Chartered Market Technician

Differentiate between equities, fixed income, commodities, currencies, and derivatives.

Distinguish between cash, futures, and OTC markets, using gold (spot XAUUSD vs. futures) as an example.

Identify the roles of brokers, dealers, and market makers in trade execution.

Interpret bid, ask, spread, and depth-of-market data from a sample order book.

Demonstrate price discovery in an auction market by walking through an order-matching example.

Describe the impact of major market session overlaps (e.g., London/New York) on liquidity and volatility.

Construct line, bar (OHLC), and candlestick charts from raw OHLC data and compare their information content.

Choose between arithmetic and logarithmic price scales for a given dataset.

Select an appropriate timeframe (intraday, daily, weekly) for a trading horizon and annotate swing highs, swing lows, and gaps on a chart.

Describe the construction rules of point-and-figure charts, including box size and reversal amount.

Construct a point-and-figure chart from price data and identify support/resistance and basic buy/sell signals on it.

Identify uptrends, downtrends, and sideways trends using HH/LL logic, and distinguish primary, secondary, and minor trends on multi-timeframe XAUUSD charts.

Draw valid trendlines and channels on a candlestick chart.

Identify horizontal support and resistance zones from prior swing points.

Apply the principle of polarity (support becoming resistance and vice versa).

Define trading volume and identify high/low volume bars on a chart, associating them with price conviction.

Identify breakout and pullback scenarios at trendlines and ranges, and define entry and initial stop-loss rules for them.

Apply Fibonacci retracements to identify potential support in an uptrend and resistance in a downtrend.

Use Fibonacci extensions to project price targets following a trend continuation or reversal.

Differentiate true breakouts from false breakouts using volume and price behavior.

Identify head-and-shoulders and inverse head-and-shoulders patterns, project price targets, and place stops.

Identify double tops, double bottoms, triple tops, and triple bottoms with measured-move targets and stop placement.

Identify ascending, descending, and symmetrical triangles, forecast breakout direction, and place stops.

Identify rectangles, flags, and pennants as continuation patterns with entry/stop rules.

Identify rising and falling wedge patterns with stop rules.

Identify cup-and-handle patterns, project price targets, and place stops.

Identify rounding tops, rounding bottoms, and broadening formations (megaphones) with stop rules.

Interpret single-candle patterns: doji, hammer, hanging man, shooting star, marubozu.

Interpret two-candle reversal patterns: engulfing, harami, piercing line, dark cloud cover.

Interpret three-candle patterns: morning star, evening star, three white soldiers, three black crows.

Identify continuation candle patterns: rising/falling three methods, tasuki gaps.

Combine candlestick signals with support/resistance levels for higher-probability trades.

Distinguish reliable from unreliable candle signals based on context and confirmation.

Calculate a simple moving average (SMA) and use it to identify trend direction.

Differentiate exponential (EMA) and weighted (WMA) moving averages from an SMA based on responsiveness.

Apply moving average crossovers (golden cross, death cross) as trend signals.

Calculate and interpret MACD, including its signal line and histogram.

Calculate and interpret RSI, including overbought/oversold levels.

Calculate and interpret the Stochastic Oscillator (%K and %D).

Identify bullish and bearish divergences between price and oscillators (RSI, MACD, Stochastic).

Interpret Bollinger Bands and ATR as measures of volatility.

Explain why volume analysis differs in spot FX/XAUUSD versus exchange-traded markets.

Confirm trends and reversals by analyzing volume patterns alongside price action.

Calculate and interpret On-Balance Volume (OBV) to confirm trends and spot divergences.

Calculate and interpret the Accumulation/Distribution line to gauge buying vs. selling pressure.

Calculate and interpret VWAP, noting its limitations as an indicator for non-exchange-traded instruments like spot XAUUSD.

Interpret equity-market breadth indicators (advance/decline line, McClellan Oscillator) and explain why they apply to broad indices, not single instruments.

Apply breadth divergence to anticipate broad equity market turning points.

Use open interest in gold futures to confirm trend strength in the broader gold market.

Define cycle length, amplitude, and phase, and identify cycles visually on a chart.

Apply seasonal analysis to identify recurring annual patterns in gold.

Describe the basic 5-3 Elliott Wave structure and identify the key Fibonacci ratios used in wave analysis.

Calculate and interpret relative strength (ratio charts) between two instruments.

Interpret intermarket relationships among stocks, bonds, commodities, USD, and gold using ratio charts.

Apply sector rotation logic across the business cycle and link it to commodity and gold performance.

Recognize key cognitive biases (anchoring, confirmation, recency, overconfidence) in sample trading scenarios.

Recognize loss aversion, the disposition effect, and herding behavior in sample trading scenarios.

Map the emotional cycle of a market (accumulation, mark-up, distribution, mark-down) on a historical chart.

Interpret the put/call ratio and the VIX as general measures of market fear and sentiment.

Describe the structure of the Commitment of Traders (COT) report.

Analyze the COT report for gold futures to identify positioning extremes and potential trend reversals.

Apply contrarian thinking using extreme sentiment readings.

Build a personal pre-trade checklist to counter your own top trading biases.

Calculate position size based on account risk percentage and stop-loss distance.

Apply the fixed-fractional position sizing method to a given trade setup.

Apply a volatility-based (ATR) position sizing method to a given trade setup.

Calculate the reward-to-risk ratio and expectancy for a trade setup.

Distinguish between initial stops, trailing stops, and time-based exits.

Calculate maximum drawdown and explain its impact on account recovery.

Construct a basic trading plan covering entry, exit, sizing, and review rules.

Outline the steps to design a rule-based trading system starting from a charting idea.

Apply backtesting principles (in-sample vs. out-of-sample, walk-forward, look-ahead bias) to a sample XAUUSD strategy.

Compare two trading systems by interpreting performance metrics (win rate, profit factor, Sharpe ratio, max drawdown).

Identify the characteristics of a curve-fit system and describe methods to avoid it.

Define survivorship bias and explain how it inflates backtest performance.

Solve a block of CMT Level 1-style practice questions covering foundational topics.

Solve a block of CMT Level 1-style practice questions covering patterns and indicators.

Complete a full-length, timed mock CMT Level 1 exam and execute a personal pacing strategy.