Reviews

Stockbee TC2000 Scan Settings: Momentum Burst and EP, Explained

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Pradeep Bonde, who writes as Stockbee, publishes his actual scan formulas — not descriptions of them, the TC2000 code — on a free Blogspot he has run since 2005, nearly two decades. He is still posting: the most recent entry on stockbee.blogspot.com when we checked was dated 31 July 2026. This guide collects the scans he has published, translates each clause into plain language, and shows what you get when you paste them into a scanner. It is a settings guide, not a biography.

A note on integrity before we go further: InvestingPaths is an independent research site and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Pradeep Bonde or Stockbee. Everything below is our summary of his publicly published material, attributed to the post it came from. Trading involves substantial risk of loss, and nothing here is financial advice or a promise of any result. He runs a paid members' site; we have no relationship with it and no incentive tied to it.

The one idea behind every scan

Bonde's scans all look for the same event. In "Stocks move in short term Momentum Bursts" (31 December 2013) he sets out the claim the whole method rests on: stocks move in bursts of 3 to 5 days, during which a stock goes up 8 to 20% — "lower priced stock can even have bursts of up to 40%" — and higher-priced stocks above $40 move in bursts of $5 to $25. His framing is that the burst begins with a range expansion day, "a day which is up bigger than last 5 to 10 days bars", often with volume expansion alongside, and that "in most cases the momentum dies down in 3 to 5 days".

That is why every scan below is a one-day event scan rather than a trend scan: he is not screening for stocks in an uptrend, he is screening for today's expansion bar, then judging the context by eye.

Reading TC2000 / Telechart formula syntax

Only the 2010 post names a platform, and the name it uses is Telechart — the product Worden now sells as TC2000. The later posts print the formulas bare, without saying where to paste them. The syntax is Worden's Personal Criteria Formula language (PCFs) throughout, and the vocabulary is short:

TokenMeaning
C, O, H, L, VToday's close, open, high, low, volume
C1, C2, V1The same figures one and two bars back — the trailing digit is a bar offset
AVGC65The 65-bar average close
AVGV100The 100-bar average volume
MINV3The lowest volume of a 3-bar window
AVGV50.1, AVGC7.25A second number after a dot shifts the whole window back by that many bars

That last row is the one people trip on. Bonde never writes out the syntax rule, but his own formulas make it legible: his Young TI65 condition is avgc7/avgc65>=1.05and AVGC7.25 / AVGC65.25 <= 1.05, which only means anything — bullish now, not bullish 25 bars ago — if .25 shifts the window back 25 bars. So minv3.1 reads as the lowest daily volume across the three sessions ending yesterday, and avgv50.1 as the 50-day average volume through yesterday — today's own print excluded, which is the point when today's print is the spike you are measuring.

One more piece of arithmetic worth doing once: when you see (100 * V / AVGV100) >= 300, the 100 * turns a ratio into a percentage, so >= 300 means today's volume is at least three times the 100-day average. Same trick in avgc7/avgc65>=1.05 — a ratio of 1.05 is a 5% margin, not a crossover.

The 4% breakout scan

From "My process loop to trade 4% b/o and $ b/o" (13 July 2017), which opens with the claim that "most stocks start their swing move or big move with a 4% breakout":

c/c1>=1.04 and v>v1 and v>100000

Three clauses: up 4% or more on the close, today's volume higher than yesterday's, volume at least 100,000 shares. His own gloss is that it "looks for a stock with price and volume surge" — and that the output is candidates, not buys: several stocks will meet the conditions and most will not be buyable.

The dollar breakout scan

Same post, for expensive stocks that rarely move 4%:

c-o>=.90 and v>100000

Note this one is close minus open, not close minus yesterday's close — it measures the size of today's own session, in dollars. He describes it as "more useful on high priced stocks above 40 as they do not often breakout with 4% move".

TI65 — the trend filter behind the rest

Two of his scans lean on an indicator he calls Trend Intensity. From "How to setup Trend Intensity scans and charts" (16 March 2018):

avgc7/avgc65>=1.05

The 7-bar average close at least 5% above the 65-bar average close. Roughly: the last week and a half is pricing the stock 5% higher than the last quarter did. He calls the bearish twin avgc7/avgc65<=.95 and uses the raw ratio avgc7/avgc65 as a sortable column for ranking.

SLTB — the low threshold breakout

From "Stockbee Low Threshold Breakout (SLTB) Scans" (6 April 2018). Its stated purpose is finding lower-risk entries in stocks that already have momentum, on a breakout whose threshold sits below the 4% and dollar scans:

minv3.1>=100000 and c>=3 and avgc7/avgc65>=1.05 and c>o and c>c1 and c/c1>c1/c2 and c1/c2<1.02

Seven clauses, and this is the formula worth walking through slowly, because it is the one that shows how he thinks. minv3.1>=100000 is a liquidity floor that a single busy day cannot fake — the quietest of the last three completed sessions must clear 100,000 shares. c>=3 throws out sub-$3 stocks. avgc7/avgc65>=1.05 is TI65: only names already in established momentum. Then the shape of today: c>o (an up bar), c>c1 (an up close), c/c1>c1/c2 (today's gain is bigger than yesterday's — acceleration), and c1/c2<1.02 (yesterday was quiet, under 2%). Together the last two say the move is starting today, off a calm bar — which is what buys you a close stop.

