Pattern Detail

Bearish Matching High

Two-candle bearish reversal: two up candles that close at the same price, a ceiling buyers cannot beat.

A real Bearish Matching High on NQ daily bars, Nov 8, 2024. Price then followed through 3.4% over the next 5 bars. The bright candles are the pattern; the dimmed bars are surrounding context.
A real Bearish Matching High on NQ daily bars, Nov 8, 2024. Price then followed through 3.4% 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)

37.3%

Backwards

Offered at least 1× its risk before the stop, vs 40.4% for a random short entry (-3.2 pts).

Move size vs normal

0.75×

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

Typical room (20-bar)

0.99R

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

Summary

Offered at least 1R of room only 37.3% of the time vs 40.4% for a random short entry — it offers LESS room than chance here. On this market and timeframe the structure works against you.

Room offered, this setup vs a random short entry

Outcome This setup Random entry Edge
Offered ≥ 1R 37.3% 40.4% -3.2
Offered ≥ 2R 29.0% 27.4% +1.6
Offered ≥ 3R 22.9% 19.8% +3.1
Stopped < 1R 62.6% 58.1% +4.6
Went sideways 0.1% 1.5% -1.4

20,747 occurrences · 1,146,594 random-entry controls · 20-bar horizon

A bearish matching high is a two-candle stall. Two up candles run with the trend, but the second one closes at almost exactly the same price as the first. Buyers tried twice and topped out in the same spot both times. That shared close acts like a ceiling, and a failure to push past it after a rally hints the move is tired.

How to spot it

  • The market is rising into the pattern.
  • Both candles are up (green) candles.
  • The two candles close at nearly the same price.
  • The matching close forms a flat ceiling across the pair.
  • The signal is the failure to close higher the second time, not a fresh push down.

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 up bars, so on the surface buyers are still winning. The market is rising, the first candle closes strong, and the second one is green as well. Demand looks healthy on a quick glance.

The catch is where the second candle finishes. It closes at almost exactly the same price as the first, not a tick higher. Buyers came back and tried again, yet for all that effort they could not push the close past the level they reached the day before. That repeated, matching close draws a flat ceiling across the pair. The people lifting the market have found the price at which sellers are willing to meet every bid, and twice now they have been turned away at the same spot. The trend is intact, but its progress has quietly stopped.

A ceiling that holds twice may give way or it may cap the move, and the data below shows which way it tends to break.

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 Matching High Firings (20)

Based on data through Apr 29, 2026

Time Risk (pts) Room offered Result
Apr 29, 2026, 12:20 PM CDT 20.75 0.69R Stopped
Apr 29, 2026, 9:40 AM CDT 10 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 29, 2026, 8:10 AM CDT 6.25 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 29, 2026, 5:25 AM CDT 6 0.00R Stopped
Apr 29, 2026, 3:55 AM CDT 7 0.00R Stopped
Apr 28, 2026, 11:10 PM CDT 2 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 28, 2026, 9:15 PM CDT 7.5 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 28, 2026, 8:35 PM CDT 9.75 0.00R Stopped
Apr 28, 2026, 1:55 PM CDT 0.5 0.00R Stopped
Apr 28, 2026, 12:45 PM CDT 11.25 0.00R Stopped
Apr 28, 2026, 11:20 AM CDT 9.25 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 28, 2026, 11:10 AM CDT 16.25 1.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 28, 2026, 8:00 AM CDT 14.5 2.60R Ran ≥1R
Apr 27, 2026, 10:35 PM CDT 2.75 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 27, 2026, 10:30 PM CDT 5.75 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 27, 2026, 5:30 PM CDT 4.5 3.00R Ran ≥1R
Apr 27, 2026, 12:45 PM CDT 2 0.00R Stopped
Apr 27, 2026, 4:45 AM CDT 2.25 0.00R Stopped
Apr 27, 2026, 4:00 AM CDT 5.75 1.26R Ran ≥1R
Apr 27, 2026, 1:25 AM CDT 1.25 3.00R Ran ≥1R

Sample backtests (2)

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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