ICT Judas Swing: How to Trade the False Move of the Day

ICT Judas swing explained: the false move after the midnight or session open, how to spot it, the entry after the reversal and when to skip it.

LSG Club · 25 October 2026 · 14 min read

The ICT Judas swing is the false move early in the trading day: after the New York midnight open or a session open, price runs one side of the range against the day’s real direction, takes the liquidity resting there, then reverses and delivers the true move. It is the manipulation phase of the day, and the reason so many breakout trades fail in the first hours of London. This guide from the LSG Club journal for logging Judas swing days explains how to spot a Judas swing, when to enter after the reversal, where the stop and targets go, and when to leave the day alone.

In short: decide the daily bias first, mark the midnight open and the Asian range, wait for price to trade to the “wrong” side of the open and sweep a clear level, and only act after a displaced market structure shift back in the direction of your bias. A Judas swing judged before the shift is just a move against you.

What is the ICT Judas swing?

Michael J. Huddleston (Inner Circle Trader) uses the term Judas swing for a short, deceptive price run near the start of the day. On a day that will close higher, price first drops below the opening price to make the day’s low. On a day that will close lower, price first rallies above the open to make the day’s high. The early run looks like a trend, triggers stops on the other side, then fails.

The Judas swing does not predict anything on its own. It is a way of reading the open: if you already have a reason to expect a bullish day, an early drop through a known low is not a reason to sell; it is the place where the low of the day may be forming.

Why ICT calls it a Judas swing

The name refers to betrayal. The move appears to show the direction of the day and then reverses against everyone who believed it.

Bullish and bearish Judas swing

Bullish Judas swing — on a day with a bullish bias, price trades below the midnight open, runs sell-side liquidity (the Asian low, an equal low, the previous session low), then shifts structure upward. The Judas low often becomes the low of the day.
Bearish Judas swing — on a day with a bearish bias, price trades above the midnight open, runs buy-side liquidity (the Asian high, equal highs, the previous session high), then shifts structure downward. The Judas high often becomes the high of the day.

Judas swing, Power of 3 and the market maker model

The Judas swing is the middle part of ICT’s Power of 3, also called AMD: accumulation, manipulation, distribution. Accumulation is the quiet range around midnight and the Asian session; manipulation is the Judas swing that raids one side of that range; distribution is the expansion toward the real target. The Power of 3 trading strategy covers all three phases and their timing; here the focus is only on the false move and how to trade after it.

The ICT market maker model describes a similar raid on a larger scale: price engineers liquidity on one side of the curve, reverses at a higher-timeframe array and returns through the same prices. Treat the Judas swing as the intraday version of that raid. A bullish Judas swing is more trustworthy on the buy side of a higher-timeframe buy model.

Mechanically, the sweep inside a Judas swing is a liquidity sweep: a run through resting stops that fails to hold. What makes it a Judas swing is the context: it happens near the open, against the daily bias, and it sets the extreme of the day.

The reference points: midnight open and session opens

The New York midnight open

ICT anchors the true day to the opening price at 00:00 New York time, not to your broker’s daily candle open. Draw a horizontal line at that price every day. On a bullish day you want to buy below it; on a bearish day you want to sell above it. A Judas swing that never reaches the wrong side of the midnight open is weak evidence, because price has not actually traded against the bias relative to the day’s open.

Midnight in New York is 04:00 UTC while the US is on daylight saving time and 05:00 UTC in winter. If you are not in New York, the Kill Zone time converter shows the midnight open and the Kill Zones in your own time zone.

The London and New York opens

In ICT’s convention the London Kill Zone runs 02:00–05:00 New York time and the New York AM Kill Zone 07:00–10:00. The London Kill Zone is the classic window for the Judas swing: price raids the Asian high or low and reverses. On some days London is itself the expansion, and the New York open produces a second, smaller Judas swing against the London move before the trend resumes. The forex session times guide lists when each session opens in UTC and New York time throughout the year.

