The box tells you how far, then you stop asking

A measured move target is the height of a sideways range, added to the edge that breaks. A box from 40.00 to 42.00 is 2.00 tall. A break above 42.00 targets 44.00, and a break below 40.00 targets 38.00.

The logic comes from how the box formed. A range builds while both sides take positions. When one side wins, price tends to travel about the distance it spent coiling. Then it often drifts back toward the range.

That drift back matters as much as the target. The box gives you one height of travel. Past that, you're guessing, and you're guessing where price likes to snap back.

Treat it as a working assumption you check against your own results. It's a way to fix an exit before you enter, which beats choosing one while the trade is moving.

Without a target, the exit gets decided mid-trade. Price runs, you feel clever, and the number you'd accept keeps climbing. Then the pullback arrives and you exit on fear instead.

Round numbers and distant highs are the usual stand-ins. They feel objective, but neither comes from the range you're trading. A distant high may sit three box heights away, and nothing about this breakout says it will get there.

The opposite failure is selling too early. With no number in mind, one red candle looks like the end. You're out at a third of the move, watching the rest go without you.

A measured move fixes both, because the target exists before the entry. You decide once, while calm, and then the chart does the work.

Start with the range itself. Mark two touches along the top and two along the bottom, with wicks or bodies used alike on both edges. Extra touches don't improve the box. They only make it more obvious and your entry later.

When a candle closes outside the box, copy the box. In TradingView, clone the rectangle and drag the copy so its bottom edge sits on the broken top edge. The top of the copy is your target. A break lower works the same way, stacked underneath.

The copy beats measuring by hand. It keeps the height exact and leaves the target visible from the first candle.

Only a candle close counts as the break. A wick that pokes out and comes back is price testing the edge. It sets no target and starts no trade.

A target only helps if the trade still pays at the price you can get. Take the 40.00 to 42.00 box breaking higher, with a 44.00 target. Your stop is a candle close back inside, below 41.60.

Enter at 42.20 and you risk 0.60 to make 1.80. That's three to one, well past the two to one minimum.

Now find the latest entry that still pays two to one. Call it E. You need 44.00 minus E to equal twice the gap between E and 41.60. Solving gives an E of 42.40.

Above that price, skip the trade, however good the break looks. Chasing to 42.80 means risking 1.20 to make 1.20, and no box height rescues that. Write the latest price next to the box before the break, so you aren't calculating while the candle runs.

Exit at one box height. If you sell in pieces, the box height is where the last piece goes. The box makes no promise beyond that distance.

It will sting sometimes. Price will keep going after you're out, and you'll feel early. That's a separate trade with a separate plan, and it needs its own level and its own stop.

Check your map before the break, too. If an existing support or resistance zone sits short of the box height, price has to get through it first. The nearer of the two is the realistic target, and it may fail the two to one test. That's a judgment call, so note which target you used.

The same arithmetic works on any chart with a clean range, gold included. The box is the only input, and it forecasts nothing past one height.

Do these before the break, while the chart is quiet. Once a candle closes outside the box, there's no time left for arithmetic. The numbers have to be on the chart already.

The list assumes you already have a sideways range. Higher highs and higher lows on the direction chart mean a trend, and there's no box to measure. Skip the exercise on that chart and trade the trend as a trend.

The last two items are the ones that get dropped. Writing down the latest entry price is what stops a chase. Deleting the boxes afterwards stops you trading a stale range tomorrow, which is an easy mistake on a busy morning. A clean chart each day keeps the next box honest.