swings that grow in both directions at once. Replace "triangles break with the trend" with the only statement a triangle supports: which edge closed first.
5 chapters · 6 quiz questions · 12 terms · included with a plan
Otus, on this module
Price spends most of its time going sideways, and sideways shapes attract the most confident folklore — the flat side always breaks, triangles resolve with the trend, the apex is a deadline. None of that is on the chart. What is on the chart is a sequence of swings getting narrower, staying level or getting wider. Read the swings and the shape takes care of itself.
The chapters
Each module ends with you doing what it taught — a written answer Otus reads, and a quiz.
- 01 · Read
A triangle is swings that converge
Ascending and descending triangles, and what a trendline actually is.
- 02 · Read
The symmetrical triangle, and the question it cannot answer
Lower highs and higher lows at once — and the apex that is not a deadline.
- 03 · Watch
Watch: Ascending Triangle
One minute, once it is public.
- 04 · Read
Rectangles, and swings that widen
The rectangle is the trading range you already know. The broadening top is its opposite.
- 05 · Write
In your own words
Numbers first, then one sentence. Otus reads it.
- 06 · Quiz
Six questions
A wrong answer still pays. It costs the combo, not the XP.
12 terms this module defines
The same definitions Otus uses in the lessons. All of them are in the trading glossary.
- Triangle
- A stretch of chart where the swing highs and swing lows converge, so each swing is smaller than the last. A description of contraction, not of direction.
- Ascending triangle
- Highs stalling at one flat band while the lows beneath them rise. Ends on a close outside either edge; the shape alone does not say which.
- Descending triangle
- Lows stalling at one flat band while the highs above them fall. The mirror of the ascending triangle, with the same limits on what it says.
- Symmetrical triangle
- Lower highs and higher lows at the same time. Each sequence cancels the other, leaving a range that narrows until a close leaves it.
- Trendline
- A straight line through two or more swing points. Two points draw it; a third swing stopping at it — drawn before that swing — is what makes it evidence.
- Pattern edge
- One of the lines that bounds a triangle, rectangle or similar shape. Drawn through real swings, given width, and judged on closes like any level.
- Contraction
- Swings and bar ranges getting smaller over a stretch of chart. What every triangle has in common, and a statement about volatility rather than direction.
- Apex
- The point where a triangle's edges would meet if extended. Where the drawn shape stops being useful — not a deadline by which price must do anything.
- Rectangle
- Two flat edges with swings bouncing between them: a trading range given a pattern name. It ends on a close outside an edge.
- Broadening top
- Swings that widen: higher highs and lower lows at once. Neither trend definition applies; the chart records expanding volatility, often after an advance.
- Expanding volatility
- Each swing travelling further than the last. The opposite of contraction, and what a broadening shape records.
- Close outside the shape
- The event that ends a triangle, rectangle or broadening shape: a bar closing beyond one of its edges. "Broke out" without that close is not yet a description.
Finishing it pays 150 XP and 3 keys on the game board, on top of what each chapter earns. XP measures what you learned — never what you earned. How levels work.
Education only. Nothing here is a recommendation to buy or sell anything; the school teaches reading charts, never predictions.
Start with lesson one.
The first modules, Otus as your tutor and the game board are free. No card needed.