Midnight open — the line that defines the “wrong side” for the day.
Asian high and low — the most common target of a London Judas swing.
Previous day high and low — larger pools that a stronger Judas swing can reach.
Equal highs or lows near the open — obvious stops that make an attractive raid.

Daily bias decides which side is the Judas

The same early drop is a bullish Judas swing on one day and the start of a sell-off on another. The only thing that separates them before the reversal is the bias you wrote down in advance. The ICT daily bias tutorial walks through the routine: the higher-timeframe draw on liquidity, premium and discount, the previous day’s high and low, and the price that invalidates the read.

For the Judas swing you need the result as one sentence, for example: “Bearish today, the draw is the previous day low, and I want a raid above the midnight open or the Asian high first.” If you cannot write that sentence, there is no Judas swing to trade, only moves.

How to identify a Judas swing step by step

Write the daily bias and the draw on liquidity before midnight New York time.
Mark the midnight open, the Asian high and low, the previous day high and low and any equal highs or lows nearby.
Wait for price to trade to the wrong side of the midnight open: below it for a bullish bias, above it for a bearish bias.
Watch for a sweep of a clear level on that side, ideally inside the London or New York AM Kill Zone, and ideally into a higher-timeframe array such as an H1 or H4 fair value gap or order block.
Look for rejection: the run stalls, wicks back through the swept level or prints a sharp reversal candle.
Confirm with a displaced market structure shift on M5 or M1 back in the direction of the bias, a body close through the last short-term swing that left a fair value gap behind it.
Mark the entry zone the displacement created, the Judas extreme as invalidation, and the targets on the other side of the range.

Steps 5 and 6 are where most traders cut corners. A sweep without a shift is not a confirmed Judas swing: price can keep running in the same direction and turn your bias into a losing trade. The market structure shift guide explains how to tell a real shift from a small pullback.

Entry, stop and target after the reversal

Entry

Most ICT traders do not enter on the shift candle itself. They wait for price to retrace into the fair value gap or order block created by the displacement and enter there with a limit order. That keeps the stop shorter and the reward-to-risk better.

Stop

The natural invalidation is the extreme of the Judas swing: below the Judas low for a long, above the Judas high for a short, plus a small buffer for spread. If price returns through that extreme, the read was wrong; the move was not false after all. Size the position from that distance, not from a fixed lot. The position size calculator does the arithmetic for your account and instrument.

Targets

First target — the opposite side of the Asian range, often the place to take partial profit.
Main target — the draw on liquidity from your daily bias, usually the previous day high or low.

Worked example: a bearish Judas swing on GBPUSD

The prices below are made up to show the logic and the arithmetic. Assume a $10,000 account risking 1% per trade, so $100 is at stake, and roughly $10 per pip per standard lot on GBPUSD.

The setup

The daily chart is bearish and the draw on liquidity is the previous day low at 1.2655. The midnight open is 1.2720. During the Asian session price ranges between 1.2706 and 1.2731. The plan is to sell above the midnight open after a raid on the Asian high, with an H1 fair value gap at 1.2740–1.2750 as the area where the rally may stall.

Sweep, shift and entry

In the London Kill Zone price rallies to 1.2748, 28 pips above the midnight open and 17 pips through the Asian high, reaching into the H1 gap. Breakout buyers join, and stops above 1.2731 are filled. Then a sequence of large bearish M5 candles closes through the last short-term higher low at 1.2722, leaving a fair value gap between 1.2730 and 1.2736. That is the shift. You place a sell limit at 1.2733, inside the gap and still above the midnight open, with the stop at 1.2753, five pips above the Judas high. The risk is 20 pips, so the size is $100 ÷ (20 × $10) = 0.5 lots.

Targets and the losing case

The first target is the Asian low at 1.2706, 27 pips away or 1.35R; taking half off there locks in about $67. The main target is the previous day low at 1.2655, 78 pips from entry or 3.9R. If price instead trades back to 1.2753 before either target, the loss is $100: the rally was not a Judas swing but the start of a move higher, and the stop said so at a defined cost.

