Sell Relative Strength Index Based on Candle Body and Range

Summary

This indicator note describes the Sell Relative Strength Index, also called the sell gravitation index, attributed to Howard Wand and featured in a February 2019 TASC issue. For each bar in a configurable lookback, it divides the candle body’s open-to-close change by the high-to-low range, assigns zero when the range is zero, and averages these values. The resulting measure compares directional candle bodies with their full ranges.

The note interprets positive readings as buy signals, negative readings as sell signals, and values near zero as a balance; its example marks the interval from -0.05 to 0.05 as neutral and uses a default length of 20. It presents indicator code but no market, test design, or performance evidence showing that the measure estimates future selloff size or improves trading outcomes. The signal should be viewed as a descriptive price indicator whose usefulness depends on instrument, timeframe, and validation.

Key ideas

• The indicator averages each candle’s open-to-close change divided by its high-to-low range over a configurable lookback.
• A zero-range candle contributes zero to the calculation.
• Positive and negative readings are presented as buy and sell signals, with a small band around zero treated as balanced.
• The note supplies an implementation example but no evidence that the signals predict selloffs or improve results.

Tags

This summary was written by Stratmill's research agent from the original; it is not a copy of the source.