Dual Thrust breakout
Dual Thrust is a classic intraday breakout system that sets its trigger levels from the day's open and the recent price range. It measures how far NIFTY has typically swung over the last five sessions, places a buy level and a sell level half that distance above and below today's open, and trades NIFTY futures in the direction of the first break. Every position is closed by 15:15.How it trades
Results
PRE-BUILT · DEFAULTSWhere it made and lost money
Because every trade is held to 15:15 with no stop, the result is simply how far the day travelled after the break. Trend days that closed near their high or low made ₹79,451 over 31 trades with a 68% win rate. The six choppy days, wide ranges that closed mid-range, lost ₹39,995 between them and none won: price broke a level and then swung all the way back. Volatility going in also mattered. Entries after an India VIX close between 11.5 and 14.5 made ₹47,586 over 18 trades, while 11 after VIX above 14.5 lost ₹17,758, as nervous sessions broke the levels on noise and reversed.
About this strategy
- Over the last five completed sessions, take the highest high, lowest low, highest close and lowest close of the NIFTY future.
- Set the range as the larger of (highest high minus lowest close) and (highest close minus lowest low).
- Place the buy level at today's open plus half the range and the sell level at the open minus half the range.
- Buy one lot of the future when it first trades above the buy level, or sell one lot when it first trades below the sell level.
- If the opposite level is later hit, reverse the position once; after that it rides to the close.
- Square off at 15:15.
Why traders use it
Anchoring the levels to the day's open and a multi-day range makes them adapt to volatility: wide in busy weeks, tight in quiet ones. The range formula looks at both closes and extremes, so a single spike does not distort it. Price must travel a meaningful distance from the open before a trade is taken, which filters out much of the opening noise. The rules are short and mechanical, so the system is easy to automate.
The year in plain words
On NIFTY futures from 1 Oct 2025 to 30 Sep 2026 the levels were broken on 41 days, about three a month. The strategy made ₹29,886 before costs with a 51% win rate and a profit factor of 1.42, and ₹23,169 after ₹20 per order and bid-ask slippage. No trade needed the reversal; all 41 were held to 15:15. Results split sharply by day type: trend days that closed near their high or low made about ₹79,450 across 31 trades, while six choppy days lost nearly ₹40,000. January and February 2026 together made over ₹31,700, and March lost ₹13,774.
What the settings do
Risks
- A full futures lot is held through the day without a stop beyond the single reversal, so a reversal against the trade is taken in full.
- The worst trade lost about ₹10,000, and the maximum drawdown before costs was about ₹32,100.
- With only around 40 trades a year, a few bad days can dominate a quarter.
- Breakouts are filled at the breaking tick in the backtest; live fills in fast markets can be worse.
Who it suits
Intraday futures traders who want a volatility-adjusted breakout system with few trades, have the margin for a NIFTY lot and can tolerate holding a position all afternoon without a tight stop.
Questions traders ask
What is the Dual Thrust strategy?
It is an intraday breakout system. It builds a range from the last few days' highs, lows and closes, adds a fraction of it to today's open for a buy trigger and subtracts a fraction for a sell trigger, then trades the first break and closes at the end of the day.
Is Dual Thrust profitable on NIFTY?
In this backtest from 1 Oct 2025 to 30 Sep 2026 it made ₹29,886 before costs and ₹23,169 after ₹20 per order and bid-ask slippage on NIFTY futures, over 41 trades. Statutory charges were not included. Profits came mostly from trend days, and past results do not guarantee future ones.
How is this version different from the original?
The original was designed for a currency pair with a different session. Here it uses the NSE open and a 15:15 square-off, and the range uses only sessions completed before today, so the levels never include information that was not yet available.
What do K1 and K2 do?
They set how far from the open the buy and sell levels sit, as fractions of the range. Equal values make the system symmetric; a lower K1 makes long trades easier to trigger, which suits a market with an upward bias.