Session Close Index (SCI)
An oscillator in its own pane that shows, for every trading session, how far the session has closed above or below its open – colored by session.
What you see
A pane below the chart with one column per candle, colored by the session the candle belongs to (New York time): Asia, London, New York and after hours, or optionally the 8 finer phases (London killzone, pre-NY, NY killzone, London close, lunch, NY PM, close, Asia). The column and the line on top show the session's index up to that candle; each session starts at zero and ends with a dot at its result. The legend shows the session of the candle under the crosshair with its index and, as Last time, the result of the same session one occurrence earlier.
A statistics box in the chart sums up all finished sessions of the loaded candles: per session the number of sessions (n), a bar and the share that closed above their open (↑), the average result of the sessions that closed above (Ø ↑) and below (Ø ↓) their open, and the average of all (Ø). Load more history to widen the sample.
How it is calculated
A session runs from its first to its last candle in New York time (a candle belongs to the session it opens in). Its open is the open of the first candle; high and low are the highest high and lowest low so far. The default index is (close − open) / (high − low) × 100: +100 means the session closed at its high after opening at its low, 0 means it is back at its open, −100 the opposite. The alternative is the plain return (close − open) / open in percent. Values are running, so every candle only uses what was known at its close. A session that started before the first loaded candle gets no value. Sessions need timeframes up to 1 hour, the phases up to 30 minutes.
How to read it
- A session that ends near +100 or −100 trended from open to close; a result near 0 means it went somewhere and came back.
- Comparing the dots of the same session day after day shows which session currently drives the market.
- A London session that reverses Asia's result, or a New York session that continues London's, is easy to spot by the colors.
Using it in strategies
Outputs: value (running index), prev (result of the previous session), prevSame (result of the same session last time), session (index of the session or phase), open, high, low of the running session and last (1 on the last candle of a finished session). In the Trade Setup, "Compare" on value keeps entries to strong sessions, e.g. above 50. In WickScript: use indicator "Session Close Index" as sci, then for example sci.prev > 60 and sci.session == 1.
Settings
Open the settings with the slider icon next to the indicator (Indicators, F3). Numeric settings can be swept as Step 1 / Step 2 parameters when you run a strategy.
Inputs
| Setting | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sessions (New York time) | Choice | Sessions – Asia, London, New York, after hours | Main sessions (Asia, London, New York, after hours) or the 8 New York phases. Options: Sessions – Asia, London, New York, after hours, Phases – 8 New York phases (killzones, lunch, PM …). |
| Index | Choice | Close vs open in % of the session range (−100 … +100) | Close vs open in percent of the session's range (−100 to +100) or as a plain return in percent. Options: Close vs open in % of the session range (−100 … +100), Close vs open in percent. |
Styles
| Setting | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Columns | On/off | on | Columns from zero to the running index. |
| Line | On/off | on | Line through the running index, one per session. |
| Dot at the close of each session | On/off | on | Dot at the last candle of each finished session. |
| Statistics box in the chart (how often and how strongly each session closed above / below its open) | On/off | on | Statistics box in the chart: per session how often it closed above its open and how strongly. |
| Height | Number | 80 | Height of the pane in pixels. (min 30) |
Outputs
These values can be used in Trade Setup triggers, filters and exits (see Trade Setup) and in WickScript.
| Output | In WickScript | Description |
|---|---|---|
| value | value | Index of the running session up to this candle. |
| session | session | Session (0 Asia, 1 London, 2 New York, 3 after hours) or phase (0 to 7) of the candle. |
| segment | segment | Running number of the session occurrence in the loaded candles. |
| last | last | 1 on the last candle of a finished session, otherwise 0. |
| open | open | Open of the running session. |
| high | high | High of the running session up to this candle. |
| low | low | Low of the running session up to this candle. |
| prev | prev | Result of the previous session. |
| prevSame | prevSame | Result of the same session the last time it ran. |
Use in WickScript
use indicator creates this indicator inside a script, with settings by their ID. Each output is a field of the name after as. See WickScript indicators.
wickscript 1
indicator "Session Close Index (SCI) from the list" in pane
use indicator "SCI" as mySci
show mySci.value as line "value"