# expansion

## What Is It?

The Expansion Wave measures whether price is making a **statistically significant move** outside its normal range. It uses a standard deviation envelope around an EMA as its reference band, then calculates how consistently price has been closing outside that band over the lookback window.

* **Bullish Expansion Wave** — price is repeatedly closing *above* the upper band
* **Bearish Expansion Wave** — price is repeatedly closing *below* the lower band

The result is normalized to a 0–100 scale and rendered as a **cyan/teal fill** on the oscillator.

***

## How It Looks on the Chart

The Expansion Wave fill is split into two halves:

* **Lower half (0–50):** Bullish expansion strength. The fill grows upward from the bottom as bull pressure increases.
* **Upper half (50–100):** Bearish expansion strength. The fill grows downward from the top as bear pressure increases.

When both bull and bear are low (price is inside the band), the fill fades and the panel appears mostly dark — this is a ranging, low-expansion environment.

***

## Role in Signal Generation

The Expansion Wave pillar contributes to signals in two ways:

### 1. Pillar Score

When the Expansion Wave is bullish, it adds **+1** to the long score. When bearish, it adds **+1** to the short score.

The Expansion Wave is counted as bullish (`bullOK`) when **either** of the following is true:

* **Sustained expansion:** The bull value is above its acceptance threshold for 3+ bars, bull is greater than bear, and the bull EMA is rising
* **Early expansion:** The bull value is turning up (rising for 2 bars) — catches early breakouts before they fully develop

The mirror logic applies for bearish (`bearOK`).

### 2. Regime Gate

When the **Regime Filter** is enabled (Noise Filter section), entries are additionally gated:

* Long signals require the Expansion Wave to be bullish (`bullOK`)
* Short signals require the Expansion Wave to be bearish (`bearOK`)

This means **if the Expansion Wave is not confirming your direction, no signal fires** — even if Momentum, Volatility, and Order Flow all agree.

***

## Settings

The Expansion Wave's internal parameters are fixed to keep the settings panel clean. The only user-facing control is:

| Setting          | Location in UI    | Description                                            |
| ---------------- | ----------------- | ------------------------------------------------------ |
| Enable Expansion | Expansion section | Enables or disables the Expansion Wave pillar entirely |

Internal defaults (for reference):

| Parameter        | Value  | Description                                           |
| ---------------- | ------ | ----------------------------------------------------- |
| Source           | Close  | Price input                                           |
| Length           | 14     | Lookback for the std dev envelope                     |
| Multiplier       | 1.0    | Standard deviation width                              |
| Smoothing        | 5 bars | EMA smoothing applied to bull/bear values             |
| Acceptance Level | 30     | Min bull/bear value to count as "active expansion"    |
| Acceptance Bars  | 3      | How many bars it must hold above the acceptance level |

***

## Tips

* **Disable the Expansion Wave** if you trade in a slow, mean-reverting market where statistical breakouts are uncommon. This lets Momentum and Order Flow drive signals.
* **Watch the fill for context.** Even without a signal dot, a brightening bullish fill during a pullback is a visual cue that expansion is rebuilding. It can help you anticipate the next signal.
* **Regime Filter + Expansion Wave** is the most conservative combination. Only enable it if you want to avoid all counter-trend trades.
* When the fill is dark on both sides of the midline, the market is in compression. Avoid trading until one side begins to brighten.


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