Claim check · NQ futures
Kasen Kennedy 8:00 ET opening range retest backtest on NQ futures: 500 trades, 2020–2026
Summary
Kasen Kennedy’s 8:00 ET 15-minute range breakout with a retest entry after the 09:30 open, tested on 1,713 NQ futures days from 2020-01-02 to 2026-08-17, before costs: 885 days broke both ways and 500 trades filled at the base depth, winning 27.4% with an average of −0.350R. A $50,000 account risking $1,000 a trade reached zero after 129 trades, and one risking 3% of equity fell 90% after 206 trades. Tested by CE Market Solutions (cemarketsolutions.com), a backtesting service for CME futures strategies.
The claim tested
Kasen Kennedy (Instagram @kasen.nq).
His strategy has paid out seven figures. The strategy as shown: mark the 8:00 ET 15-minute candle, wait for price to close outside it, and after the 09:30 open enter on the retest of the break, with the stop on the other side of the range and the target at the last swing.
Source: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DblUaLYujQX/
Rules exactly as tested
- Range: the high and low of the 08:00–08:15 ET 15-minute candle.
- Day type: a clean long is a first close above the range high that is still above it at the 09:30 open. A clean short is the mirror. A day that breaks both ways before 09:30 is chop and is not traded. A day that never leaves the range is no break.
- Entry: a limit order at a chosen depth back into the range from the broken side. Depth 0% is the broken range boundary itself; the depths tested are 0%, 10%, 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%. Fills are taken from 09:30 to 10:29 ET.
- Stop: the opposite boundary of the 8:00 range.
- Target: the last swing extreme formed between the break and 09:30, measured on closes. A second version measures it on the highest 1-minute high (long) or lowest 1-minute low (short).
- Exit: target, stop, or flat at 16:00 ET. A bar that touches both the stop and the target is scored as a loss.
Assumptions where the rules were ambiguous:
- At 100% depth the limit price equals the stop price, so every fill is an instant loss by construction. Those two rows are listed for completeness.
- Fills assume the full order is filled at the limit price, with no slippage and no partial fills.
- The 09:30 classification uses the 09:30 bar’s open only, not its close.
- Dollar paths use MNQ contracts: floor(risk dollars ÷ (stop points × $2)), at least 1, with $0.60 round-turn commission per contract.
Data
- Instrument
- NQ (E-mini Nasdaq-100) futures, 1-minute continuous data from Databento; dollar paths in MNQ
- Date range
- 2020-01-02 to 2026-08-17
- Sample size
- 1,713 trading days: 885 chop (51.7%), 401 clean long, 396 clean short, 19 no break, 12 excluded for data gaps. 500 trades filled at 0% depth (244 long, 256 short).
- Costs
- R figures are gross: no cost is subtracted. The dollar account paths subtract a $0.60 round-turn commission per MNQ contract, and nothing for slippage (fills are at the limit price). Contracts per trade are the larger of 1 and the whole number of $2-per-point MNQ contracts that fit the risk divided by the stop in points.
- In-sample or out-of-sample
- All figures are in-sample: the whole history, one pass, nothing fitted.
