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Patterns To Watch

Weekend Setups During Holiday Volatility

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Written by Timothy Sykes
Updated 11/25/2025 5 min read

It’s Thanksgiving week.

The house smells like stuffing and coffee. Family’s in town. Your uncle’s talking about an AI bubble in the market. The kids are glued to their screens.

And while everyone’s swiping cards, booking flights, and blowing cash on Amazon deals … One quiet corner of the market is setting up the same trade that my students and I target week after week.

Don’t fall for the holiday money trap. Instead, use the volatility to make gains

For example, last weekend, I pulled 9% from OSRH after it fit this exact pattern.

  • It’s one trade.
  • At the same time.
  • Every week.

That’s why I call it the perfect side-hustle setup.

Even if you’re busy, even if you’ve got family over, you can plan it in advance and execute with peace of mind.

Look at another one of my weekend trades from mid-October below:

Source: Profit.ly

This Friday, my weekend pattern will reveal itself again. Most people will miss it because they’re distracted.

But all this week you’ve got a perfect opportunity to prepare for Friday’s price action.

And due to the short trading week, because of Thanksgiving, this coming Monday gap up could be even bigger than normal …

The OSRH Trade: Proof The Pattern Still Works

© Millionaire Media, LLC

Last weekend’s play on OSRH was a perfect example of how predictable this setup has become.

Week after week we see this price action in the market.

And the stock had all the ingredients that I look for heading into a Friday close:

  • Low float.
  • Fresh catalyst.
  • Morning spike.
  • Consolidation into the close.

When a stock holds strength into the weekend, especially in this market of short squeezes and low-float movers, it sets up the potential for a big Monday morning gap-up.

I didn’t chase it during the morning spike. I waited for my setup, the same entry I’ve taught for years: buying late Friday when price action confirms, and locking in gains Monday morning.

  • OSRH had 8 million shares in the float.
  • The company announced a potential global licensing agreement that morning, November 21.
  • It spiked 60% after the news came out.
  • The price consolidated around $0.60 into the close.

I bought shares on Friday afternoon and sold them on Monday morning for a 9% profit.

Take a look at the OSRH chart below, every candle represents one trading minute:

OSRH chart multi-day, 1-minute candles Source: StocksToTrade
OSRH chart multi-day, 1-minute candles Source: StocksToTrade

No stress and no all-day screen watching.

That’s why I love this pattern. It’s structured. It’s repeatable. And it’s not an emotional drain.

I’d rather take consistent singles like this than swing for home runs that blow up my account.

How to Prepare for This Friday’s Setup

Here’s how you get ready for this week:

  • Track the strongest Friday movers. These are your candidates for the weekend pattern. Focus on low-float names with catalysts that hit in the morning.
  • Watch for strength into the close. If a stock holds gains in the last hour, it’s a potential setup.
  • Don’t chase into after-hours. I buy during the confirmed bounce.
  • Lock in gains on Monday morning. This pattern works because we enter and exit with a plan.

My OSRH trade wasn’t random. It was the result of a specific process.

And with Thanksgiving cutting this week short, the odds of a strong Monday gap could be even higher than usual.

Here’s why:

Most traders will check out early on Friday (if they show up at all) to get a head start on the holiday weekend. On Saturday and Sunday, they find the strong stocks that they missed on Friday and enter orders to buy shares that execute on Monday.

That’s what creates the gap up.

While most traders are distracted by family, food, and travel, I’ll be watching for the next version of OSRH to show its hand on Friday afternoon.

Watch my video below for all the details:

Cheers

 

*Past performance does not indicate future results



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Author card Timothy Sykes picture

Timothy Sykes

Tim Sykes is a penny stock trader and teacher who became a self-made millionaire by the age of 22 by trading $12,415 of bar mitzvah money. After becoming disenchanted with the hedge fund world, he established the Tim Sykes Trading Challenge to teach aspiring traders how to follow his trading strategies. He’s been featured in a variety of media outlets including CNN, Larry King, Steve Harvey, Forbes, Men’s Journal, and more. He’s also an active philanthropist and environmental activist, a co-founder of Karmagawa, and has donated millions of dollars to charity.
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* Results are not typical and will vary from person to person. Making money trading stocks takes time, dedication, and hard work. There are inherent risks involved with investing in the stock market, including the loss of your investment. Past performance in the market is not indicative of future results. Any investment is at your own risk. See Terms of Service here

The available research on day trading suggests that most active traders lose money. Fees and overtrading are major contributors to these losses.

A 2000 study called “Trading is Hazardous to Your Wealth: The Common Stock Investment Performance of Individual Investors” evaluated 66,465 U.S. households that held stocks from 1991 to 1996. The households that traded most averaged an 11.4% annual return during a period where the overall market gained 17.9%. These lower returns were attributed to overconfidence.

A 2014 paper (revised 2019) titled “Learning Fast or Slow?” analyzed the complete transaction history of the Taiwan Stock Exchange between 1992 and 2006. It looked at the ongoing performance of day traders in this sample, and found that 97% of day traders can expect to lose money from trading, and more than 90% of all day trading volume can be traced to investors who predictably lose money. Additionally, it tied the behavior of gamblers and drivers who get more speeding tickets to overtrading, and cited studies showing that legalized gambling has an inverse effect on trading volume.

A 2019 research study (revised 2020) called “Day Trading for a Living?” observed 19,646 Brazilian futures contract traders who started day trading from 2013 to 2015, and recorded two years of their trading activity. The study authors found that 97% of traders with more than 300 days actively trading lost money, and only 1.1% earned more than the Brazilian minimum wage ($16 USD per day). They hypothesized that the greater returns shown in previous studies did not differentiate between frequent day traders and those who traded rarely, and that more frequent trading activity decreases the chance of profitability.

These studies show the wide variance of the available data on day trading profitability. One thing that seems clear from the research is that most day traders lose money .

Millionaire Media 66 W Flagler St. Ste. 900 Miami, FL 33130 United States (888) 878-3621 This is for information purposes only as Millionaire Media LLC nor Timothy Sykes is registered as a securities broker-dealer or an investment adviser. No information herein is intended as securities brokerage, investment, tax, accounting or legal advice, as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund. Millionaire Media LLC and Timothy Sykes cannot and does not assess, verify or guarantee the adequacy, accuracy or completeness of any information, the suitability or profitability of any particular investment, or the potential value of any investment or informational source. The reader bears responsibility for his/her own investment research and decisions, should seek the advice of a qualified securities professional before making any investment, and investigate and fully understand any and all risks before investing. Millionaire Media LLC and Timothy Sykes in no way warrants the solvency, financial condition, or investment advisability of any of the securities mentioned in communications or websites. In addition, Millionaire Media LLC and Timothy Sykes accepts no liability whatsoever for any direct or consequential loss arising from any use of this information. This information is not intended to be used as the sole basis of any investment decision, nor should it be construed as advice designed to meet the investment needs of any particular investor. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future returns.

Citations for Disclaimer

Barber, Brad M. and Odean, Terrance, Trading is Hazardous to Your Wealth: The Common Stock Investment Performance of Individual Investors. Available at SSRN: “Day Trading for a Living?”

Barber, Brad M. and Lee, Yi-Tsung and Liu, Yu-Jane and Odean, Terrance and Zhang, Ke, Learning Fast or Slow? (May 28, 2019). Forthcoming: Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Available at SSRN: “https://ssrn.com/abstract=2535636”

Chague, Fernando and De-Losso, Rodrigo and Giovannetti, Bruno, Day Trading for a Living? (June 11, 2020). Available at SSRN: “https://ssrn.com/abstract=3423101”