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Falcon v2.0 — NQ, fixed stop, fixed risk

Three changes, and the measurement behind each one.

18 August 2026 · applies to every ticket from this date

Superseded. The result figures below came from a bar-data backtest. They were re-run on CME tick data in August 2026 with harsher fill assumptions and the net came out roughly half this size. The numbers on this page are left as published rather than quietly edited — read the v2.2.1 figures, which are the ones to plan around.

What changed

Instrument: MNQ → NQ (E-mini Nasdaq-100).
A hard 28-point stop on every trade, submitted with the entry. No trailing, no break-even shift, no manual override.
Fixed risk sizing — position size is derived from a fixed dollar risk over the stop distance, instead of a variable size. On NQ that works out to 1 contract, risking $560.
Targets and entry logic are unchanged. Same signals, same sessions, same exits.

Why — the data behind each decision

1 · We measured heat, not just outcomes

Across 1,449 historical trades we measured Maximum Adverse Excursion — how far each trade went against the entry before it resolved. The separation was extreme:

Winners: median 1.4 points of heat. 46% never moved against the entry at all.
Losers: median 32.4 points of heat.
89% of winners never exceeded 20 points of heat, while 84% of losers went past it.

That told us a fixed stop was viable — losers reveal themselves early and clearly.

2 · Why 28 points and not tighter

The obvious idea was to cut at ~21 points, where the probability of a trade ending as a loss crosses 55%. We tested it on the full history: of the 280 trades that reached 21 points of heat, 124 recovered and won. Cutting there would have reduced net profit by about 14% while adding little protection.

The chosen level sits above the 95th percentile of winner heat (27.4 pts) and below the median loser heat (32.4 pts) — wide enough to let winners breathe, tight enough to cut losers before they run.

3 · Why the instrument changed

MNQ commission was eating 16% of every winner. This was not a small drag — it was the single largest cost in the system, and it was the reason two calendar years (2023 and 2024) printed losses on the MNQ version.

On NQ, with identical signals, all five years are profitable. Those earlier losing years were a commission artefact, not a decaying edge.

Verified results — NQ, 28-point stop, 1 contract, Sep 2022 → Aug 2026

Two sets of numbers are shown. Raw is the backtest output. Adjusted is the number we ask you to plan around: the backtest occasionally fills exits far beyond the intended target on gaps and fast candles, so every winning trade above 18 points (the 95th percentile of winners) has been truncated to 18 points. That removed 67 trades' worth of unrealistic profit — 18.7% of raw net.

Metric	Raw	Adjusted — plan on this
Closed trades	1,487	1,487
Win rate	84.5%	84.5%
Net profit	$71,135	$57,850
Profit factor	1.62	1.50
Expectancy per trade	$47.84	$38.90 (0.069R)
Average win / average loss	—	$138 / −$503
Max drawdown	—	−$3,988 (7.1R)
Recovery factor	—	14.5×
Longest losing streak	—	3 trades
Commission paid	—	$8,565

Year by year (adjusted): 2022 +$4,165 · 2023 +$12,058 · 2024 +$12,394 · 2025 +$15,583 · 2026 YTD +$13,650. Win rate stayed inside 81.9%–86.4% in every one of those years.

Stop behaviour: 202 trades (13.6%) ended at the stop. 48% of winners never traded against the entry. Only 52 winners in four years needed more than 21 points of room.

Account sizing — please read this before going live

Measured across 663 trading days with one NQ contract:

Worst realised day: −$1,142. Worst estimated intraday floor including open-trade heat: −$1,710.
A $1,000 daily loss limit would have been threatened on 97 of 663 days — roughly every 7 trading days. A $1,500 limit: 8 days. A $2,000 limit was never breached in four years.
73.8% of days were profitable; the longest run of losing days was 3.

Practical guidance: one NQ contract needs a daily loss allowance of about $2,000 and a drawdown allowance of about $5,000.

If you are on a smaller funded or evaluation account, trade MNQ or reduce size accordingly — but understand from the table above that MNQ's commission drag is severe on a 6-point median target, so expect materially lower net returns per unit of risk than the NQ figures shown here.

What we are NOT claiming

This is a high win-rate, low payoff system: average win $138 against average loss $503. The break-even win rate is 78.5% and we run at 84.5% — a 6.1 percentage point buffer. That buffer is real but not large. Poor fills, wider spreads, or a higher commission tier eat into it directly.
The system needs volatility and range. Its profitability scales with how many points the market delivers, not with how clever the entry is.
Do not exit manually when a trade shows 20+ points of heat. The data says that instinct costs money — a quarter of those trades still come back and win. Let the stop do its job.
All figures above are backtested, outlier-adjusted results. They are not a forecast.

What you need to do

Open an NQ chart (NQ1!). The indicator now refuses to load on anything else, on purpose — the risk numbers on the ticket are only correct for NQ.
Re-create your alert. Add alert → Condition: Falcon · NQ → Any alert() function call → Open-ended.
Check your account allowance against the sizing section above before the first ticket.

Nothing else changes. The ticket, the lines, the panel and the alert wording are the same as you already know.

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Backtested and outlier-adjusted results. Hypothetical or simulated performance results have certain limitations and do not represent actual trading. No representation is being made that any account will or is likely to achieve profit or losses similar to those shown. Falcon is a trading tool and does not provide financial advice. Futures trading involves substantial risk of loss.