Bollinger bands pierce (long)longBacktest Results @ EURUSD • 1 Minute
This stragegy buys when price breaks up from the Bollinger Bands upper band. This is believed to indicate the beginning of a big upmove. It then sells whenever price goes below the Bollinger Bands middle line. See whether buying the Bollinger Bands breakout is a good idea! We've backtested it.
Equity Curve
Backtest covers 11 days of EURUSD • 1 Minute (Euro vs USD spot (Interactive Brokers)) data, from July 2, 2025 to July 13, 2025.
Equity curve is the strategy's performance over time. You should compare it to the asset's Buy & Hold performance. In general, you want the blue area to be well above the gray area.
Drawdown is how much losses (realized or unrealized) the strategy has had if compared to the highest equity peak. Compare this to the asset's drawdown to see whether your strategy does a decent job of isolating you from downside volatility. In general, the red area must be well within the gray area.
So, we have backtested Bollinger bands pierce (long) on 11 days of EURUSD • 1 Minute candles. This backtest resulted in 175 positions, with the average win rate of 34% and reward-risk ratio of 2.11. If you assume that 2.11 reward-to-risk ratio holds, you need a minimum win rate of 32.1 to be profitable. So you're looking good so far. The key metrics are as follows:
- Total Return: Total Return: 0.20% vs -0.90% for the asset
- Max Drawdown: Max Drawdown: -0.60% vs -1.20% for the asset
- Exposure: Exposure: 28.00% time in the market
- Win Rate: Win Rate: 34.0%, vs 32.1% minimum
- Reward/Risk Ratio: Reward/Risk Ratio: 2.11
With that exposure in mind, you can tell that for 28% time-in-market, you get -22.22% of the asset upside potential, and 50.00% of the asset downside potential.
Bollinger bands pierce (long): enter a position when
All of the following: # Echo 1min Chart(close) (1 candles ago) < 1min Bollinger Bands ® (20, 2, 2, 0, close), Up (1 candles ago) 1min Chart(close) > 1min Bollinger Bands ® (20, 2, 2, 0, close), Up
Bollinger bands pierce (long): exit a position when
All of the following: # Oscar 1min Chart(close) < 1min Bollinger Bands ® (20, 2, 2, 0, close), Middle
Bollinger bands pierce (long) @ EURUSD • 1 Minute (0.2%) backtest results explained by Alex C, Mike, Sarah
Alex C
AuthorZe backtest results show some interesting patterns, but I have concerns about ze strategy's robustness. Ze win rate of 34% combined with ze risk/reward ratio of 2.11 mathematically works out - zat's why we see positive net profit despite more losing trades than winners.
What worries me is ze high frequency of trades - 35 per day is quite intensive for a Bollinger Band strategy. Zis could lead to death by thousand cuts through spread/commission costs which are not factored in here. Ze long losing streaks (up to 18 trades) could also be psychologically challenging to handle in real trading, even though ze individual losses are small at -0.02%.
From pure mathematical perspective, ze strategy shows promise with positive expectancy and good win rate leeway above ze minimal required win rate. However, I would want to see how it performs across different market regimes and longer timeframes before considering it viable. Ze current 11 day sample size is too short for statistical significance in my opinion. We need at least 6 months of data to draw meaningful conclusions.
Mike
AuthorYo fam, this Bollinger Bands strategy is looking kinda interesting! 🚀 Let me break it down for you from a Wendy's trader perspective.
First off, we're beating the market here - strategy's up 0.2% while buy & hold is down -0.9%. That's already got me hyped! The win rate might look low at 34%, but check this out - our winners are twice as big as our losers (2.11 risk/reward ratio). That's the secret sauce right there! Plus we've got this nice 33.68% cushion above the minimum required win rate, which is straight-up bussin'.
The thing that really gets me excited is the trading frequency - 35 trades per day is no joke! 💪 With that many opportunities, even small gains can stack up quick. The max drawdown is only -0.6% too, which means we're not likely to blow up our accounts like some of those YOLO plays I see on Reddit. And hey, we're only in the market 28% of the time, so we're not overexposing ourselves.
Just keeping it real though - that 18-trade losing streak could be rough on the mental game. But if you can diamond hand through that, the math shows this strategy could be viable. Might even use my next Wendy's paycheck to give this a shot! 🍔📈
Sarah
AuthorThis is a horrible strategy, amigo! Let me tell you why with my typical Spahish directness.
The win rate of 34% is pathetic, even though mathematically it works due to the risk/reward ratio of 2.11. But losing 66% of the time? That's like playing Russian roulette with four bullets! The maximum losing streak of 18 trades would destroy most traders mentally - imagine losing 18 times in a row! This is not trading, this is masochism.
The total profit of 0.2% over 11 days is laughable, especialmente considering you're making 35 trades per day! That's a lot of work for practically nothing. The market exposure of 28% means you're sitting out most of the time - why even bother? And that drawdown of -0.6% for such tiny gains? Ridiculous!
Si quieres mi opinion honesta - this strategy is garbage. The only positive thing I can say is that the win rate leeway looks good mathematically, but who cares when everything else is terrible? You're better off flipping monedas than using this strategy. Go back to drawing board and create something that doesn't make me want to throw my computer out the window.
