As of 05/16/2025   Indus: 42,655 +331.99 +0.8%     Trans: 15,159 +118.21 +0.8%     Utils: 1,043 +15.20 +1.5%     Nasdaq: 19,211 +98.78 +0.5%     S&P 500: 5,958 +41.45 +0.7%	YTD  +0.3%   -4.6%    +6.1%   -0.5%    +1.3%	Targets    Overview: 05/12/2025     43,700 or 40,900 by 06/01/2025   16,000 or 14,000 by 06/01/2025   1,075 or 1,000 by 06/01/2025   19,500 or 17,700 by 06/01/2025   6,000 or 5,600 by 06/01/2025
Chart Pattern Indicator: on 4/15/25

As of 05/16/2025   Indus: 42,655 +331.99 +0.8%     Trans: 15,159 +118.21 +0.8%     Utils: 1,043 +15.20 +1.5%     Nasdaq: 19,211 +98.78 +0.5%     S&P 500: 5,958 +41.45 +0.7%	YTD  +0.3%   -4.6%    +6.1%   -0.5%    +1.3%
Targets    Overview: 05/12/2025     43,700 or 40,900 by 06/01/2025   16,000 or 14,000 by 06/01/2025   1,075 or 1,000 by 06/01/2025   19,500 or 17,700 by 06/01/2025   6,000 or 5,600 by 06/01/2025
Chart Pattern Indicator: on 4/15/25

Bulkowski on When Price Reaches Intraday High and Low

My book, Swing and Day Trading, discusses when securities reach the intraday high and low starting on page 193. I show a picture of the book on the left. By clicking this link and buying the book, you help support thepatternsite.com.

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This article discusses research that finds the most common minutes when price reaches the intraday high and low.

• Summary
• Background
• Methodology
• Results
• See Also.

Intraday High-Low: Summary

Price reaches the day's high and low often within the first minute of the stock's open. Within the first hour of trading, the day's high occurs 49% of the time and price reaches the day's low 46% of the time, on average.

Intraday High-Low: Background

A May 2011 article in Active Trader magazine titled, "Intraday swing extremes," gave me the idea for this research. Their staff tested the E-Mini Nasdaq 100 futures to determine when price is most likely to set the day's high and low.

I decided to test this for stocks.

Intraday High-Low: Methodology

I used a database covering both bull (2/2003 to 12/2005) and bear (2/2007 to 2/2009) markets on 55 stocks. That gave me over 60,300 samples of data on the 1-minute scale.

For each day, I found the day's high and low and logged when those occurred. From the analysis, I excluded all half trading days, such as half days before a market holiday.

More

Intraday High-Low: Results

The results were similar to what Active Trader staff reported in their article. Most of the time, the intraday high or low is set early in the session, often in the first minute. Activity remains high for several minutes after the open and tapers off until near the end of the trading day. Within a few minutes of the close, activity picks up again and price may post new highs or lows then, but the level is about a third of the opening minutes.

The table shows the results.

For example, in the first minute, price reaches the day's high 10% of the time. The first minute also sees price making the day's low 9% of the time.

Another example: The first hour sees price post the day's high 49% of the time and the day's low 46% of the time.

-- Thomas Bulkowski

More

See Also

• Reversal times. When does price reverse during the day?
• Price trends. Consecutively higher/lower closes before the breakout offers performance clues.
• Price recovery. Do stocks that decline least in a bear market rebound furthest?
• Price velocity is similar on entry and exit from chart patterns.
• Price volatility. Stocks with volatility too high or low hurt profits.

Always borrow money from a pessimist. He doesn't expect to be paid back.