Every Strategy Family vs a Benchmark
None of 1,342 strategies passed the corrected test. 265 finished ahead of the equal-weight benchmark on the raw number and 39 had an unadjusted p-value under 0.05, but after correcting for 1,774 tests (Benjamini-Hochberg, q below 0.10), 0 passed. That does not prove no strategy works. 1,342 is distinct strategies; 1,774 counts every distinct run that traded, robustness reruns included.
Families group strategies by method, not by asset. Open a family for each rule's gap to the benchmark, p-value, corrected q, source and result file, or read the evidence page for the method.
| Family | What it tests | Strategies | Ahead of benchmark | p under 0.05 | Passed correction |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Momentum | Rules that buy what has recently risen, or rank assets by recent gain and hold the leaders. | 210 | 59 | 5 | 0 |
| Trend following | Rules that follow the direction of price, such as moving-average crossovers and channel breakouts. | 194 | 43 | 13 | 0 |
| Mean reversion | Rules that bet a stretched price will drift back toward its recent average. | 142 | 4 | 1 | 0 |
| Volatility | Rules that react to how much price is swinging, including low-volatility tilts and volatility breakouts. | 121 | 21 | 2 | 0 |
| Equity factors | Rules that tilt a stock portfolio toward a measurable trait, such as nearness to a 52-week high or low beta. | 76 | 45 | 10 | 0 |
| Other tested patterns | Tests that fit no other family, such as portfolio insurance and rebalancing bands. | 64 | 12 | 3 | 0 |
| Day and month seasonality | Rules tied to the day of the week, hour of the day or month of the year. | 62 | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| Macro | Rules that switch between assets based on macro series such as the dollar or real yields. | 49 | 17 | 2 | 0 |
| Social media chart patterns | Indicator rules that spread through trading videos and social posts, coded from how they are taught. | 47 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Sentiment extremes | Rules that act on crowd mood measures, such as the Fear and Greed index. | 33 | 9 | 1 | 0 |
| Top 100 retail strategies | Rules drawn from popularity rankings of retail strategies, such as the most-liked TradingView scripts. | 33 | 4 | 0 | 0 |
| Pairs and stat arb | Reversal and pairs rules that bet two related prices, or a price and its own average, move back together. | 28 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Macro and intermarket | Rules that read one market, such as the dollar or credit spreads, to time another. | 19 | 6 | 0 | 0 |
| Popular rules, strongest version | The strongest fair version of a popular rule, retested across market regimes to give it its best chance. | 19 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Funding carry | Rules that use the funding payments on crypto perpetual futures as a signal. | 16 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Popular indicator rules | 16 | 4 | 0 | 0 | |
| Trending techniques | Five techniques that were widely discussed among retail traders from August to October 2026, such as opening-range breakouts and the 9/21 EMA cross. | 15 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Event driven | Rules that trade the days after an unusual event, such as a price gap, and compare against matched controls. | 13 | 5 | 0 | 0 |
| Fundamental factor | 12 | 9 | 2 | 0 | |
| Machine learning | Rules built from machine learning or portfolio-optimisation methods rather than a single indicator. | 12 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Chart structure | Rules built from drawn chart shapes, such as pivots, ZigZag reversals and line-break charts. | 11 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Calendar-event drift | Rules tied to a dated event, such as a funding reset, a holiday or the turn of the month. | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Positioning | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Managed futures trend | Trend rules in the style of managed-futures funds, applied to the assets tested here. | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Trading books | Rules taken from published trading books, such as Connors and Livermore. | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Breadth | Rules that time the market by how many stocks sit above a long-run average. | 5 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Liquidity sweep | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Path order | Tests of whether the order in which gains and losses arrive changes what a rule earns. | 5 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Rebalance control | Tests of when to rebalance an ETF portfolio, set against rebalancing on a plain schedule. | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Candle patterns | Named candlestick shapes, such as the morning star, tested as entry rules. | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Event clock | Exit rules that count movement, direction changes or volume instead of elapsed time. | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Open interest vs spot | Rules that act when open interest (positions held open in futures) and spot price tell different stories. | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Premium discount | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Tjr core model | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Volume | 4 | 1 | 0 | 0 | |
| Anchor occupation | Rules that look at how long price has stayed above or below an anchor, such as the day's open or an entry price. | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Holding clock | Exit rules that use how long a trade has been open, such as a deadline to recover a loss. | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Oil shock attribution | Rules that ask whether an oil move is passed through to energy stocks or inflation-linked assets. | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Profit disposition | Exit rules for what to do with a winning trade, such as moving the stop to breakeven or selling half. | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Rate decomposition | Rules that split a rate move into real yield and inflation expectations and trade the lag in gold or bonds. | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Tail budget | Position-sizing rules that shrink exposure to assets with clustered or severe losses. | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Breadth dispersion | Rules that use how widely stock returns differ from one another as a market-timing signal. | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Breakout | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Capital deployment | Rules for how and when to put cash to work, such as dollar-cost averaging and value averaging. | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Credit vol disagreement | Rules that act when credit markets and the VIX volatility index disagree. | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Daily profile | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Fair value gap | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Htf cascade | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Judas swing | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Macro disagreement | Rules that act when two macro signals, such as the dollar and real yields, point in different directions. | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Session liquidity | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Stop reentry | Rules for whether and when to buy again after a stop-loss has sold the position. | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Minervini trend template | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | |
