Scat is correct and Mike is right. That chart is a trading range...buy low and sell high until it breaks out. There are always trends within a TR but you may have to adjust your time frames to trend trade.
Multiple time frames are good... then you recognize that everything you see in a longer term is also revealed in a shorter term chart and in greater detail. The longer term chart shows "where", the shorter term shows "what".
Speaking of that... do you recognize that the "upswing" in a TR acts like a mini-bull, and the "downswing" in the TR acts like a mini-bear... regardless of whether the market trend is bullish or bearish? (This is "Gold Star" guidance... just in case you were thinking of dismissing it as "nuthin".)
%% I see a big part of the problem. Remember the recent SPY chart with Fed rate hikes, you asked about?? SPY is not in a trading range that bad. Bond barbed wire range=ouch Its trending much less better than that the SPY chart with Fed rate hikes on it. Put another way,its easier to see with extreme examples. Warren Buffet wrote Katherine G, instead of below average bond profits; aim @11%-12% stock market+ she got more than that[old Fortune magazine]Many millions + billions better than bonds EVEN if we dont do single stocks, good trends still apply; MSFT is trending better than that+ you can most likely find a better trend that MSFT. Murky trend = messy trend= mess. Money market pays about 4.44%+ you can do better than that much of the time......................I got caught in the same slop mess with oil stock ETFs so it can happen to anybody
Interesting, a lot about the trading range. In my experience, trading ranges don't last very long and by the time there is a clear past trading range, it's getting ready to break out of it and you're too late (to trade the range)
That's OK. The TR is one set of circumstances, the breakout is another. It's not one trade but rather two... IOW, trade the TR correctly, then shift mindset when price breaks out.
Most TR breakouts fail which makes fading the edges good plays. The false breakouts trap the breakout traders. Eventually there is a real breakout but better to wait for a test of the BO point or a higher low or lower high for entry into the emerging trend.
For sure, I'm just wondering if it's about to change direction instead of heading for the bottom of the range yet again. A lot of volume on the way up to the resistance level but then a lot of volume keeping it from going any higher. Now it's starting to look like it's consolidating, almost a flag pattern sort of in the middle of the trading range. I guess I should've said, if you had to take a long or short trade tomorrow morning which one would you take?