Measured move

A measured move is a convention for turning a distance already travelled on a chart into a projected one: the height of a pattern, or the length of an earlier leg, is measured and then laid off again from a chosen starting point. It appears in the standard descriptions of several named patterns, where the projection is presented as part of the pattern's definition rather than as a separate claim, which is one reason it is so often repeated without being examined. It is worth being clear about what the projection is. Nothing about a distance price has already covered establishes that it will cover the same distance again; the convention supplies a number where otherwise there would be none, and the number's authority comes from the convention rather than from the market. The starting point is chosen too, so the same pattern measured from a different point yields a different projection. Readers who use them generally treat the result as a way of stating a target, not as a statement about likelihood.