Ichimoku beat buy & hold on 13 of 47 famous assets
The more complete a rule looks, the more it is worth checking whether the completeness holds up — and nothing on a chart looks more complete than Ichimoku. Its cloud and its web of lines promise trend, momentum and support all at once, an all-in-one system, which is a big part of the draw. But the signal you actually trade is far simpler than the picture: it goes long while price holds above the cloud and steps aside when price closes below it — a trend/regime filter. So here it is on the asset you care about, run the honest way the whole site measures: costs on every trade, every signal waiting for its bar to close, the benchmark always just buying and holding the same asset. One honest catch up front — the cloud is drawn ahead of price, which makes it look forward-looking, but it is built entirely from past highs and lows, so it lags every turn by design. Here is the whole glass: every famous asset, every winner and every loser.
So — does Ichimoku work?
On the honest evidence: mostly, no. Across the 47 famous assets with enough trades and history to judge, the Ichimoku cloud rule beat buy & hold on 13 of them — 28%, so 34 of the 47 did better simply held. That's a shade above the 26% we measure across every rule — but read that carefully. These are famous names that mostly trended over the window, and a trend/regime filter flatters itself on a trend, so a higher rate here is a fact about this survivorship-selected panel, not evidence that Ichimoku “works”. The typical run didn't win either: its median came in at -59 pts versus buy & hold over the window. A handful of real winners exist — that's why the question is worth asking honestly — but a beat on this panel is inflated by survivorship, by a mostly-trending set of names, and by the many lines and settings you could have read after the fact; a loss counts against the rule in a way a win does not count for it. The burden of proof is on the rule, and an elaborate-looking chart is not that proof.
These are famous names that still trade today. Assets that delisted, went bankrupt or (for crypto) died or were rug-pulled aren't in the set (survivorship bias) — and that history isn't available from the free public data this tool runs on — so this rate isn't a representative base rate for every asset that has ever traded.
Where it shone, where it died
Forget the headline average — the honest signal is in the spread. One unchanged Ichimoku rule turns into a triumph on one asset and a wreck on the next, decided entirely by which asset you happened to point it at.
Solana — Ichimoku beat buy & hold by +156 pts here, holding above the cloud through a long clean trend and stepping to cash before the worst of the turn. That is as much a statement about that asset's trend as about the rule's skill — you couldn't have known in advance which asset would oblige.
Nvidia — Ichimoku came in at -790 pts versus buy & hold. Around a flat cloud price crosses in and out, so the rule flips late near local highs and lows, gets chopped on the whipsaws, and pays costs on every one — the classic way a trend filter bleeds when there is no trend.
Why Ichimoku looks like it always works
- • All those lines sell completeness, not foresight. Ichimoku bundles five things into one picture, so it feels like it covers everything at once. But the signal this study actually trades — and the one part that collapses to a single clean, testable rule — is the cloud regime, and that is a plain lagging trend filter; the extra lines add more to read, not more edge.
- • The cloud looks like it predicts; it only echoes. The Kumo is drawn ahead of price, which makes it look forward-looking — but it is past highs and lows shifted forward, so it lags every real turn, and “price held the cloud as support” is something you can only confirm once the move is already over.
- • The wins cluster where things trended hardest — crypto. Split the live scoreboard by asset class and the handful of beats bunch up in crypto: Ichimoku cleared buy & hold on 9 of 11 crypto but only 4 of 36 stocks — a few assets that trended hard enough to carry a lagging filter, not an edge in the rule.
- • You get shown the one chart where price rode the cloud. Picking the asset and the dates after you already know Ichimoku looked good there is hindsight dressed up as proof. The whole glass above is what's left when you can't choose.
- • A regime filter needs a regime. Holding above the cloud pays only while a trend persists; in a sideways range price crosses the cloud back and forth, the rule whipsaws in and out for a string of small losses, and pays costs each time.
Nothing here is filtered — every Ichimoku run is public, the wins sitting right next to the wrecks. Read the full scoreboard, then point the cloud at the asset you actually care about and watch which side of the line it lands on.
Figures are computed live from simulated backtests over roughly the last five years and update as new bars close. “Ichimoku” here is the signature cloud (Kumo) regime rule — long while price holds above the displaced cloud, flat when it closes below, and neutral inside the cloud (holding the prior position) — with the cloud built only from past data. Other settings and the full line system behave differently, which is the point; you can test them yourself. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future results. This is an educational, analytical tool — not investment advice, and not a recommendation to buy or sell anything. You make all decisions and execute on your own broker.