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Strategies · on Gecko’s tip list

Morning StatementFundamentalIntraday

“Ahead of expectations” before the open · same-day trade

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Today: Tip generation. Gecko raises tips from this strategy and tests them on a paper (pretend-money) account. Strategies loop back from paper trading to be refined, dropped or replaced - only those that pass every check reach live trading.

Buys the morning a company says it is trading ahead of what the market expects, and sells the same afternoon.

The idea

UK companies publish results and trading updates at 7am, an hour before the market opens. When a company says trading is ahead of market expectations - and isn’t merely holding or cutting its guidance - the opening price tends to under-react, and the shares carry on rising through the day as investors digest the news. An AI reads each statement within a minute of it reaching the FCA’s archive, so the order is in before 8am.

Which shares

All 248 FTSE 350 and other UK stocks Gecko follows. It works best on FTSE 250 companies and more volatile shares.

When it buys

  1. A company publishes a results or trading statement while the market is closed (before 07:30, after the close, or at a weekend).
  2. The statement says trading is ahead of market expectations.
  3. Guidance is raised or not mentioned - not just held, and not cut.
  4. Buy at the 08:00 opening price. Speed matters: most of the edge is gone by 08:05.

When it sells

  1. Sell at the close the same day.
  2. Protective stop: one day’s average price range below the previous close.

How often it tips

22%of trading days bring a tip
1.5tips a week on average - at least one in 56% of weeks
6.2tips a month on average
88tips in the backtest’s last 12 months

Counted from the backtest’s trades, 2016-2026, on the shares above. A few more tips arrive than trades: a signal on a share already held is still sent, marked as skipped.

Results so far

£2.27won for every £1 lost
762trades, 2016-2026
56%of trades won
+0.46Raverage per trade, in units of the amount risked

Backtest #404 - CFDs on a £10,000 account risking 2% a trade, with commission and financing, before bid-ask spreads.

Forward testing
Rules frozen 8 October 2026 - forward tracking counts every signal since.
Paper trading
Paper orders are placed automatically before 08:00 since 9 October 2026. No closed paper trades yet.
Live trading
Not live.

Worth knowing

  • The rule was chosen by testing on all stocks over all years, so the backtest flatters it - its real test is forward tracking from 8 October 2026.
  • Bid-ask spreads are not yet included; they are widest just after the open, exactly when this strategy buys.

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