Renko charts box height

[MTfan]

Hi,

Is there a way to change the box height calculation for Renko charts?

I am not able to find any settings for Renko charts....

It seems fixed at 0.25 at the moment. I would like to use a % of price.

Edited January 7, 2016 by MTfan

[Mike Medved]

Your previous question: Use High/Low is on historical charts. It doesn't apply to intraday charts, because there the calculation is done not by candles but by ticks.

The BOX SIZE: on the Main tab of the ribbon menu allows you to change the box size for Renko. It is an absolute value right now. I will look into having % as an option.

[Mike Medved]

To follow up:

for P&F box size as a % is easy, since it is always one box. But for Renko, each column may contain many "boxes". I presume each box within the column is the same size (although at different price levels). So -

Does each column (whether an X or an O one) have its own "box size" - presumably fixed as a % of price at the start of the column?

[MTfan]

Hi Mike,

Thanks very much for your level of interest in my post.

I just wanted to first explain my motivation for asking.....

I took some screen captures of 2 charts but I don't see a way to insert them into this post. So I will just describe and give details if you want to reproduce them.

Chart 1 - 6 months, historical, Renko, box height 0.25, Symbol CSE.TO - This shows just a single box for the 6 months, has a bottom price of 3.25 to a top price of 3.5. A single box for 6 months of data does not seem enough info. One could argue that that is still usuable, but if you change chart type to OHLC, you will see the price almost goes down to 3 and up to 3.75. I.e. price movements between 3 and 3.25 and between 3.5 and 3.75 are not displayed. I think this is chopping out significant data.

Chart 2 - Same settings, Symbol CP.TO - Price over 6 months fluctuates between ~ 158 and 210, and the box size is so small that is starts to look similar to a OHLC chart, ie the Renko chart is not filtering out small price movements.

Of course, one could say one needs to enter a unique box height value for each chart/symbol, but that becomes tedious if one has to enter this height each time one views a different chart, and there are 100s of charts.

Please correct me if I am wrong but one cannot enter and save a unique box height value per symbol, is that correct? I would understand if that is not possible at the moment because I imagine you would have to programmatically save a box height per symbol...and this would take a lot of work.....

So a compromise to not being able to save a unique box height per symbol is to use a % of price. Hence my original post.

So to respond to your question - I am not at all a Renko expert so I am not sure if there is a best practice for calculating box height as price varies over time.

IMHO a fixed box height based on % of price at reversal time, per up or down column/trend would be fine. IMHO this is already a huge improvement over using a fixed height.

 

 

 

 

[Mike Medved]

Sounds good. I will try to google around to see what the standard practice is for this (if there is any).

[MTfan]

Great, thanks

[Mike Medved]

Oops. Of course I mixed up P&F and Renko in my reply - Renko is simpler to do in terms of % than P&F. Anyway - will do.

[MTfan]

Just to confirm:

Please correct me if I am wrong but one cannot enter and save a unique box height value per symbol, is that correct?

Oh, well that is good that Renko is easier

[Mike Medved]

Right, none of the parameters are per symbol. They are all per chart. Chart *may* be associated with a symbol (let's say you double click on a symbol, that brings up a chart, you change some params, close the chart, double-click on the symbol again to bring up the chart, the params that were changed will be remembered).

 

But if you navigate the charts by typing in new symbol in the chart or using the "linked" feature, then the chart is the chart and its params stay the same, but the symbol changes.

[Jerry Medved]

emailed you

[MTfan]

Great! Thank you!

[MTfan]

I see that % box size is now part of the latest update - it looks great and thanks again!

 

 

[Nagpada]

On 1/7/2016 at 8:08 PM, Mike Medved said:

To follow up:

for P&F box size as a % is easy, since it is always one box. But for Renko, each column may contain many "boxes". I presume each box within the column is the same size (although at different price levels). So -

Does each column (whether an X or an O one) have its own "box size" - presumably fixed as a % of price at the start of the column?

Are you sure ??? Should it not be the other way round ?? Col = P&F.  If I have your attention, do your Renko bricks repaint or have you done a workaround to fix this problem. ATR is a good way to fix renko box height. Also there will be a problem back testing standard renko because on reversal, the reversal bar open lines up with the previous bar open. You will need to have an option for reversal bar open to match previous bar close. 

[Mike Medved]

If the box size is based on the % of the price at the start of the Renko "candle", and doesn't change while the candle is being built, then there is no retro-changing of the box size.

And yes, the exact break points will not match between candles - that is, if there is an X tall green candle followed by X tall red candle, the close of the second candle will not match the open of the first candle. Can't be helped if you base your box size on % and not on an absolute number.

[Nagpada]

On 1/8/2016 at 7:19 AM, Mike Medved said:

Sounds good. I will try to google around to see what the standard practice is for this (if there is any).

Get Beyond Candelsticks by Steve Nison. That's the 1st intro to America of these new exotic charts i.e. Renko. Line Break etc.etc. Me thinks you have some research to do on exotic charts and their quirks and the workarounds many chart / indicator builders(commercial ) have done . Some of the builds being hawked are absolute nonsense ( charts look pretty ) but totally false picture for trading. Ultimately Nison and the Japs. are correct. Maybe a few tweeks MIGHT be useful. Many users want wicks BUT wicks are just trial balloons ( very, very low volume at those price ranges ). 

Edited October 6, 2018 by Nagpada