Break Levels and Hold Levels

Strip away the jargon. A break level is nothing more than a marked swing high or a marked swing low. Peaks and valleys. That’s the whole idea, and it makes them the easiest thing on the chart to spot and trade.

How do you play it? First touch. You go long the first time price returns to a break level low, short the first time it returns to a break level high. George says it plainly… “first touch long, first touch short.” First touch bounces are what the group plays.

And George marks his two level types so he can read the chart at a glance. Break levels get a dotted line. Hold levels get a solid line. That single convention builds an instant range on the screen.

Here’s the test that separates a real level from a random price. Before George trades any level, he demands two-candle clearance. At least two candles must hard close completely away from the level… the open, the high, the low, the close. The entire candle clears.

Why demand the separation? Because a level needs room to work. Let price get away so it can come back. If price never left the zone, there’s nothing to return to, and no trade to make.

Two candles alone won’t save you, though. You also need genuine distance. George has passed on levels that technically had two-candle separation but only moved a point or two off the zone. No clearance. No trade… “I don’t care if there’s a line, I don’t care if it’s a fair value gap, there’s not enough distance” (Dec 6, 2022).

And the rule runs both ways. If a hold level hasn’t formed because price never cleared, then you don’t really have a break level either… “if I don’t have a hold level form, maybe I don’t have a break level” (Nov 16, 2022). One test protects you from trading noise. This is the backbone of the No Level, No Trade rule.

Now the precision. Inside every valley and peak you mark the greediest candle. In a valley, mark the top of the greediest blue candle… the one furthest down in price and closest in time. In a peak, mark the bottom of the greediest white candle, the one highest in price and first in time.

Train that until it becomes reflex. When you can mark the bottom of the highest first white candle in a peak and the top of the lowest blue candle in a valley without second-guessing, you’ve passed grade one of the system.

Which part of the candle? George’s personal convention is simple. Mark bodies for break levels, wicks for hold levels. On really long wicks he marks both, because price tends to bounce off each one.

There’s a practical edge to anchoring your alerts to the body. Price reaches the body before it reaches the wick’s tip, so a body-anchored alert notifies you sooner… “by anchoring these to the body instead of the wick I’m going to be notified sooner” (Dec 23, 2024). When a wick is tested, treat the body as tested too. The wick and the body are the same thing.

Very long wicks give you options. You can trade the base, trade 50% of the wick, or trade the ladder point, depending on your risk tolerance and how big a stop you can carry… “when you got a big wick, you got a couple choices. I can trade the base, I can trade 50%, or I could trade the ladder point” (June 3, 2026). And skip the thin stuff. George likes at least two white candles with real structure, not a single lonely doji.

Inside a valley or peak, two levels can appear. The front side is the greediest one… first in time, best price. The back side sits further back in time. Both need that two-candle separation to count. No separation on the back side, no valid level.

A level earns the word “legit” when it has a front side. One candle cleared, then a second candle cleared. That’s the whole qualification, and it’s what lets you get pickier as you improve… “there’s no front side. So as you get a little more picky, you’ll start seeing that” (May 18, 2025). No front side, no trade.

There’s a backup for the borderline cases. Even without a clean front side, a roughly 10-point move off an area tends to create a level people will defend… “a 10-point move typically makes a pretty good break level” (July 9, 2025). Ask yourself: did it go 10 points at minimum? If so, when price comes back, traders are likely to defend it.

Master these three levels before you risk a dime. In the group, students draw the break level, front side, and back side and get them graded to confirm accuracy. Why the grading? Because these levels are black and white.

If George could teach a new trader only one setup, this is it. The break level trade. They almost always bounce. They’re easy to mark. And your stop is the smallest distance possible.

Timing is everything. George is a first-touch trader. He wants the first touch… “I want to be on the first touch, I’m very much a first touch trader.” Why? The first touch is where the level is freshest. Once it bounces, it’s tested, and a tested level is less likely to defend again unless it sits at a wonderful high time frame location like the bottom of a range.

If price does break clean through, the level still earns its keep. It usually comes back and retouches before continuing. That gives you a long on the first touch and a short when it breaks out. When you catch a clean, untested break level, that’s the trade George loves most… “that’s a clear untested break level, look what it did, touch and bounce” (Nov 26, 2022). Read more in Touch and Go.

One more discipline. Don’t move your break level line until price has genuinely hard closed through it. Leave it on the chart so you can see, at a glance, that it’s been hit and weakened… “I wouldn’t move it until it’s been hard closed, for that reason you need to visually know it’s been hit and weakened” (Nov 26, 2022). Where you set the stop after entry belongs to Stop Loss Placement.

A hold level does one job. It predicts where price is going to bounce. That prediction is where you make your entries, and George trades them with a high degree of certainty.

These marked levels build into the Core Strategy that full members learn… the first three bounce levels. Trade just those first three, and the results speak for themselves. On July 21, 2025, George reviewed the day and counted “the first three bounce levels you learn in our group, you would have had six wins, no losses, no scratches”. Strict Core Strategy.

The power comes from objectivity. There’s nothing magical here. Learn the two bounce levels and you’ll draw the exact same lines George draws… “you learn those two bounce levels, you will draw the exact same level” (July 26, 2025). That repeatability is the point. Your levels match his, every time.

And this is where confidence gets built. George points to the end-of-day RTH session charts, the first three levels taught in boot camp, and how they perform… “that forms the basis of your confidence” (Jan 8, 2025). Master the marking, grade your levels against the record, and the with-the-trend and counter-trend setups start reading the same way. Everything above feeds directly into the Battle Plan.