The bearish version in the same post is close to a mirror but not one. It adds a clause the bullish scan has no counterpart for — and it drops TI65 entirely, so unlike the bullish scan it never asks whether the stock had momentum to lose:

c1/c2>=.98 and c/c1<c1/c2 and c<c1 AND C<O and minv3.1>=100000 and (C - L) / (H - L) <0.2 and c>3

(C - L) / (H - L) < 0.2 is the close's position inside the day's range: the stock finished in the bottom 20% of its bar. A weak close, not merely a down day.

Episodic pivots — the earnings scan

The other half of Stockbee is the episodic pivot (EP): a stock that re-rates on genuinely new information and then drifts for months. In "What are Episodic Pivots and how to find them" (12 February 2010) he grounds it in Post Earnings Announcement Drift, cites Ball and Brown (1968), and gives the scan:

((C - C1) >= 5 AND V > 10000 AND C >= 62.50 AND V > V1) OR ((( 100 * (C - C1) / C1) >= 8 AND V > 3000 AND (100 * V / AVGV100) >= 300) AND C > 1)

It is two scans joined by OR, aimed at two different kinds of stock. The left branch is for high-priced names: up $5 or more in dollars, above $62.50, on volume above yesterday's. The right branch is for everything above $1: up 8% or more in percent, on at least three times the 100-day average volume. The two absolute volume floors (V > 10000, V > 3000) are much lower than the 100,000 his later scans use, which is usually read as Telechart expressing volume in hundreds of shares rather than shares. Either way they are not what filters this scan — the relative-volume clause is.

He also publishes the intraday version he runs, in "My process flow for Episodic Pivots (EP)" (30 July 2014):

c/c1>1.04 and v>3*avgv50.1 and v>=300000

Up 4%, on more than three times the 50-day average volume through yesterday, with a hard 300,000-share floor. The same post describes the rest of his day: analysing after-hours movers up 4%+ on 50k volume, running a pre-market scanner for stocks up at least 2% on 50k+ volume, and re-running the EP scan through the session. His stated conclusion is blunt — "Most EP where I made big money I bought in pre market."

Float is his stated edge on EPs, and it is not in any formula. The 2010 post says a float below 25 million is ideal and that "the best moves happen on float below 10 million", while earnings breakouts on 100M+ float names tend to pull back. He also notes that the biggest EP moves usually come with volume "typically of 10 times or more compared to average volume".

Every clause, and what it filters for

ClauseScanWhat it filters for
c/c1>=1.044% b/oToday's close at least 4% above yesterday's
v>v14% b/o, EPToday's volume above yesterday's — participation is rising, not just high
v>1000004% b/o, $ b/oTradeable size; 300,000 on the intraday EP scan
c-o>=.90$ b/oToday's session travelled at least 90¢ from open to close
minv3.1>=100000SLTBThe quietest of the last 3 completed sessions still cleared 100k shares
c>=3SLTBNo sub-$3 stocks
avgc7/avgc65>=1.05SLTB (TI65)7-bar average close 5%+ above the 65-bar average — established momentum
c>oSLTBAn up bar
c>c1SLTBAn up close
c/c1>c1/c2SLTBToday's gain is larger than yesterday's — the move is accelerating
c1/c2<1.02SLTBYesterday was quiet, so the stop can sit close underneath
(C-L)/(H-L)<0.2SLTB bearishClosed in the bottom fifth of the day's range
(C-C1)>=5EPUp $5 or more in absolute dollars (high-priced branch)
C>=62.50EPRestricts that branch to expensive stocks
(100*(C-C1)/C1)>=8EPUp 8%+ in percent (everything-else branch)
(100*V/AVGV100)>=300EPVolume at least 3× the 100-day average
v>3*avgv50.1EP intradayVolume more than 3× the 50-day average through yesterday
C>1EPExcludes sub-$1 stocks

Bonde is consistent that the scan is the beginning. His published buy checklist for the 4% and dollar breakouts is judgment, not code: close near the high, a narrow-range or negative bar the day before, "stock should not be up 3 days in a row", a young trend rather than an extended one, and the breakout being the first to third setup since the move started. None of that is in a formula, by design.

Running these outside TC2000

Our backtester builds a strategy from a rule library and tests it on daily bars; the same library powers a free, unmetered universe screen, and neither needs an account. It is worth being precise about where that stops.

