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Past performance is no guarantee of future success. All information should be viewed as educational only

UNITED STATES Disclaimer required by Government - Commodity Futures Trading Commission informs: Futures and options trading have great potential rewards, but also great potential risk. You must be aware of the risks and be willing to accept them in order to invest in the futures and options markets. Don't trade with money you can't afford to lose. This is neither a solicitation nor an offer to buy/sell futures, shares or options on the same. No representation is being made that any account will or is likely to realise profits or losses similar to those discussed in this document. The past performance of any trading system or methodology is not necessarily indicative of future results.

CFTC RULE 4.41 - HYPOTHETICAL OR SIMULATED PERFORMANCE RESULTS HAVE CERTAIN LIMITATIONS. UNLIKE A RECORD OF ACTUAL PERFORMANCE, SIMULATED RESULTS DO NOT REPRESENT ACTUAL TRADING. ALSO, SINCE THE TRADES WERE NOT EXECUTED, THE RESULTS MAY HAVE OFFSET THE IMPACT, IF ANY, OF CERTAIN MARKET FACTORS, SUCH AS LACK OF LIQUIDITY. SIMULATED TRADING PROGRAMMES IN GENERAL ARE ALSO SUBJECT TO THE FACT THAT THEY ARE DESIGNED WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL OR IS LIKELY TO REALISE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE SHOWN.

NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL, OR IS LIKELY TO, REALISE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE DISCUSSED WITHIN THIS SITE. IF YOU DECIDE TO INVEST REAL MONEY, ALL TRADING DECISIONS IN THE FINANCIAL MARKETS SHOULD BE YOUR OWN.

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Kaufman’s Efficiency Ratio (KER)

StrategyQuantIndicators

Quantifies market efficiency on a 0-to-1 scale using the ratio of net price change to total movement. Identify trending markets, filter choppy conditions, and select between trend-following or mean-reversion algorithms.

Kaufman’s Efficiency Ratio (ER)

The Efficiency Ratio (ER) was first presented by Perry Kaufman in his 1995 book ‘Smarter Trading‘. It is calculated by dividing the price change over a period by the absolute sum of the price movements that occurred to achieve that change. The resulting ratio ranges between 0 and 1 with higher values representing a more efficient or trending market.

The value of the ER ranges between 0 and 1. It has the value of 1 when prices move in the same direction for the full time over which the indicator is calculated, e.g. n bars period. It has a value of 0 when prices are unchanged over the n periods. When prices move in wide swings within the interval, the sum of the denominator becomes very large compared to the numerator and ER approaches zero.

Some uses for ER:
– A qualifier for a trend following trade; a trend is considered “persistent” only when RE is above a certain value, e.g. 0.3 or 0.4 .
– A filter to screen out choppy stocks/markets, where breakouts are frequently “fakeouts”.
– In an adaptive trading system, helping to determine whether to apply a trend following algorithm or a mean reversion algorithm.
– It is used in the calculation of Kaufman’s Adaptive Moving Average (KAMA).

How To Calculate the Efficiency Ratio

ER = Direction / Volatility

Where:

Direction = ABS (Close – Close[n])

Volatility = n ∑ (ABS(Close – Close[1]))

n = The efficiency ratio period.

Source: http://etfhq.com/

Past performance is no guarantee of future success. All information should be viewed as educational only UNITED STATES Disclaimer required by Government - Commodity Futures Trading Commission informs: Futures and options trading have great potential rewards, but also great potential risk. You must be aware of the risks and be willing to accept them in order to invest in the futures and options markets. Don't trade with money you can't afford to lose. This is neither a solicitation nor an offer to buy/sell futures, shares or options on the same. No representation is being made that any account will or is likely to realise profits or losses similar to those discussed in this document. The past performance of any trading system or methodology is not necessarily indicative of future results. CFTC RULE 4.41 - HYPOTHETICAL OR SIMULATED PERFORMANCE RESULTS HAVE CERTAIN LIMITATIONS. UNLIKE A RECORD OF ACTUAL PERFORMANCE, SIMULATED RESULTS DO NOT REPRESENT ACTUAL TRADING. ALSO, SINCE THE TRADES WERE NOT EXECUTED, THE RESULTS MAY HAVE OFFSET THE IMPACT, IF ANY, OF CERTAIN MARKET FACTORS, SUCH AS LACK OF LIQUIDITY. SIMULATED TRADING PROGRAMMES IN GENERAL ARE ALSO SUBJECT TO THE FACT THAT THEY ARE DESIGNED WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL OR IS LIKELY TO REALISE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE SHOWN. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL, OR IS LIKELY TO, REALISE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE DISCUSSED WITHIN THIS SITE. IF YOU DECIDE TO INVEST REAL MONEY, ALL TRADING DECISIONS IN THE FINANCIAL MARKETS SHOULD BE YOUR OWN.

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Details
Version	1.0.0
Published	October 19, 2026
Last updated	November 2, 2026
App	SQ
Type	Snippet
Author	clonex / Ivan Hudec
App version	145.3058
Codebase category	Indicators / Signals