Money Moves is a trend indicator for MT4 and MT5 whose flip level is settled before the bar opens. Most ATR trend bands are built from the midpoint of the bar you are standing on, so the level that would turn the trend keeps moving while that bar prints. This one tests the close against the previous bar's stop, which means the number you read at 09:00 is the number that decides 09:59.
On 57,540 hourly gold bars back to January 2014 it flipped 829 times on default settings, about one signal every 69 bars. That is a responsive tool rather than a patient one, and it is the first thing worth knowing before deciding it suits you.
What the flip level actually is
| What a trend flip needs | What a band-style trend tool usually does | What Money Moves does |
|---|---|---|
| A trigger you can read in advance | Compares the close with a band built from that same bar's midpoint, so the trigger moves as the bar forms | Compares the close with the previous bar's stop. The level is fixed at the prior close |
| A stop that does not loosen | Recentres every bar, so a quiet stretch widens the band again | Once price is on the right side, the stop only ratchets toward price and never backs away |
| One sensitivity control | Two or three dials that interact in ways nobody documents | Also two dials, and they turn out to be the same dial. Measured below |
| A visible level | Draws a band | Draws the level itself as a step line, so its last point is the trigger for the next bar |
Row one is why the thing exists. The stop is hl2 ± mult × ATR(period) × filter, recomputed each bar and then ratcheted, and the flip rule reads the previous value of it. At every close you have one number: the price the next close has to beat.
Row four is a decision rather than something inherited. The engine computes that level on every bar and nothing drew it, so the one line that says where the trend turns was invisible. It is the staircase in every screenshot here, on by default.
The two dials that are one dial
TBSensitivity and Signal Filter look like separate controls. They are not. Stop distance is TBSensitivity × Signal Filter × ATR, so only the product matters and any pair with the same product gives a bar-for-bar identical chart.
Counted on the same 57,540 gold H1 bars:
| Setting | Signals | Bars per signal |
|---|---|---|
| Signal Filter 0.50, TBSensitivity 10 | 1,637 | 35 |
| TBSensitivity 5, Signal Filter 1.0 | 1,637 | 35 |
| Signal Filter 1.00, TBSensitivity 10 | 829 | 69 |
| Signal Filter 2.00, TBSensitivity 10 | 393 | 146 |
| TBSensitivity 20, Signal Filter 1.0 | 393 | 146 |
Not close. Identical. Pick one, leave the other alone, and you have a single honest sensitivity control instead of two knobs that cancel each other.
What it draws
The trend stop, a step line under price in an uptrend and above it in a downtrend, broken on the flip bar so the jump is not drawn as a vertical line.
LONG and SHORT signals, an arrow and a word on the flip bar, each in its own buffer so an EA can read them through iCustom.
The vortex cloud, two bands that are each the average of six moving averages of one length, shaded by the tick-volume spike on the bar: faint when quiet, solid when volume is over twice its ten-bar median.
Market structure, BOS and CHoCH lines from confirmed swing pivots, with optional HH/LH/HL/LL labels. State is committed on closed bars only.
Top and bottom crosses from a slow WaveTrend oscillator turning back from beyond ±53. They say not here, they are not entries.
A trend ribbon along one edge, an optional trailing stop in percent, ATR or points, and optional entry / stop / 1:1 / 2:1 / 3:1 levels. Everything except the signals has its own switch.
No position sizing, no order blocks, no scanner, no dashboard.