What maps cleanly:

Bonde's clauseOur ruleMatch
c/c1>=1.04Rate of change, length 1, over 4%Exact
c1/c2<1.02Same rule, under 2%, evaluated 1 bar agoExact
v>v1Volume vs its own average, over 1.0× its 2-bar averageExact — our average includes today, so a 2-bar one is true exactly when today beats yesterday
v>100000Volume traded, over 0.1M sharesExact
(100*V/AVGV100)>=300Volume vs its own average, over 3× its 100-bar averageExact — AVGV100 carries no dotted offset, so his average includes today's spike too, and so does ours
c>oUp or down bar, closes above its own openExact
c>c1This bar vs an earlier bar: close above the close 1 bar backExact
(C-L)/(H-L)<0.2Williams %R, length 1, under −80Exact — %R measures the close's position in the high-low range of the last N bars including today, so at length 1 it is that clause, rescaled to −100…0
avgc7/avgc65 crossoverMoving average comparison, 7 SMA over 65 SMADirection only — see below

One boundary note covers the whole table: our over is a strict >, while several of his clauses are >=. The two disagree only about a stock landing exactly on the number — up exactly 4.00%, volume at exactly 3.00× the average — so the verdicts stand, with a rounding-width seam.

And what does not, which is the more useful list:

  • The 5% TI65 margin. Our moving-average comparison answers above or below and takes no percentage cushion, so avgc7/avgc65>=1.05 degrades to avgc7 > avgc65. That is a materially looser filter — it admits every name that has only just turned up.
  • Acceleration (c/c1>c1/c2). No rule compares one return to another return, so SLTB's defining clause has no equivalent.
  • Float. There is no float rule. Market cap is not float, and our share-count rule measures a change in share count, not the tradeable supply. Since float is the edge Bonde names for EPs, this is the biggest single gap.
  • Absolute dollar levels. c>=3, C>=62.50, C>1, c-o>=.90 and (C-C1)>=5 are all fixed prices or fixed dollar moves; our price rules are all relative (versus a moving average, a band, the 52-week high), so none of these can be stated.
  • Anything intraday. Our engine holds daily bars only. His pre-market and after-hours passes — where he says most of his big EP entries came from — have no equivalent here at all.
  • The universe. Our nightly screen covers US SEC filers we hold point-in-time filings for, capped at 2,000 names. That is not the whole US market, and it is emphatically not the low-float micro-cap pond his EP scan is designed to fish in.

Add all that up and a rule set built from these formulas in our tool is a simplified subset of Bonde's scan, not "Stockbee's scan" — and a subset that has quietly dropped the float cap, the 5% momentum cushion and the acceleration clause is a different and looser strategy. If you build it, judge the result on its own terms rather than as a verdict on his method.

In TC2000 itself the formulas go in as Personal Criteria Formulas, which sit on the Premium tier — the same requirement covered in our TC2000 pricing breakdown, and the mechanics of building and saving conditions are in our EasyScan setups guide.

Frequently asked questions

Does Stockbee publish his scans for free? Yes. The formulas above are on his public Blogspot, dated 2010 to 2018, and the blog was still active in July 2026.

What is the difference between the 4% breakout and SLTB? Threshold. The 4% scan needs a 4% close-to-close move; SLTB triggers on a smaller move accelerating off a quiet bar, in a stock already passing his TI65 filter. He describes it as a way to buy earlier and add on the breakout day.

What does TI65 actually measure? avgc7/avgc65 — the 7-bar average close divided by the 65-bar average close. Above 1.05 is his bullish threshold, below 0.95 his bearish one, and the raw ratio doubles as a ranking column.

Do I need TC2000 to run these? For the formulas as written, yes — they are TC2000/Telechart PCF syntax and need the Premium tier. Most individual clauses rebuild elsewhere; the float filter and the intraday scans usually do not.

Is a scan hit a buy signal? Not in his own description. The breakout post says so twice — once under the 4% scan and again under the dollar scan, with the same checklist attached to each: the scan returns candidates, and a buy still has to match a setup he checks by eye — close near the high, a quiet bar before, not already up three days, and early in the move rather than late.

Where to go from here

Bonde's material is unusually testable for published trading content, because he gives you the code rather than a description of it. To run the formulas as written you need TC2000's Premium tier; to see how much of the idea survives translation, our backtester will build the expressible clauses and test them on daily bars for free — caveats above kept firmly in view.

For the neighbouring method built on the same premise but a far longer holding period, see our Qullamaggie TC2000 scan settings guide, which publishes his ADR% formula the same way. If you are earlier in the process, what a breakout strategy is actually doing and our swing trading playbook are the better first reads.

Test it before you trust itEvery rule in this article can be backtested on real daily prices in seconds — free, no signup.Open the backtester

Backtest figures in our articles are computed by our own engine over real price data — fees and slippage included, shown against buy-and-hold — and live embeds refresh as new data lands.

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