Range-Bound
A market oscillating between a floor and ceiling without a clear trend — where breakout strategies bleed and mean-reversion works.
A range-bound market trades sideways between a support floor and a resistance ceiling, without establishing a sustained up- or downtrend. Crypto spends large stretches ranging, especially during the apathy phases of a cycle — the long, boring middles between explosive moves.
Ranges reward different tactics than trends: buying support and selling resistance (mean reversion) works while the range holds, whereas trend-following and breakout strategies generate whipsaw losses. Ranges also build energy — the longer and tighter the range, the more significant the eventual breakout tends to be. Recognizing whether the market is trending or ranging is a prerequisite for choosing any strategy at all.