Tabular metrics of Bollinger bands pierce (long) backtested on EURUSD • 1 Minute
| Total Trades | 175 | Net Profit | 0.2% | Buy & Hold Profit | -0.9% |
| Win Rate | 34% | Reward/Risk Ratio | 2.11 | Max Drawdown | -0.6% |
| Asset Max Drawdown | -1.2% | Exposure | 28.0% | Avg Candles in Position | 14.6 |
| Sharpe Ratio | Sortino Ratio | Realized Volatility | — | ||
| Max Winning Streak | 3 | Avg Winning Streak | 1.4 | Max Losing Streak | 18 |
| Avg Losing Streak | 2.6 | Avg Trades per Month | 1050.0 | Avg Trades per Day | 35.0 |
| Return Std Dev | 0.0 | Loss Std Dev | 0.0 | Win Std Dev | 0.0 |
| Expectancy | 0.0 | Beta | 0.26 |
All backtests for Bollinger bands pierce (long)
| backtest | exposure | peformance vs asset | drawdown vs asset | win% | reward/risk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
BTCUSDT • 1 Minute | 24% | (6.4%/8.9%) 0.72x | (-2.3%/-1.9%) 1.21x | 45 | 2.9 |
EURUSD • 1 Minute | 28% | (0.2%/-0.9%) -0.22x | (-0.6%/-1.2%) 0.50x | 34 | 2.1 |
GLD • 1 Minute | 30% | (2.6%/0.0%) Infinityx | (-1.9%/-5.5%) 0.35x | 40 | 2.1 |
NVDA • 1 Minute | 29% | (10.9%/16.7%) 0.65x | (-2.1%/-4.4%) 0.48x | 42 | 2.5 |
SPY • 1 Minute | 30% | (1.2%/4.6%) 0.26x | (-1.9%/-2.1%) 0.90x | 34 | 2.2 |
TSLA • 1 Minute | 31% | (-15.1%/-10.3%) 1.47x | (-16.7%/-21.4%) 0.78x | 31 | 1.5 |
WMT • 1 Minute | 26% | (-3.3%/-5.4%) 0.61x | (-4.0%/-6.4%) 0.63x | 32 | 1.6 |
BTCUSDT • 10 Minutes | 27% | (7.2%/26.3%) 0.27x | (-4.8%/-12.1%) 0.40x | 38 | 2.1 |
EURUSD • 10 Minutes | 32% | (2.3%/6.8%) 0.34x | (-2.7%/-4.3%) 0.63x | 36 | 2.1 |
GLD • 10 Minutes | 38% | (6.0%/43.7%) 0.14x | (-9.8%/-8.3%) 1.18x | 43 | 1.6 |
NVDA • 10 Minutes | 33% | (8.1%/32.9%) 0.25x | (-26.2%/-42.8%) 0.61x | 44 | 1.4 |
SPY • 10 Minutes | 33% | (3.6%/14.3%) 0.25x | (-7.7%/-20.7%) 0.37x | 42 | 1.6 |
TSLA • 10 Minutes | 31% | (4.5%/59.0%) 0.08x | (-37.6%/-55.3%) 0.68x | 39 | 1.7 |
WMT • 10 Minutes | 34% | (25.4%/40.1%) 0.63x | (-6.8%/-23.8%) 0.29x | 43 | 2.1 |
BTCUSDT • 1 Hour | 30% | (9.3%/71.3%) 0.13x | (-17.2%/-30.6%) 0.56x | 38 | 1.8 |
EURUSD • 1 Hour | 32% | (6.5%/8.4%) 0.77x | (-4.2%/-9.0%) 0.47x | 40 | 1.9 |
GLD • 1 Hour | 35% | (21.0%/117.6%) 0.18x | (-28.2%/-22.2%) 1.27x | 41 | 1.8 |
NVDA • 1 Hour | 36% | (521.6%/3126.3%) 0.17x | (-36.1%/-68.0%) 0.53x | 47 | 2.3 |
SPY • 1 Hour | 36% | (31.9%/106.7%) 0.30x | (-11.2%/-35.1%) 0.32x | 46 | 1.6 |
TSLA • 1 Hour | 34% | (2572.3%/1395.5%) 1.84x | (-29.3%/-75.1%) 0.39x | 46 | 3.1 |
WMT • 1 Hour | 34% | (62.8%/138.2%) 0.45x | (-14.6%/-26.9%) 0.54x | 43 | 2.1 |
BTCUSDT • Daily | 36% | (320.8%/1335.5%) 0.24x | (-61.6%/-76.6%) 0.80x | 40 | 3.2 |
EURUSD • Daily | 29% | (3.2%/10.8%) 0.30x | (-10.2%/-23.3%) 0.44x | 30 | 2.7 |
GLD • Daily | 33% | (106.4%/595.1%) 0.18x | (-23.8%/-45.3%) 0.53x | 45 | 2.1 |
NVDA • Daily | 39% | (9137.3%/373678.5%) 0.02x | (-67.9%/-90.0%) 0.75x | 50 | 2.5 |
SPY • Daily | 32% | (32.3%/1316.3%) 0.02x | (-33.3%/-56.7%) 0.59x | 42 | 1.7 |
TSLA • Daily | 35% | (8915.3%/24185.2%) 0.37x | (-40.7%/-75.0%) 0.54x | 45 | 5.0 |
WMT • Daily | 34% | (-20.9%/9978.0%) -0.00x | (-65.4%/-50.6%) 1.29x | 37 | 1.7 |