| Volatility disagreement | Rules that act when the VIX curve and the rest of the market disagree. | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Volume order | Rules that use when in the day volume arrives, or how it clusters, to predict returns. | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Age price barrier | Exit rules where the stop tightens as the trade gets older. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Excursion balance | A rule that requires a trade's gains to repay its worst drop before it is held. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Failed breakout | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Index alignment | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Liquidity draw | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Liquidity run | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Low-volatility squeeze and breakout | A squeeze rule: wait for unusually narrow price ranges, then trade the breakout. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Market structure | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Open-interest and price divergence | A rule that compares open interest (positions held open in futures) with the price trend. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Order block | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Participation | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Regime | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Alternative-data sentiment | A rule that buys extreme fear and avoids extreme greed on a sentiment index. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Sequential evidence | A rule that exits after accumulating several signs that the trade is going the wrong way. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Session range | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Session relay | A rule that looks at whether a gain was recovered across successive trading sessions. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Tail arrival | A test of whether avoiding clustered shock days improves a stock strategy. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Underwater entry | A rule that buys crypto only when it trades well below its yearly high. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Volatility-gated sentiment extremes | A rule that buys extreme crypto fear only when volatility is in a set range. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Realized-volatility expansion | A rule that triggers when realised volatility starts rising, independent of price direction. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Volume concentration | A rule that looks at whether volume is spread across small and large moves. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Wealth mixture | A rule that blends several fixed ETF portfolios by how much each has accumulated. | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
- Momentum
Rules that buy what has recently risen, or rank assets by recent gain and hold the leaders.
210 strategies · 59 ahead of benchmark · 5 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Trend following
Rules that follow the direction of price, such as moving-average crossovers and channel breakouts.
194 strategies · 43 ahead of benchmark · 13 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Mean reversion
Rules that bet a stretched price will drift back toward its recent average.
142 strategies · 4 ahead of benchmark · 1 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Volatility
Rules that react to how much price is swinging, including low-volatility tilts and volatility breakouts.
121 strategies · 21 ahead of benchmark · 2 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Equity factors
Rules that tilt a stock portfolio toward a measurable trait, such as nearness to a 52-week high or low beta.
76 strategies · 45 ahead of benchmark · 10 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Other tested patterns
Tests that fit no other family, such as portfolio insurance and rebalancing bands.
64 strategies · 12 ahead of benchmark · 3 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Day and month seasonality
Rules tied to the day of the week, hour of the day or month of the year.
62 strategies · 8 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Macro
Rules that switch between assets based on macro series such as the dollar or real yields.
49 strategies · 17 ahead of benchmark · 2 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Social media chart patterns
Indicator rules that spread through trading videos and social posts, coded from how they are taught.
47 strategies · 2 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Sentiment extremes
Rules that act on crowd mood measures, such as the Fear and Greed index.
33 strategies · 9 ahead of benchmark · 1 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Top 100 retail strategies
Rules drawn from popularity rankings of retail strategies, such as the most-liked TradingView scripts.
33 strategies · 4 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Pairs and stat arb
Reversal and pairs rules that bet two related prices, or a price and its own average, move back together.
28 strategies · 2 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Macro and intermarket
Rules that read one market, such as the dollar or credit spreads, to time another.
19 strategies · 6 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Popular rules, strongest version
The strongest fair version of a popular rule, retested across market regimes to give it its best chance.
19 strategies · 2 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Funding carry
Rules that use the funding payments on crypto perpetual futures as a signal.
