An oscillator that smooths price three times with an exponential moving average and then reads the rate of change of the result. Short-term noise is stripped away by three successive filters; what remains is the momentum of the momentum of the momentum.
TRIX (Triple Smoothed Exponential Average) was introduced by Jack Hutson in the pages of Technical Analysis of Stocks and Commodities during the 1980s. The indicator applies an exponential moving average (EMA) to price three times in succession, then takes the rate of change of the resulting series — distilling an extremely low-frequency reading of "momentum within momentum within momentum."
The final value oscillates around zero, with centreline crosses signalling shifts in trend. Because the series passes through three layers of smoothing, almost all short-term jitter is removed; the signals it produces are few, but each one carries weight.
The standard parameter is 15. As with MACD, TRIX is often paired with its own EMA — a "signal line" overlaid on the indicator — to provide an earlier secondary cue.
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