Sound complicated? Actually, it’s HARDER to make the study indicator work than it is to make the strategy work! The strategy will automatically decide if you are long or short based on the criteria you give it for entries and exits. There is one more set of logic to decide if we are in the long direction or the short direction, and that tells the indicator which one to plot. This is done for both sides at the same time. There is logic to check whether that value is outside the current trailed value (ignore it) or inside the current trailed value (update the trailing stop to the tighter level). In the Volatility Stop, I’m actually always calculating the values of the long side stops and the short side stops according to the ATR. Along with this, you need to define recursive functions that perform the trailing action. This is needed for the calculation of the new stop loss value once we switch direction. In that indicator, I had the logic for the long side and the short side together in the same set of code. The key is to reproduce the entry logic in your stop strategy routine. The way to make trailing stop strategies work is similar to the way I made my “Volatility-based trailing stop” indicator. You have to know where the entry took place. But if you want to trail a certain number of points behind your entry, for example, you can’t use the “dumb” stop method. This kind of a number is always on, so to speak. You can use “dumb” stops, like my experimental “N bar trailing stop” indicator, that just takes the low / high of N bars back and plots the value. In general, any intelligent trailing stop must have knowledge of the entry point, so it knows where to start trailing. But it is possible to get trailing stop strategies to work! It just takes some extra elbow grease. Unfortunately, due to the way that ToS currently works with strategies, there is no way to make your entry and exit strategies “talk” to each other automatically. I have received lots of requests for making a trailing stop strategy work in Think or Swim.