16 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Popular indicator rules
16 strategies · 4 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Trending techniques
Five techniques that were widely discussed among retail traders from August to October 2026, such as opening-range breakouts and the 9/21 EMA cross.
15 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Event driven
Rules that trade the days after an unusual event, such as a price gap, and compare against matched controls.
13 strategies · 5 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Fundamental factor
12 strategies · 9 ahead of benchmark · 2 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Machine learning
Rules built from machine learning or portfolio-optimisation methods rather than a single indicator.
12 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Chart structure
Rules built from drawn chart shapes, such as pivots, ZigZag reversals and line-break charts.
11 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Calendar-event drift
Rules tied to a dated event, such as a funding reset, a holiday or the turn of the month.
10 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Positioning
10 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Managed futures trend
Trend rules in the style of managed-futures funds, applied to the assets tested here.
10 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Trading books
Rules taken from published trading books, such as Connors and Livermore.
8 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Breadth
Rules that time the market by how many stocks sit above a long-run average.
5 strategies · 2 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Liquidity sweep
5 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Path order
Tests of whether the order in which gains and losses arrive changes what a rule earns.
5 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Rebalance control
Tests of when to rebalance an ETF portfolio, set against rebalancing on a plain schedule.
5 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Candle patterns
Named candlestick shapes, such as the morning star, tested as entry rules.
4 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Event clock
Exit rules that count movement, direction changes or volume instead of elapsed time.
4 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Open interest vs spot
Rules that act when open interest (positions held open in futures) and spot price tell different stories.
4 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Premium discount
4 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Tjr core model
4 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Volume
4 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Anchor occupation
Rules that look at how long price has stayed above or below an anchor, such as the day's open or an entry price.
3 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Holding clock
Exit rules that use how long a trade has been open, such as a deadline to recover a loss.
3 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Oil shock attribution
Rules that ask whether an oil move is passed through to energy stocks or inflation-linked assets.
3 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Profit disposition
Exit rules for what to do with a winning trade, such as moving the stop to breakeven or selling half.
3 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Rate decomposition
Rules that split a rate move into real yield and inflation expectations and trade the lag in gold or bonds.
3 strategies · 2 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Tail budget
Position-sizing rules that shrink exposure to assets with clustered or severe losses.
3 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Breadth dispersion
Rules that use how widely stock returns differ from one another as a market-timing signal.
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Breakout
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Capital deployment
Rules for how and when to put cash to work, such as dollar-cost averaging and value averaging.
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Credit vol disagreement
Rules that act when credit markets and the VIX volatility index disagree.
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Daily profile
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Fair value gap
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Htf cascade
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Judas swing
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Macro disagreement
Rules that act when two macro signals, such as the dollar and real yields, point in different directions.
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Session liquidity
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Stop reentry
Rules for whether and when to buy again after a stop-loss has sold the position.
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Minervini trend template
2 strategies · 1 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Volatility disagreement
Rules that act when the VIX curve and the rest of the market disagree.
2 strategies · 2 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Volume order
Rules that use when in the day volume arrives, or how it clusters, to predict returns.
2 strategies · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Age price barrier
Exit rules where the stop tightens as the trade gets older.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Excursion balance
A rule that requires a trade's gains to repay its worst drop before it is held.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Failed breakout
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Index alignment
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Liquidity draw
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Liquidity run
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Low-volatility squeeze and breakout
A squeeze rule: wait for unusually narrow price ranges, then trade the breakout.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Market structure
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Open-interest and price divergence
A rule that compares open interest (positions held open in futures) with the price trend.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Order block
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Participation
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Regime
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Alternative-data sentiment
A rule that buys extreme fear and avoids extreme greed on a sentiment index.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Sequential evidence
A rule that exits after accumulating several signs that the trade is going the wrong way.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Session range
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Session relay
A rule that looks at whether a gain was recovered across successive trading sessions.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Tail arrival
A test of whether avoiding clustered shock days improves a stock strategy.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Underwater entry
A rule that buys crypto only when it trades well below its yearly high.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Volatility-gated sentiment extremes
A rule that buys extreme crypto fear only when volatility is in a set range.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Realized-volatility expansion
A rule that triggers when realised volatility starts rising, independent of price direction.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Volume concentration
A rule that looks at whether volume is spread across small and large moves.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction
- Wealth mixture
A rule that blends several fixed ETF portfolios by how much each has accumulated.
1 strategy · 0 ahead of benchmark · 0 with p under 0.05 · 0 passed correction