The 13-week market-type mix: reading regime persistence
Most traders read today's market type and stop there. But a single day's reading — Bullish / Quiet, say — tells you where you are, not how stable the ground is under you. The 13-week market-type mix answers the second question: over the last quarter, how much time did the market actually spend in each direction-by-volatility state?
What it measures
Every session, the dashboard classifies the broad market into one of 20 market types — five MQN direction bands (Superbullish → Superbearish) crossed with four ATR% volatility states (Quiet → Supervolatile). The 13-week mix takes the trailing 65 sessions (about a calendar quarter) and tallies the share of days spent in each state, collapsed into three buckets you can act on:
- Risk-on — bullish direction, contained volatility.
- Neutral — directionless or chopping.
- Risk-off — bearish direction, or strength paired with expanding volatility.
The result is a single bar that shows the composition of the recent regime, not just its latest value.
Why persistence matters more than the latest reading
A market type that has held for fifty of the last sixty-five sessions is a different trading environment from one the market only flipped into yesterday. Regimes have momentum: a quarter that is 70% risk-on has repeatedly rewarded trend-following and pullback entries, and a strategy tuned to that environment has had room to work. A quarter that is split evenly across all three buckets has whipsawed — the same strategy would have given profits back.
The mix is how you tell those apart before you size the trade. It is the difference between "the market is bullish today" and "the market has been reliably bullish for a quarter."
How to read the three patterns
- One bucket dominates (≈60%+). The regime is persistent. Lean into the playbook that fits it and let your rules run; the environment has been stable enough to trust position size.
- Two buckets share the quarter. A transition is underway — often risk-on giving way to neutral, or neutral tipping toward risk-off. Tighten stops, expect rotation, and treat fresh signals with more scepticism.
- All three are present in meaningful share. The quarter has been choppy. Reduce exposure, shorten holding periods, and favour mean-reversion over breakout — the market has not paid trend-followers.
Where it sits in the daily workflow
The mix is context, not a signal. Read the Regime tab for today's market type, then glance at the 13-week mix to judge how much conviction that reading deserves. Cross it with breadth — a risk-on quarter with deteriorating participation is a narrower, later-stage advance than the same quarter with broad breadth. Only then select the strategy and execute your own tested rules.
You can see today's 13-week mix, alongside the live direction and volatility charts, on the market regime dashboard — and the full per-state matrix is explained in what is MQN.
Educational market commentary based on the NextOrderAlpha Market Regime Dashboard. Not a signal, recommendation, or financial advice. Markets involve risk; past performance and past regime behaviour do not guarantee future results. You implement your own trades.