Variations of the Judas swing

London Judas swing — the classic version: a raid on the Asian high or low between 02:00 and 05:00 New York time, followed by the London expansion.
New York Judas swing — when London has already moved in the bias direction, the New York open can pull back against it, sweep the London session low or high and resume. Treat it as a second chance, not a reason to fade London.
Weekly Judas swing — on the weekly candle, an early-week move (often Monday or Tuesday) against the weekly direction that forms the weekly high or low. The ICT weekly profiles article covers those shapes.
Judas into a reversal pattern — when the sweep runs a pair of equal highs or lows and fails, the same move is often described as a Turtle Soup; the ICT Turtle Soup pattern guide focuses on that specific variant.

When to skip the Judas swing

No written bias — if the higher timeframes disagree, you cannot know which side the false move should be on.
High-impact news in the window — a release at 08:30 New York can create its own raid and reverse a clean setup; entries close to it need a separate plan or none.
The move never reaches the wrong side of the midnight open — there has been no real manipulation relative to the true day.
The Asian range is already huge — when Asia has expanded strongly, London often continues instead of reversing.
No displacement after the sweep — a slow drift back through the level is not a shift and fails often.

Common Judas swing mistakes

Calling every early move a Judas swing in hindsight and building a bias around it after the reversal has already happened.
Fading the move before the shift: selling into a rally only because “it should be the Judas”. The rally can be the real trend.
Ignoring the midnight open and using the broker’s daily open, which can sit hours away from the ICT reference.
Placing the stop inside the Judas swing instead of beyond its extreme, so a final wick takes you out before the reversal.
Chasing the expansion after missing the retracement, with a stop that is twice as wide as the plan allowed.

Judas swing checklist

Daily bias and draw on liquidity written before midnight New York time.
Midnight open, Asian range, previous day high and low marked.
Price traded to the wrong side of the midnight open.
A clear liquidity level was swept, ideally inside a Kill Zone and into a higher-timeframe array.
Displaced market structure shift back in the bias direction, with a fair value gap or order block left behind.
Limit entry in that gap, stop beyond the Judas extreme, size from the stop distance.
Targets: opposite side of the Asian range first, then the draw on liquidity; at least 2R to the main target.
No high-impact release inside the trade window, or a written plan for it.

If any line is missing, the day is a no-trade day for this model. Trading involves risk and a confirmed Judas swing still loses regularly; practise the routine on a demo account first and keep the risk per trade small.

Log your Judas swing days

The fastest way to learn whether the Judas swing works for you is to log every day you prepared for it, including the days you skipped. Record the bias, which side the false move was on, which level it swept, the session, whether there was a shift, and the result in R. After forty or fifty days you will see whether London or New York Judas swings pay better and whether your skip rules save money. An ICT trading journal that shows each trade on a real chart makes that review practical.

FAQ

What is a Judas swing in ICT?

A Judas swing is ICT’s term for the false move near the start of the day: price runs the liquidity on one side of the range, against the day’s real direction, then reverses and delivers the true move. On a bullish day it is the early drop that forms the low; on a bearish day it is the early rally that forms the high.

What time does the ICT Judas swing happen?

Most often between midnight and 05:00 New York time, with the London Kill Zone (02:00–05:00 New York) as the classic window. A second Judas swing can form around the New York open, 07:00–10:00 New York time. In UTC the times shift by one hour with US daylight saving.

Is the Judas swing the same as the manipulation in Power of 3?

Yes. In ICT’s Power of 3 (AMD), the Judas swing is the manipulation phase between accumulation and distribution. The term Judas swing emphasises the deceptive nature of the move and its timing near the open.

How do I enter after a Judas swing?

Wait for a displaced market structure shift back in the direction of your daily bias, then enter on the retracement into the fair value gap or order block that the shift created, with the stop beyond the Judas extreme. Entering before the shift means trading against the market on a guess.

Does the Judas swing work on gold and indices?

The idea applies to any market with a clear opening reference and liquidity on both sides of the range, so ICT traders use it on forex, gold and index futures. Index futures often show theirs around the 09:30 New York equity open.