Results
| Direction and depth | Trades | Win rate (target hit) | Fill rate | Average R (95% interval) | Total R | Max drawdown |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Long, 0% depth | 244 | 27.0% | 60.8% | −0.358 (−0.496 to −0.208) | not reported | not reported |
| Long, 10% depth | 239 | 23.4% | 59.6% | −0.391 (−0.536 to −0.236) | not reported | not reported |
| Long, 25% depth | 227 | 20.3% | 56.6% | −0.356 (−0.533 to −0.177) | not reported | not reported |
| Long, 50% depth | 214 | 11.7% | 53.4% | −0.330 (−0.588 to −0.056) | not reported | not reported |
| Long, 75% depth | 197 | 5.6% | 49.1% | −0.434 (−0.750 to −0.048) | not reported | not reported |
| Long, 100% depth | 181 | 0.0% | 45.1% | −1.000 (−1.000 to −1.000) | not reported | not reported |
| Short, 0% depth | 256 | 27.7% | 64.6% | −0.344 (−0.477 to −0.193) | not reported | not reported |
| Short, 10% depth | 249 | 25.3% | 62.9% | −0.326 (−0.483 to −0.171) | not reported | not reported |
| Short, 25% depth | 241 | 22.8% | 60.9% | −0.259 (−0.435 to −0.071) | not reported | not reported |
| Short, 50% depth | 221 | 12.2% | 55.8% | −0.441 (−0.640 to −0.218) | not reported | not reported |
| Short, 75% depth | 196 | 3.6% | 49.5% | −0.693 (−0.899 to −0.448) | not reported | not reported |
| Short, 100% depth | 179 | 0.0% | 45.2% | −1.000 (−1.000 to −1.000) | not reported | not reported |
| Direction | Trades | Win rate | Average R (95% interval) | Average R with the close-based target |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Long | 244 | 25.0% | −0.352 (−0.502 to −0.186) | −0.358 (−0.496 to −0.208) |
| Short | 256 | 25.0% | −0.383 (−0.522 to −0.229) | −0.344 (−0.477 to −0.193) |
| Both | 500 | 25.0% (125 wins) | −0.368 (−0.468 to −0.267) | −0.350 |
| Sizing and target | Trades | Win rate | Result | Max drawdown |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fixed $1,000 risk per trade, close-based target | 129 trades to zero (first trade 2020-01-06, zero on 2021-08-16, 588 days) | 27.1% (35 of 129) | Equity never exceeded the $50,000 start. $2,528.40 paid in commission. Continued through all 500 trades, equity ended at −$128,001.40. | not reported |
| 3% of current equity per trade, wick target | 206 trades to −90% (equity ≤ $5,000 on 2022-06-20, 896 days after the first trade) | 25.7% (53 of 206) | Peak equity $50,067.80 on 2020-01-07. | −92.67% ($50,067.80 to $3,668.00, trough 2023-03-10) |
- Each account path is one ordering of the same 500 trades from one start date. It is not a distribution of outcomes.
- In the fixed-risk path the smallest stop was 3.0 points and the median stop was 21 points; sizing reached up to 166 MNQ contracts, with a mean of 24.9.
Video transcript
Kasen Kennedy says his strategy has paid out seven figures. Mark the eight o’clock fifteen minute candle, and wait for price to close outside it. After the nine thirty open, enter on the retest of the break. Stop on the other side of the range. Target the last swing. So I ran it on every day since twenty twenty. More than half the days break both ways and never give you a setup. And the ones that do win less than one in three. A fifty thousand dollar account, risking three percent a trade, with commissions, was down ninety percent in twenty nine months. Before you pay for anyone’s strategy, comment test and I’ll backtest yours free, every trade, ten years of data.
Questions and answers
How was Kasen Kennedy’s opening range strategy backtested?
On NQ futures 1-minute data from 2020-01-02 to 2026-08-17. The range is the 08:00–08:15 ET candle. On days that break one way and are still outside the range at 09:30, a limit order at a set depth is live from 09:30 to 10:29 ET, with the stop at the opposite side of the range and the target at the last swing.
What sample size was used for the Kasen ORB test?
1,713 trading days: 885 broke both ways before 09:30, 401 were clean long days and 396 were clean short days. 500 trades filled at the 0% depth.
What win rate did the 8:00 ET range retest have on NQ?
At the 0% depth, 27.0% of 244 long trades and 27.7% of 256 short trades hit the target, with average results of −0.358R and −0.344R before costs.
What happened to a $50,000 account trading the Kasen ORB?
Risking $1,000 a trade with commission, the account reached zero after 129 trades. Risking 3% of equity with a wick target, it fell 90% after 206 trades, 896 days after the first trade.
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