Example Divergence Trade: Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX)

Here’s a divergence trade I took last week in $NFLX, using the Multi-Divergence indicator in my trade plan. 

The setup: NFLX announced earnings on Oct 16.  Price made an all-time high.  I looked at the chart and saw a big divergence on the volume-weighted MACD.  The last big divergence in June led to a big drop. So I was looking to get in a bearish position. 

The candle on Oct 17 is the most recent bar on this chart. I saw that the bar had made the all time high and then fallen down below the prior day’s close, which I took as my bearish entry signal with NFLX at $200. 

The plan: $190 looked like a possible support, and a return to $204 would tell me my timing was wrong. I thought this move should happen in the next few days, so I bought the Nov 3 weekly options 197.5/195 put spread for $0.97.  I chose the 197.5 strike instead of the at-the-money 200 strike because it had higher gamma—it would have a larger change in delta with movement if I was right.  If the move didn’t come in the next day or so, I would get out and move on. 

I didn’t have to wait long:

The day ended red and had a good follow through day next. When the 190 support was nearly hit, I went to take profits. I sold for $1.57, which is a return of about 62%.  I love it when a plan comes together (extra Hannibal).

Note that the divergence indicator wasn’t the entry signal—it just provided context to give me an edge.  Divergences can often resolve with a continuation in the trend instead of a reversal. The context combined with the actual reversal behavior in the daily candles was what led me to take a trade. Always have a plan before you trade, and always follow your plan. My failures have come when I don’t do one or both of those things. 



Update: Multi-Divergence Indicator v2 for Think or Swim (MACD, RSI, CCI, On Balance Volume and many more)

I’ve made an update to the Multi-Divergence indicator. No more arrows! It’s now a lower histogram that gives you a picture of whether the divergence is increasing or decreasing, and also the size of it relative to all the other divergences on the chart. Here’s an example of it in action for $TSLA (Tesla Inc), along with a plot of Volume Weighted MACD for visualization:

The divergences now have a value between 0 and +/- 100. Zero means no divergence is present. A bearish divergence has a negative value while a bullish divergence has a positive value. The scale is determined by the widest divergence, whether bullish or bearish, on the current chart. In this case, the widest divergence came on Sept 15. Everything else is relative to that. If a new divergence comes along that is even larger, then the indicator will scale everything to the new max value.

You can also use this new study as-is in a scan. Just set up a study filter as described below:

Go to the scan tab in Think Desktop, and choose “Stock Hacker”.  Then you click “Add Study Filter” (First in screenshot below) then click the pencil to edit the default filter that is added (Second in screenshot):

Set the aggregation period at the top to whatever timeframe you are interested in. Then edit the default ADXCrossover() seen here under Condition Wizard:

Here’s an example of how to set the scan input, looking for bullish divergences of 30 or greater on the Volume Weighted MACD with a divergence length of 20:

You click in the upper left dropdown and choose “study”, then lookup Pro_MultiDivergence_v2 from the dropdown list. Then you can select the divergence (bulldiv or beardiv) from the Plot dropdown. Under inputs you choose the length and divergence indicator you want.

For a bullish scan: Choose “is greater than or equal to” and set the select condition dropdown at top right to “Value”, and enter your scan value as a positive number.

For a bearish scan: Choose “is less than or equal to” and set the select condition dropdown at top right to “Value”, and enter your scan value as a negative number.

This indicator is in the “Donors Only” section of my Google site under Released ThinkScript Studies. You can become a donor to the blog through PayPal here: