The Ripster EMA Cloud system is one of the few indicator setups whose author published the numbers. Not "use some fast and slow averages" — four named pairs with published lengths, and for the two that carry the system a stated job and a stated timeframe. That is why it ships as a built-in on Deepvue, TrendSpider and TradingView while most Fintwit indicators stay screenshots. This guide reproduces the settings from Ripster's own post and from the Tenet Trade Group rules PDF, quotes him where the wording matters, and is straight about which half of the system is testable on daily bars and which half is not.
One framing note first, because it decides what this page is. Ripster's headline configuration is a 10-minute chart, and the trades he documents on it are largely options day trades. He also names a second application in his own words — 1 hour and daily for swings — and that is the half this page can take further than a settings list. The intraday configuration, the opening-range mechanics and the options themselves are reported here and tested nowhere, for a reason stated plainly further down.
Who Ripster is, and where these numbers come from
Ripster (@ripster47) is a US options and equities trader with a following reported in the hundreds of thousands on X, best known for the shaded moving-average bands he calls EMA Clouds. He teaches through ripstereducation.com and the associated Tenet Trade Group, whose free ten-page welcome PDF opens by naming "the Ripster EMA Cloud Trading System." Those two documents are the primary sources below; where they differ on a setting, we say so rather than picking one. Where the same instruction is merely worded differently in the two, we quote whichever version is clearer and have not flagged every variant.
A note on integrity before we go further: InvestingPaths is an independent research site and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Ripster, RipsterEducation, or Tenet Trade Group. Everything below is our summary of their publicly published material, attributed as such. Trading involves substantial risk of loss, and nothing here is financial advice or a promise of any result. That warning needs to be sharper than usual for this system, because much of what is documented around it is options trading: a defined-risk-looking options position can still lose its entire premium in a session, short options carry losses larger than the account, and none of the mechanics of expiry, assignment, implied volatility or spreads is covered on this page. An indicator setting is not a risk framework.
The cloud pairs, as published
An EMA cloud is the shaded area between two exponential moving averages. The colour flips with the ordering, and the band is read as a support or resistance zone rather than as a line. In the PDF's own words: "It is areas (clouds) between two EMAs that are shaded... The EMA clouds serve as support or resistance for Intraday or swing trading."
| Cloud | EMA lengths | What he says it is for | Timeframe he names for it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trend / bias cloud | 34 and 50 | "34-50 CLOUD DECIDES OVERALL TREND UP OR DOWN"; "Whenever you long or short that 34-50 ema cloud is your risk level" | "any timeframe"; 10-minute for day trades, 1-hour for swings |
| Trendline cloud | 5 and 12 (or 5 and 13) | "acts as a fluid trendline for day trades"; "5-12 CLOUD IS USED TO RIDE THE TREND OR HIT POPS IF LONG" | 10-minute; also "works as trend line as well" on the 1-hour |
| Pullback ribbon | 8 and 9 | "8-9 EMA Clouds can be used as pullback Levels"; "8-9 CLOUD (RIBBON) IS USED TO AS PULLBACK POSITION ADD" — marked optional | not separately stated |
| Optional cloud | 20 and 21 | listed among the optional cloud lengths, but in neither "here's where to start" list; no job stated for it in either source | not stated |
| Slow cloud | 72 and 89 | appears only in one of the two "here's where to start" setup lists; no job stated | not stated |
Two rows are thinner than the others on purpose. 72-89 appears in one of the two "here's where to start" lists with no described function; 20-21 appears in neither of those lists at all — it turns up in the lengths a platform script plots and in a passing line about various combinations of clouds. So any specific use attributed to either — 72-89 as a "macro trend" filter is the common one — is somebody's reading rather than his instruction.
The four rules that actually run the system
Strip the charts away and the published system is small. These are the load-bearing sentences.
1. The 34-50 cloud sets the bias. His own quoted formulation: "Additionally at high level price over under 34-50 EMA clouds confirms either bullish or bearish bias on the price action for any timeframe." Note the last three words — this is the one rule he explicitly frees from a timeframe.
2. Over the 50, bullish; under it, bearish. Verbatim in both sources: "Over 50 emas trend is bullish below is Bearish." The simplest expression of rule 1, collapsing the band to its slow edge.
3. The 34-50 cloud is the risk level. "Whenever you long or short that 34-50 ema cloud is your risk level," followed immediately by the discipline clause: "if the stock crosses over the cloud, long becomes short and short becomes long." The same band that grants the position revokes it — and the revocation is a reversal instruction, not merely an exit.
4. The 5-12 cloud rides the trend, and its loss ends the ride. "Let trend ride as long as 10 min candle rides 5-12(5-13) Cloud. 10 Min candle closes under you get out intraday." The entry-side companion: "5-12 cloud cross is your confirmation... Long when 5 cross 12 and short when 12 under 5 (combine with 50 ema 10 min)."
Read together, that is a two-speed structure most trend systems only imply: a slow band deciding whether you are allowed to be long at all and where you are wrong, and a fast band managing the position while the slow band's answer holds. Same architecture as the classic moving-average trend filter, with the band drawn instead of the line.
Is it 5-12 or 5-13? The sources genuinely disagree with themselves
The honest answer is that Ripster writes both, in the same sentence, in both documents: "Ideally, 5-12 or 5-13 EMA cloud acts as a fluid trendline for day trades." The parenthetical "5-12(5-13)" appears again in his trend-riding rule. He treats them as interchangeable and never states a preference. A page insisting the "real" setting is one of them is inventing a distinction the author did not make.
A second, more interesting inconsistency sits inside the Tenet PDF itself: it contains two separate "here's where to start" pages with different EMA lists. One says "setup 5-12, 8-9 and 34-50 as your EMAS"; the other says "setup 5-12 (or 5-13) 34-50 72-89 as your EMAS". Both then tell you to focus first on the 34-50 cloud on the 10-minute chart. The constant across every version of the starting instructions is the 34-50 cloud; the rest of the stack varies within one ten-page document.
A third discrepancy circulates widely. The Webull script reproduced in the PDF is credited to a third party and its own header calls it "based on the 8-21 34-50 strategy" — an 8-over-21 cloud, not the 8-9 ribbon and 20-21 pair Ripster lists. If your Webull setup looks different from your TradingView one, that is why.
The detail almost nobody mentions: which price the EMAs use
Two scripts are printed in the same PDF, and they do not compute the same averages.
The thinkorswim version uses ExpAverage(hl2, …) — an EMA of the midpoint of each bar's high and low. The Webull version uses ema(close, …) — an EMA of the close. On a quiet session the two lines are nearly identical; on a wide-range bar closing near one extreme they are not, and a "did it close under the cloud" test can genuinely disagree between platforms. If your chart sits slightly differently from somebody else's screenshot, check the price source before you check the lengths.
While we are in that code: the thinkorswim snippet as printed will not compile as pasted. It defines ema13 from the input ema1high = 13, then calls AddCloud(ema5, ema12, …) on an ema12 that is never defined. A one-word fix, but worth knowing before you conclude your platform is broken.
Availability, from Ripster's own platform post, matches what the documents imply: Deepvue, TrendSpider and TradingView carry the clouds as built-in indicators (search "Ripster" in TradingView's indicator list, or "MA Cloud by Ripster" on TrendSpider), while thinkorswim and Webull need the custom scripts — which is why the PDF prints those two and not the others. He also publishes an official TradingView script. Choosing between platforms on other grounds is what our Deepvue and TC2000 comparison and TC2000 versus thinkorswim are for.
The intraday half, reported and not tested
Three published rules belong to the 10-minute chart and stay there.
- The first-30-minute volume rule. "Volume is key if stock has done 20% vol in 1st 30 mins, it will trend in same direction."
- Opening range breaks. "Add Opening Range Breaks to this system for intraday trades at open," plus a gap-down variant: short if rejected under the 10-minute 50 EMA cloud, long if it reclaims.
- The exit granularity itself. "10 Min candle closes under you get out" is a rule about a bar that lasts ten minutes.
We are not going to backtest any of it, and the reason is specific rather than modest: our backtester runs on daily bars only. It executes at daily closes, holds no intraday price history and stores no intraday volume, so there is no version of the 20%-in-30-minutes rule it could evaluate — not an approximate one, not a proxy. Running 5/12 and 34/50 over daily bars and calling the result "Ripster's system" would be testing something he does not trade. The rest of this page is about the application he does name for the daily chart.
Building the swing half in a free backtester
His swing instruction is short and specific: "On swings 1 Hr Use 34-50 EMA for bullish over and bearish under. 5-12 or 5-13 clouds on One hour works as trend line as well." Daily is named alongside the hour throughout — "1Hr/Daily for Swings" — so the daily chart is inside his stated scope, not our extrapolation of it.
Here is how each published rule maps onto conditions in our free backtester, which builds rule sets from a plain-language library and runs them over daily bars — that link opens with fees and slippage already switched on, because the tool's own default is zero on both.
| Ripster's rule | How to express it | Rule used |
|---|---|---|
| Bullish bias over the 34-50 cloud | Price over the 34 EMA and price over the 50 EMA | Price vs moving average, twice |
| "Over 50 emas trend is bullish" alone | Price over the 50 EMA | Price vs moving average |
| The cloud is green (34 above 50) | 34 EMA over the 50 EMA | Moving average comparison |
| "Long when 5 cross 12" | 5 EMA crosses above the 12 EMA | Moving average cross |
| The 5-12 cloud holding | 5 EMA over the 12 EMA | Moving average comparison |
| Bias cloud is actually rising, not just above | The 50 EMA is rising over N bars | Moving average slope |
| "You get out" when the bar closes under the fast cloud | Trailing stop on a close below the 12 EMA | Trailing stop, type EMA |
| The 34-50 cloud as the risk level | Trailing stop on a close below the 50 EMA, or an exit rule of price under the 50 EMA | Trailing stop, or exit rules |
| Price coiled on the bias cloud | Price is less than 2% above its 34 EMA | Distance from a moving average |
| Pullback into the 8-9 ribbon to add | A 1-2 bar corrective pullback ends here | Corrective pullback |
Two of those deserve a comment. The trailing stop of type EMA exits on a close below a moving average of your chosen length — structurally the same instruction as "the candle closes under the cloud and you get out", only measured on a bar that lasts a day instead of ten minutes. And price inside the cloud is expressible, contrary to what you might expect of a shaded band: an OR of two blocks (under the 5 and over the 12, or over the 5 and under the 12) covers both orderings of the pair.
One constraint worth knowing before you build a twelve-rule set: a free custom run is capped at a five-year window. Sharing is not a constraint — a custom rule set rides in the URL as an encoded rules= payload, so the Share link hands somebody the whole twelve-rule build rather than the name of a preset.
What still cannot be tested, honestly
- Every intraday timeframe, ten-minute and one-hour alike. Daily is the only resolution available, so even the hourly application he names for swings is out of reach — we can test the daily half of "1Hr/Daily", not the hourly half.
- Intraday volume, and therefore any version of the 20%-in-30-minutes rule.
- Opening range breaks and gap-down reclaims, both open-of-session mechanics on intraday bars.
- Options, entirely. The backtester models long equity positions with fees — no option, no expiry, no premium decay.
- The stack as a single condition. Our Moving average stack rule is fixed at 20 > 50 > 200, so a cloud stack has to be assembled from separate comparison rules, one pair at a time.
- A discretionary read of the band. "Many times a stock will change trend right on these clouds" is an observation about behaviour, not a condition, and forcing it into one is where a discretionary system quietly becomes a different system.
Frequently asked questions
What are Ripster's EMA cloud settings? Four pairs: 5 and 12 (or 5 and 13) as a fast trendline cloud, 8 and 9 as an optional pullback ribbon, 20 and 21 as an optional cloud, and 34 and 50 as the trend and risk cloud. A 72-89 pair appears in one of his setup lists without a stated purpose.
Is it the 5-12 or the 5-13 cloud? Both. He writes "5-12 or 5-13" in the same sentence in both of his published descriptions and never states a preference between them. The difference on a chart is marginal.
What timeframe are the EMA clouds for? His stated answer is "10 Min for day trading and 1Hr/Daily for Swings", and he adds that he keeps premarket and after-hours data on for the 10-minute chart. The 34-50 bias read is the one he explicitly extends to "any timeframe".
Which cloud is the stop? He does not use the word stop. He writes that "whenever you long or short that 34-50 ema cloud is your risk level", and that a cross of the cloud flips the position rather than merely closing it. Intraday the fast rule is separate: a 10-minute close under the 5-12 cloud ends the trade.
Do I need to pay for the indicator? No. It is built in on Deepvue, TrendSpider and TradingView, and the thinkorswim and Webull scripts are published free in the welcome PDF.
Is the ATR setting part of the system? Not as a stated number. The PDF discusses using ATR alongside daily trading range and mentions a 14-day period only as an example of a set period, not as a prescribed setting. Treat any specific "Ripster ATR setting" you see quoted as somebody's default.
Take the numbers, keep the scepticism
What makes this system worth writing down is that it is falsifiable in the parts that matter: two averages, an ordering, and a stated place where you are wrong. That is more than most published setups offer — enough to build and test rather than admire.
It is also, on his own account, an intraday options system with a swing application attached, and only the swing application is something this page can take anywhere. To see what a 34-50 bias filter with an EMA trailing exit actually did over years of daily closes, build it in the backtester. For the same treatment of slower systems, the Qullamaggie scan settings, the Minervini Trend Template and Weinstein's stage analysis are the closest neighbours, and the swing trading playbook covers the trade management the clouds stand in for. The indicator finds the condition. The risk stays yours.