Pattern Detail

Bearish Descending Hawk

Two-candle bearish reversal: two up candles where the second is small and held entirely inside the first, a fading rally.

A real Bearish Descending Hawk on NQ daily bars, Feb 9, 2009. Price then followed through 5.2% over the next 5 bars. The bright candles are the pattern; the dimmed bars are surrounding context.
A real Bearish Descending Hawk on NQ daily bars, Feb 9, 2009. Price then followed through 5.2% over the next 5 bars. The bright candles are the pattern; the dimmed bars are surrounding context.
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How to read this

Everything here is in R, the setup's own risk. 1R is the distance from the entry (the pattern's closing price) to where it would be proven wrong — its highest high over the 2 bars that form it. So "offered 2R" means price ran twice that distance in your favor at some point before the stop. It does not assume you took profit there: a target is a strategy choice.

Room offered (≥ 1R)

39.6%

Not reliable

Offered at least 1× its risk before the stop, vs 40.4% for a random short entry (-0.9 pts).

Move size vs normal

0.81×

Realized range over the next 20 bars vs a random bar. Precedes a quieter stretch.

Typical room (20-bar)

1.04R

Average run in favor (capped at 3R), vs 1.05R for a random short entry.

Summary

Offered ≥1R 39.6% of the time vs 40.4% for a random short entry. The 0.9-point gap is no bigger than the ±2.0-point margin of error you would get by chance from 2,327 occurrences. Not a reliable edge.

Room offered, this setup vs a random short entry

Outcome This setup Random entry Edge
Offered ≥ 1R 39.6% 40.4% -0.9
Offered ≥ 2R 30.8% 27.4% +3.4
Offered ≥ 3R 23.6% 19.8% +3.8
Stopped < 1R 60.2% 58.1% +2.1
Went sideways 0.2% 1.5% -1.3

2,327 occurrences · 1,146,594 random-entry controls · 20-bar horizon

A bearish descending hawk is a two-candle stall built from two up candles. The first is a large up candle that runs with the trend, and the second is a smaller up candle whose whole range fits inside the first. Both bars are green, so it still looks bullish on the surface, but the shrinking second candle shows buyers losing reach. The narrowing after a strong push is the warning.

How to spot it

  • The market is rising into the pattern.
  • The first candle is a large up (green) candle.
  • The second candle is also an up (green) candle, but smaller.
  • The second candle’s entire range sits inside the first candle’s range.
  • The signal is the loss of momentum, not a down candle yet.

The dashed box on the chart above marks the 2 candles on a real occurrence, with the advance before and the move after.

The psychology

Both candles are green, so the rally looks intact at a glance. The first is a large up bar that runs hard with the trend, exactly what a healthy advance should produce. The second is up as well, but small, and its whole range fits inside the first.

That shrinking is the catch. Buyers tried again on the second bar and could not extend the move. They held the ground but covered far less of it, which is the first sign that demand is thinning right when it should be strongest. Nobody is selling yet, there is no red candle to point to, but the loss of reach after a strong push says the side in control is running low on fuel. The narrowing, not a down bar, is the warning.

A rally that stalls while still green is a quiet kind of top. The figures below show how often that stall tends to turn into a real one.

Does it actually work?

A pattern is a setup, not a trade, so the honest question is not “did it win” but “how much room did it tend to offer before it was proven wrong.” The tabs below answer that across five futures markets (Nasdaq, S&P 500, gold, crude oil, natural gas) and seven timeframes from one minute to one day.

For each occurrence we measure the room the move offered in units of the pattern’s own risk, then set it against what a random entry on the same market would have done. When the pattern offers more room more often than chance, that shows up as a real edge. When it does not, the page says so plainly.

Read it with the sample size in view. On the faster timeframes a pattern can fire thousands of times, enough to trust. On the daily chart it is far rarer, so treat those numbers as a hint rather than a verdict. Thin samples are flagged for you on the page.

How we measured it

  • Entry is the close of the final candle of the pattern.
  • One unit of risk, 1R, is the distance from that close up to the pattern’s invalidation point: the highest high of the two candles that form it. If price trades through there, the setup is wrong.
  • We then follow the next 20 bars and record how far price ran in your favor, in multiples of that risk, before the stop was hit.
  • Every figure is set against a random entry on the same market and timeframe, so the market’s own drift is accounted for.
  • No profit target and no position sizing. Where you take profit is a strategy choice; this measures only the room the pattern tends to give.

What this page does not cover

  • Volume on the pattern’s candles.
  • Whether the pattern forms at a meaningful resistance level.
  • Pairing it with a trend filter or a confirming signal.
  • A profit target or position sizing. We use the pattern’s own invalidation point as the stop to define risk, but where you take profit, and how much you put on, are strategy decisions this page leaves to you.

Sample Bearish Descending Hawk Firings (20)

Based on data through Apr 29, 2026

Time Risk (pts) Room offered Result
Apr 29, 2026, 3:55 AM CDT 7 0.00R Stopped
Apr 28, 2026, 11:10 AM CDT 16.25 1.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 22, 2026, 7:30 PM CDT 23.5 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 22, 2026, 1:35 AM CDT 6.5 1.31R Ran ≥1R
Apr 21, 2026, 7:20 PM CDT 7.5 1.17R Ran ≥1R
Apr 20, 2026, 9:15 PM CDT 2.25 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 17, 2026, 12:40 PM CDT 12 0.00R Stopped
Apr 15, 2026, 6:50 PM CDT 8.5 2.56R Ran ≥1R
Apr 14, 2026, 5:20 AM CDT 0.5 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 14, 2026, 1:40 AM CDT 6.75 1.59R Ran ≥1R
Apr 7, 2026, 8:10 AM CDT 20.25 0.89R Stopped
Mar 31, 2026, 5:25 PM CDT 15.5 1.31R Ran ≥1R
Mar 24, 2026, 6:10 AM CDT 11.25 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Mar 22, 2026, 8:40 PM CDT 9 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Mar 15, 2026, 10:35 PM CDT 3.25 0.54R Stopped
Mar 11, 2026, 3:30 PM CDT 1.25 0.00R Stopped
Mar 10, 2026, 8:55 PM CDT 6 2.63R Ran ≥1R
Mar 10, 2026, 3:20 AM CDT 9.5 0.00R Stopped
Mar 5, 2026, 1:10 AM CST 16.5 0.67R Stopped
Feb 26, 2026, 8:05 PM CST 14.5 1.21R Ran ≥1R

Sample backtest

Real backtested runs of this pattern, with commissions and slippage. Open one for the full equity curve and metrics, or backtest it yourself on your own contract and dates.

Backtest this pattern

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