Trend Break Oscillator (TBO)
Oscillator in its own pane that shows how decisively a candle closes above the recent high or below the recent low, and stays at zero otherwise.
What you see
A pane below the chart with a line on a fixed scale from −2 to +2 and a dashed zero line. Candles with a clear break also get a small bar, green above zero and red below.
How to read it
- Above zero: the candle closed above the highest high of the previous Lookback Period candles, a break to the upside.
- Below zero: the candle closed below the lowest low of that period, a break to the downside.
- Zero: the close stayed inside the recent range.
The size shows how far the close got beyond the old high or low, measured against the size of the breaking candle itself, and is capped at ±2. A small value means the candle barely closed beyond the level, or the candle was large compared with the break; a value near the cap means a decisive close well beyond it.
With Smoothing 1 each candle is judged on its own, so the line drops back to zero as soon as a close falls back inside the range; a larger Smoothing averages the last values and lets the line fade out instead. A value only uses the current candle and the candles before it and does not change once the candle has closed.
Using it in strategies
The output value is the oscillator value. In the Trade Setup it works as a breakout trigger (value above zero for longs, below zero for shorts) or as a filter that asks for a minimum break strength. In WickScript: use indicator "Trend Break Oscillator" with period 50 as tbo, then for example tbo.value > 0.5.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lookback Period | Number | 20 | Number of previous candles whose highest high and lowest low form the range that has to be broken. Longer periods react only to bigger breakouts. (min 3) |
| Smoothing | Number | 1 | Simple average over this many oscillator values; 1 shows the raw value. The first value appears after Lookback Period + Smoothing − 1 candles. (min 1) |
| Height | Number | 90 | Height of the indicator pane. (min 20) |
Styles
| Setting | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Line Color | Color | #9E0000 |
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 | Break strength: positive for a close above the recent high, negative for a close below the recent low, 0 otherwise (range −2 to +2). |
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 "Trend Break Oscillator (TBO) from the list" in pane
use indicator "TBO" with period 20 as myTbo
show myTbo.value as line "value"