Reading the chart
| On the chart | Read it as |
|---|---|
| Step line flat for many bars | The ratchet has nothing new to lock in |
| Step line creeping toward price | The trend is tightening its own invalidation |
| A cross above a candle, no signal | Momentum is stretched. A reason not to add, not a reversal call |
| Two flips within a handful of bars | A range, and the engine has no range filter |
Settings
| Setting | Default | What it changes | When to move it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Strategy | Default | Overwrites the three inputs below with a preset | See the table further down. The names mislead |
| Period | 1 | ATR length behind the stop distance | The input with the most leverage. Gold H1: 829 signals at 1, 307 at 5, 253 at 10 |
| TBSensitivity | 10 | ATR multiples of stop distance | Your sensitivity control. Raise for fewer signals |
| Signal Filter | 1.0 | Multiplies the same distance | Leave it. It duplicates TBSensitivity exactly |
| Top/Bottom Sensitivity | 5 | Length of the exhaustion oscillator | Lower for more crosses: 1,146 tops at 1, 689 at 5, 445 at 10 on gold H1. It never touches the signals |
| Vortex Cloud Sensitivity | 2 | Length of both cloud bands | Integer division inside, so 2 and 3 give the same cloud. Use 4 to double it |
The Period default deserves a second look. ATR(1) is not an average of anything, it is the true range of the bar you are on, so at default the band is one candle wide times ten. Quick off a spike, jumpy after one. Moving it to 5 takes gold H1 from 829 flips to 307.
The four presets, measured on gold:
Preset Period TBSens Filter H1 signals H4 signals
Default 1 10 1.0 829 325
Scalping 10 10 0.5 683 191
Intraday 2 15 0.5 689 181
Swing 10 5 1.2 534 151
Read that again: Scalping is quieter than Default on H1 and H4, not busier. It only becomes the busiest preset down on M15. Pick by the numbers, not by the name.
Money Moves vs a plain ATR trend band
A plain band gives you a line that reacts to the bar it sits on. Money Moves keeps that engine, settles the trigger a bar earlier, ratchets instead of recentring, and adds three reads that do not feed each other: structure breaks, exhaustion, and a volume-shaded cloud. Moving Top/Bottom Sensitivity from 1 to 10 changed the signal count by six out of 829, which is what independent really means.
What this version can't do
It has no range filter, and the distribution is lopsided. Take the fourteen most recent EURUSD H4 signals: six ran under 25 pips before the opposite signal printed, and four ran over 170. The big ones pay for the small ones or they do not, and that is an exit question this indicator does not answer.
The exhaustion crosses are slow by design. On gold H1 that is 689 tops in twelve years, roughly one a week, and on M15 you can go days without one.
MT4 gets the same engine and the same defaults, but MetaTrader 4 has no coloured candles and no fills, so the trend candle painting is missing there and the cloud is drawn as two coloured rails instead of a shaded band. Signals, stop line, structure and ribbon are identical.
You won't find a win rate table on this page, and I'd be careful with any indicator page that has one. Every count here counts signals, not trades.
The thing that cost the most time was not the engine. It was one array read a single element past the end, on the oldest bar of the MT4 build, which loaded without a word and drew an empty chart. Compiled clean the whole time.
Questions you'll have
Does Money Moves repaint? Closed bars, no. The flip test reads the previous bar's stop and market structure is committed on closed bars only, so nothing behind the forming bar is rewritten. The forming bar is live until it closes, which is why alerts default to firing after the close.
What are the best settings for Money Moves? Start at the defaults and change Period first, it has the most leverage. Then use TBSensitivity alone and leave Signal Filter where it is, because the two multiply into the same number.
Why do TBSensitivity and Signal Filter feel like they do the same thing? Because they do. Stop distance is their product, so 5 with 1.0 gives exactly the chart 10 with 0.5 gives, bar for bar over twelve years of gold.
Which timeframe should I run it on? H1 and H4. That is about one signal every 69 bars on gold H1 and every 50 on H4. M15 works, but expect roughly one a day per symbol.
Does the Strategy preset named Scalping give more signals? Only on M15. On H1 and H4 it is quieter than Default, on gold and on the majors both.
MT4 or MT5? Both, one download each, same engine and same defaults. MT5 adds trend-coloured candles, the shaded volume cloud and Telegram alerts with a chart screenshot; MT4 has alert, email and push.
Can my EA read the signals? Yes. Buy and Sell each hold the marker price on a signal bar and nothing otherwise, and the active stop and the trend direction have buffers of their own. No chart objects to parse.
Support
Message me with a screenshot, plus the symbol and timeframe. That is normally enough to work out what happened. Updates are free.
Analysis tool. It places no trades and makes no profitability claim. Past price behaviour is not a guide to future price behaviour.