Every session, a dual-discipline scanner grades volatility-contraction setups A through F — chart pattern plus fundamentals — and a market-regime gate decides how aggressive the letter should be. You get the setups, the levels, the grade, and a plain-English read. Before the breakout, not after.
The pattern is a volatility contraction — a base that tightens into a pivot — a concept popularized by trader Mark Minervini, screened here alongside growth-fundamentals criteria in the CAN SLIM tradition. Chart feeds show you what tightened. Screener platforms hand you a tool and wish you luck. This letter runs the whole workflow — regime, pattern, fundamentals, grade — and writes up the result in plain English.
| What you get | Chart-feed services | DIY screener platforms | The Coil Report |
|---|---|---|---|
| VCP pattern detection | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Fundamental confirmation (CAN SLIM) | — | DIY | ✓ built in |
| Market-regime gate (when not to act) | — | — | ✓ leads every issue |
| A–F breakout quality grade | — | — | ✓ every setup |
| False-breakout suppression, with reasons | — | — | ✓ shown, not hidden |
| Plain-English read on each setup | — | — | ✓ the whole point |
| Walk-forward validated rules (no backfitting) | undisclosed | undisclosed | ✓ documented |
The same process runs after every close. Order matters — most services skip the first gate entirely.
Follow-through days, distribution counts, breadth, rally age. The regime decides how strict the screen runs and how aggressive the letter is allowed to be. In bad tape, the letter tells you to stand down — that restraint is the product.
Every name must clear the 8-point trend template and show a genuine volatility contraction. Then CAN SLIM fundamentals — earnings, sales, ROE, leadership — either confirm the setup or flag it as technical-only.
Survivors get a breakout-quality grade, a composite score, the pivot and invalidation levels, and a short plain-English read. False-breakout candidates get suppressed — and you see why.
This is a constructed example built to show the format. It is not a current or past pick.
Price has carved three progressively tighter pullbacks against a flat ceiling near the pivot. Each swing gives up less ground than the last, and volume has thinned through the base — a healthy contraction. Earnings and sales growth clear the fundamental screen, which is what earns the A. A move through the pivot on expanding volume is the event the pattern is built to catch. Failure to hold the most recent low would void the setup.
The grade isn't always an A — and not every setup ships. Three more constructed examples, across the range:
Three-contraction base, volume dried to 0.2x average, fundamentals confirmed. The clean case the pattern is built to catch.
Contraction present, but relative strength is lagging and no fundamental confirmation. Technical-only — a weaker case, graded accordingly.
Base looked clean, but earnings hit in three sessions. Suppressed with the reason shown — never sent as a live signal.
All three are constructed for illustration, not real tickers or real trade history. No dates, prices, or outcomes shown are actual — same rule as the sample above.
Every qualified setup is graded on pivot proximity, volume character, base structure, and relative strength — so you know where to put your attention first.
When a setup breaks its pivot on qualifying volume, it moves to the top of the issue as an ACTION signal. Daily-tier readers get pivot alerts the morning a break could trigger.
Every issue opens with the regime dashboard: distribution days, breadth, follow-through status, sector leaders and laggards. Context before candidates, always.
Setups that look right but carry a documented flaw — earnings gap ahead, extended past pivot, broken support — get suppressed with the reason shown. A confirmed breakout needs price above pivot and real volume behind it, not a drift on light trading — so on a day nothing confirms, you see exactly which names approached the line and by how much they missed. A quiet day reads as discipline, not silence.
A regime-adjusted framework in percentages: how the current tape scales maximum position size and stop discipline. A general risk ceiling, never individual advice.
Pivots and invalidation levels are written to map onto your broker's screener and conditional orders, so acting on your own research takes minutes, not evenings.
A free taste of how the letter explains a setup. It teaches you what to look for in a volatility contraction. It does not use live prices and does not tell you what to do.
Every plan is the same general-circulation letter — the difference is how often and how deep, never who it's tailored to. Annual pricing takes two months off.
Sample issues, free, straight to your inbox — the regime dashboard, the graded setups, the plain-English reads. Decide with the real thing in hand.