Strategy 01 · AlphaTrading Bot
The breakout, run by the book.
A disciplined trend-following system built on the rules that made the original Turtle Traders famous, rebuilt for modern markets. It buys new highs after a quiet period, sizes every position from volatility, adds to winners, and exits on whichever of two stops fires first.
- Breakout channel
- 20-day
- Risk per unit
- 0.125%
- Pyramid depth
- 4 units
- Hard stop
- 1 × ATR
- Status
- Live, daily
The strategy
Breakout trading, explained simply.
You don't need to know what an ATR is. The bot watches for instruments making new highs after a quiet period, and when they break out, it gets in. Everything after that is arithmetic.
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01
Wait for a breakoutThe entry
The bot tracks the highest close over the last 20 trading days, about one month. The moment an instrument closes above that level it is a signal: the market is showing momentum that wasn't there before.
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02
Risk first, alwaysPosition sizing
Before buying anything the bot decides how much it is willing to lose on the trade: exactly 2% of the portfolio per unit. It then works backwards from the instrument's volatility to the number of shares.
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03
Add to winnersPyramiding
When a trade moves the right way the bot adds more, up to four separate units, each sized with the same 2% rule. You only scale in when the market is proving you right.
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04
Two independent exitsThe stops
A hard stop measured in the instrument's own volatility protects against a sudden fall. A trailing stop follows the trend and locks in profit as the move extends. Whichever fires first closes the position.
Entry rule (simplified)if today's close ≥ highest close of the last 20 days → BUY shares = floor( (portfolio × 2%) ÷ (ATR × volatility multiplier) ) // ATR uses Wilder's smoothing, not a simple average
Exit rule (whichever fires first)hard stop = entry_price − (ATR × 1.5) // fixed at entry trailing stop = lowest close of the last 10 days // updates every bar // either one closes the full position
The research
Every variable was tested.
We didn't run one backtest and call it done. Every parameter was varied systematically over five years of real market data, and the configuration we run is the one that held up across the whole watchlist, not the one that peaked on a single ticker.
combinations across six dimensions: channel length, stop multiplier, scale step, maximum units, trend filter and adjusted stop. All of them on the full five-year dataset, for every instrument.
- Breakout channel length
- 20 days
- ATR stop multiplier
- 1 × ATR
- Scale step (pyramiding)
- 0.5 × ATR
- Maximum pyramid units
- 4
- Risk per unit
- 0.125% of equity
- Maximum size per unit
- 10% of account
- ATR smoothing
- Wilder's EMA
The 20-day channel consistently outperformed the longer lookbacks tested (30, 40 and 55 days) on this watchlist. Shorter windows produced too many false entries; longer windows missed the bulk of each move.
Headline returns from a sweep like this are dominated by one or two tickers, so we don't publish them here. The performance page shows the full figures with their drawdowns, and the simulator runs the same engine so you can check any of it yourself.
The configuration was chosen after seeing its results. Treat every published number as an upper bound; live performance is normally lower.
Risk management
Two safeguards on every trade.
The bot doesn't rely on hope. Every open position carries two independent stops. They operate at the same time, and whichever fires first ends the trade.
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A
Hard stopThe ATR floor
- Set at entry: entry price − (ATR × 1.5)
- Fixed. It does not move after entry
- Caps the maximum dollar loss on any single unit
- Calculated from Wilder's ATR smoothing, not a simple average
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B
Trailing stopThe channel floor
- Trails the price and is recalculated every day
- Set at the lowest close of the last 10 days for a long position
- Rises as the trend extends, locking in profit automatically
- Exits the full position when price breaks the channel
Watchlist
Your watchlist.
You can add any ticker you like in setup, and trim the list whenever you want. These are the instruments the rules were validated on, which is where most subscribers start.
| Symbol | Instrument | Why it is here |
|---|---|---|
| SPY | S&P 500 ETF | Flagship trend vehicle |
| QQQ | Nasdaq 100 ETF | Tech momentum leader |
| GLD | Gold ETF | Long-term trend vehicle |
| AAPL | Apple Inc | Most traded stock globally |
| TSLA | Tesla Inc | Volatile, breakout-prone |
| NVDA | NVIDIA Corp | AI-driven mega-trend |
Fewer, larger winners. Trend following loses on most trades by design and pays for them with the few that run.
Past performance of a backtest is not a guarantee of future results. Figures on this page are simulated over historical data, not live trading results, and live performance may differ materially. Read the risk disclosure before subscribing.
See it in action, free.
The Turtle simulator runs the exact same breakout logic against real historical data. Pick any symbol, adjust the parameters, and see what the bot would have done. No account needed.