Analysis, not financial advice. A technical summary describes recent price behaviour; it does not forecast the future.
Many market websites, including ours, condense dozens of indicators into a single label such as "Strong Buy" or "Sell". That label is convenient, but it hides a lot of detail. Knowing how it is built tells you when it is useful, when it is misleading, and what to look at underneath it. This guide uses our gold (XAUUSD) technical summary as the example, but the same ideas apply to most summaries you will find online.
What a technical summary is
A technical summary is a vote. A set of standard tools each looks at the chart and casts a vote: buy, sell or, for some tools, neutral. The votes are counted and the result is turned into a label on a five-step scale:
Strong Sell, Sell, Neutral, Buy, Strong Buy
The summary is repeated for several timeframes. Ours covers six: 15 minutes, 30 minutes, hourly, 5 hours, daily and weekly. Each row is calculated independently from bars of that length. Our 5-hour bars are built from hourly bars aligned to the 6 PM New York session open, so they will not match other websites' 5-hour candles exactly.
The two groups of voters
Most summaries split their tools into two groups, because the groups answer different questions.
Moving averages: where is price compared with its recent average?
Our moving average group uses twelve averages: simple and exponential versions of six lengths, from 5 to 200 bars. The rule is simple. If price is above an average, that average votes buy. If price is below it, it votes sell. Moving averages almost never vote neutral: only when price sits exactly on the average, and an average with too little history to calculate casts no vote at all.
This group is trend-following. It changes its mind slowly, which keeps it steady in trends and makes it late at turning points. See each average and its vote on our moving averages page.
Indicators: is momentum building or fading?
The indicator group asks twelve oscillators and trend-strength tools for a reading, such as the Relative Strength Index, the stochastic oscillator, the Moving Average Convergence Divergence, the average directional index, Williams percent range and the Commodity Channel Index. Each has its own thresholds for buy, sell and neutral. For example, our Relative Strength Index reads neutral from 45 to 55, buy from 55 to 70, sell from 30 to 45, and overbought or oversold beyond 70 or 30.
Not every tool casts a vote. The Average True Range only reports whether volatility is high or low. The Relative Strength Index, the stochastic oscillator, the stochastic Relative Strength Index, Williams percent range, the Commodity Channel Index and the Ultimate Oscillator can read overbought or oversold, and those readings are not counted as buy or sell. That is why the indicator counts usually add up to 11 or fewer, not 12.
This group reacts faster. It often turns before the moving averages do, and it can produce false alarms in strong trends. Each reading is listed on our technical indicators page.
How the votes become a label
Here is exactly how our summary scores each timeframe. Other websites use similar but not identical rules, which is one reason their labels sometimes differ from ours.
- Each group gets its own label. A group reads Buy when buy votes outnumber sell votes, and Strong Buy when buy votes lead by at least two to one and by at least three votes. Sell and Strong Sell work the same way in reverse. Equal votes give Neutral.
- The two group labels are combined. Buy counts as +1 and Strong Buy as +2; Sell counts as −1 and Strong Sell as −2. Neutral counts as 0.
- The total sets the overall label. A total of +3 or more is Strong Buy, +1 or +2 is Buy, 0 is Neutral, −1 or −2 is Sell, and −3 or lower is Strong Sell.
A worked example
At 4:13 PM Eastern Time on October 26, 2026, the hourly row of our gold summary showed:
- Moving averages: 3 buy, 9 sell. Sell votes lead three to one and by six votes, so the group reads Strong Sell (−2).
- Indicators: 7 buy, 2 neutral, 2 sell. Buy votes lead by more than two to one and by five votes, so the group reads Strong Buy (+2). The counts add up to 11 because the Average True Range never votes.
- Total: −2 + 2 = 0, so the hourly summary reads Neutral.
The label "Neutral" hides a real conflict: price was below most of its averages, but momentum had turned up after a bounce. That is very different from a quiet market where every tool is near the middle. Always look at the counts, not just the label. Our guide to why signals disagree across timeframes looks at this example in more detail.
Reading the rows together
The six rows are best read from the bottom up:
- Weekly and daily describe the larger trend. They change slowly, so a change here is notable.
- 5 hours and hourly describe the swing of the last few days.
- 30 minutes and 15 minutes describe the latest move. They flip often, and many of those flips reverse.
When the fast rows disagree with the slow rows, the fast rows are usually describing a pullback inside the larger trend. When every row agrees, the trend is aligned, though that can also coincide with stretched conditions.
What a technical summary cannot tell you
- It does not know about the news. A scheduled release such as inflation data or a Federal Reserve decision can override every reading within minutes. Check the economic calendar first.
- It does not measure distance. "Strong Sell" says the votes are lopsided, not how far price might fall. A market can read Strong Sell while sitting right on major support.
- It does not measure reliability. The same label can be right one week and wrong the next. Only a history of readings shows how a summary has behaved. Our signal history shows the last 24 hourly readings, for the hourly timeframe only, so it cannot show how the summary behaves over weeks; for that, log the readings yourself.
- It is built from the same inputs. Many tools in each group use the same prices over similar windows, so their votes are not independent opinions. Twelve agreeing votes are not twelve separate confirmations.
- It depends on the data source. Futures and spot gold trade at slightly different prices, and websites use different session times. Small differences in labels between websites are normal.
Good habits when using any summary
- Note the time of the reading. A summary from an hour ago may already be out of date, so check its update time or expiry.
- Read the counts behind the label, and check which group is driving it.
- Start with the slow timeframes for direction, then use the fast ones for timing.
- Check scheduled events before acting on any reading.
- Decide your risk limit before you decide your entry.
If you build your own tools, our free signal feed publishes the readings in machine-readable form, with an expiry time on every reading. The signal.txt file carries the hourly reading only; signal.json adds the label for each of the six timeframes, with the full vote counts for the hourly timeframe.
Frequently asked questions
What does Strong Sell mean on a technical summary?
It means most of the tools on that timeframe are voting sell, by a wide margin. It describes recent price behaviour. It does not mean price will keep falling.
Why does a summary show Neutral when the chart looks clearly bearish?
The moving averages and the indicators can point in opposite directions and cancel each other out. Look at the vote counts to see whether Neutral means balance or conflict.
Why does another website show a different label for gold?
Websites use different tools, settings, scoring rules, price sources and session times. Compare the underlying direction rather than expecting identical labels.
How often is the technical summary updated?
Ours is recalculated every hour from Sunday 6 PM to Friday 5 PM New York time, with no update during the daily 5 PM to 6 PM break. The bars come from COMEX gold futures delayed about 10 minutes, converted to an approximate spot price by subtracting the measured gap between futures and spot, and the last bar of every timeframe is completed with a live spot quote. Each reading shows the time it was made and expires 70 minutes later.
Analysis, not financial advice. Poverty Sux does not manage money or recommend trades.
Not financial advice. This guide is general education about how technical tools and markets work. It does not consider your situation, and trading gold, especially with leverage, can lose more than you deposit. Read the disclaimer.