The Mighty iTrend indicator


History: The iTrend and it's origins date back to 2005

The original iTrend was first released by Dr. Richard Gaines then published as a translated indicator by MetaQuotes Russia.

There wasn't anything special about it, it's core consisted of two vintage, built-in platform indicators:

• Bulls & Bears indicator
• Bollinger Bands

These two, basic codes were mashed into one subwindow & tweaked where it produced an indicator that basically combined the Bulls & Bears Power indicator with the Bollinger Bands. This looked like a promising concept at the time, but failed unless you used it on the Daily timeframe or higher.

Scriptor released his own version in 2007 which was exactly the same code but displayed Lines instead of (Histogram) Bars.

Mrtools, Mladen & Igorad's groundbreaking work created one of the best trend trading indicators of all time

In a time not too long ago, Igorad began investigating this code and started work on his own strategy using the original indicator as a base for his wild idea.

The most interesting part of this indicator's past was that Igorad's idea was to use an even more advanced iTrend, in an aim to help him recover from previous trading losses.
His system was called the "BrainTrading" strategy and his new concept no longer used the standard (built-in) MT4 indicators, but advanced versions of the Bollinger Bands & Bulls Bears Power from Mrtools and Mladen.

In BrainTrading we want to trade together with the people. If people go short so we go short.
We do not want to complicate our life and because of that we like simple indicators and this simple Brainwashing system.
We want to make small deposit to the broker because we can regulate the filter in this system (we can regulate the filter to filter the false signals using iTrend indicator which = Bears Power + Bulls Power + Bollinger Bands + current price). We want to trade together with majority of the traders.

But... the iTrend had to be plotted & calculated "manually" each week

The concept was there, but the coding was absent. Each week, the BrainTraders manually calculated the iTrend's "max" line for the M15, M30, H1 etc. charts in order to visualize it's "max" level (the second dotted line that's used to signal an entry) which was now the most important part of the indicator.

Mrtools automates the iTrend's "max" line

Mrtools from Forex-TSD saw great potential in the iTrend and began painstakingly working on it by looking at the code, tweaking and adjusting it's inputs so it could possibly run automatically, without the need for a trader or a coder to manually estimate it's max line every week.

Mrtools reworked the entire code and forwarded his finished version to Mladen who then optimized, and even added his own finishing touches to it.

Within an hour, Mladen had sent back an optimized code that provided:

• A confirmed, fully automated iTrend max level line without the need to manually calculate it.
• A dynamically moving "max" line which would self-adjust according to previous bars and when pierced by the iTrend's histogram, would guide traders into unquestionable trends.

From this code, a completely new indicator was born without the need to manually calculate it's max line (second line).

From Igorad, Mrtools and Mladen's work, their code went on to be the legendary iTrend we use today, which is still based off the Bulls Bears & Bollinger Bands but now, a completely different indicator.

With the work of three special coders, traders no longer need to manually calculate or update it each week. We are simply spoilt with the ability to just drag and drop it onto our charts using our mouse. But for those who wonder, the indicator is quietly calculating and working in the background, making sure it creates the best trading decisions for you.

Below are the very first iTrend indicators in case any one wants to have a poke around or experiment with.

Links and additional references

• For the iTrend indicator used in the first screenshot above, please see: iTrend with colored histogram by Mrtools
• For more reading, please see our review of the modern day iTrend in our Top 10 indicators list

The original iTrend by Dr. Richard Gaines from 2005

Below is the original iTrend which was translated by Metaquotes.

iTrend indicators before Igorad, Mrtools & Mladen

The iTrend by Collector from 2005.

The iTrend by Scriptor in 2007

Mrtools's Original "Auto" iTrend indicator from 2010

Auto itrend for BrainTrading

This version of BrainTrading uses an auto itrend for figuring the location of buy and sell areas using Newdigital's calculations.

By default the iTrend is counting level bars = 300 bars back, to get highest level of iTrend, and then multiplying that by level factor which = .283 by default.

Now it should be possible to back test or optimize BrainTrading, and who knows maybe there may be a better level factor or settings to make this a very good EA.

Why 0.283?

Igorad's explanation of his findings.

This indicator is counting everything up to 300 bars back on the history starting from the current bar and estimating the max value of iTrend. Then this max is multiplied by 0.283. Why 0.283? I found it experimenting and trading this system for 1 year.

From the beginning - I estimated iTrend max manually every week for M15, M30, H1 etc timeframes. After that - good coder made auto level iTrend indicator so this indicator is making this auto level job: taking max vaklue of iTrend for some period of bars (for 300 bar for example) and multiply this max value by 0.283. So, when you are backtesting - iTrend indicator is making auto levels: you backtest for 300 bars back and you will get one level (max * by 0.283), if you will backtest more than 300 bars (for example) - you will receive the other maximum (one max from 0 to 300 bars, the other max value is calculated since 301 till 600 bars and so on. And every max is multiplied by 0.283).

Nonlag iTrend by Mrtools

This was the first "alternative" version of the iTrend made by Mrtools: The non lag iTrend.

iTrend On Chart Multi-timeframe display by Mladen

Mladen then created this simple yet useful on-chart dashboard of the iTrend.

Mladen's 20 Price Type Display iTrend indicator

As iTrend uses High and Low in it's calculations, there were difficulties adding Price Types to the code. But thanks to Mladen, he worked around this and managed to add all 20 types of prices and it was released as "iTrend 3".

Mrtools's iTrend with multiple display capability

This was the version of Itrend which came with a unique "3 drawing options"

You could now display:

• Lines
• Histogram with Lines
• Histogram on it's own

It also came with Multi-timeframe mode and Alerts.

The first non-repainting iTrend post Forex-station 2016

This is the old i Trend made much simpler(used Mladen's mt5 version). Has all the price options and 8 different moving average options. The dashed line is sort of trend confirmation level, if iTrend is above the level the trend is considered strong, it's controlled by level factor and level look back bars.