# ICT Turtle Soup: Fading a Liquidity Sweep · DT Academy > Turtle soup explained: Connors and Raschke's Street Smarts rule, how ICT uses the name, and how to tell a failed break from a real one. [Back to ICT Concepts](https://www.thedtterminal.com/academy/courses/ict-concepts) Lesson 11Turtle soup: fading a liquidity sweep Chapters done # Turtle soup: fading a liquidity sweep Lesson 11 · 6 min read · By DT Terminal Trade the failed break of an old high or low. The setup comes from Connors and Raschke's Street Smarts (1995); ICT uses the name loosely. Unlock the full lesson in the app Worked examples, the quiz and the interactive tools are in the app. Free account. [Continue in the app, free](https://www.thedtterminal.com/login?signup=true&redirect=%2Fjournal%2Facademy%2Fict-turtle-soup) Chapter 1 of 7 ## Where the name comes from **Turtle soup** is a reversal trade after price breaks an old high or low, takes the liquidity resting there, and **fails to hold beyond it**. **It is not an ICT invention.** The name comes from Laurence Connors and Linda Bradford Raschke's book *Street Smarts* (1995). It pokes fun at the Turtles, traders who followed a 20-day breakout system: turtle soup **trades the breakouts that fail**. ICT later borrowed the name for his own liquidity-sweep reversals. This lesson gives you both versions, so you can test each as a written rule. **Credit the source.** Turtle soup is Connors and Raschke's setup, from 1995. ICT uses their name for a looser, discretionary version. Chapter 2 of 7 ## The original rule The Street Smarts buy rule, on daily bars, as the course research summarises it: 1. Today makes a **new 20-day low**. 2. The prior 20-day low is **at least 4 sessions old**. 3. An **entry stop** sits back above the old low, so you are only filled if price trades back up through it. The entry stop is the clever part: **you never buy the break, only its failure**, once price is back above the level. Upside down, the same idea fades a failed new 20-day high. Example 1 below follows these steps on sample gold. Any stop or target beyond the entry is your own rule. Chapter 3 of 7 ## How ICT uses the name ICT uses "turtle soup" for **any liquidity sweep of an obvious old high or low**: buy-side liquidity above highs, sell-side liquidity below lows, as in [Liquidity the ICT way](https://www.thedtterminal.com/academy/ict-liquidity). The basics of sweeps are in [Day 13, liquidity](https://www.thedtterminal.com/academy/liquidity). | | Street Smarts | ICT use | | --- | --- | --- | | The level | The prior 20-day low or high | Any obvious old high or low: a session low, the previous day’s high, equal lows | | The trigger | An entry stop back through the old level | A **close back inside**, usually with a market structure shift | | Timeframe | Daily bars | Any timeframe | | Rules | Fixed and written | Discretionary | **Discretion is where the risk is.** A rule you can write down, like the original, is a rule you can test. The ICT use only becomes testable once you **write your own version of each row**. Chapter 4 of 7 ## Failed, or still breaking Every turtle soup starts as a break that looks real. **Only what happens next** tells them apart. Turtle soup ### A failed break, against one still breaking - The old low or high - Bullish shift - Bearish shift A liquidity sweep of an old low faded with a long A liquidity sweep of an old high faded with a short Turtle soup breaks the old low, closes back above it Liquidity sweep, then shift the ICT use: then a close above the last lower high Still breaking no close back above yet: too early to fade Real break closes below and keeps going **The top two rows are setups. The bottom two are not.** A break that is still closing beyond the level has not failed, and a real break never does. Schematic candles, not market data. The old high column is the old low column turned upside down. Chapter 5 of 7 ## The original rule, worked Sample candles, not a real session. Worked example ### Example 01: `XAUUSD` D1: the Street Smarts rule The worked example, with every number walked through, is in the app. [Continue in the app, free](https://www.thedtterminal.com/login?signup=true&redirect=%2Fjournal%2Facademy%2Fict-turtle-soup%3Fsection%3Dexamples%23examples) Free account **Step by step** The lowest low of the last 20 sessions is 3,962.40, made 11 sessions earlier, so it passes the 4-session test. A day trades down to 3,951.80, a new 20-day low. The next day trades back up through the buy stop, filling the order, and closes at 3,978.40. With a stop just under the new low, at 3,950.80, the risk is 11.600 per ounce. This is an illustration, not a trade to take. Chapter 6 of 7 ## The ICT version, worked Sample candles, not a real session, in New York time (EDT). Worked example ### Example 02: `GBPUSD` M15: a liquidity sweep of the London low, ICT style The worked example, with every number walked through, is in the app. [Continue in the app, free](https://www.thedtterminal.com/login?signup=true&redirect=%2Fjournal%2Facademy%2Fict-turtle-soup%3Fsection%3Dict-example%23ict-example) Free account **Step by step** The old low forms at 03:30 during the London session. The 08:45 liquidity sweep reaches 1.27020 and closes back above at 1.27190. The 09:30 candle closes at 1.27440, above the last lower high of 1.27380. New York and London change their clocks on different dates, so for about three weeks a year the London open lands an hour later on a New York clock. Chapter 7 of 7 ## Fading too early, and testing it The classic mistake is **fading a breakout before it has failed**, while price still closes below the old low. Stops cluster beyond obvious highs and lows, and triggering them can speed a move up: **a fast run through the level, not a reversal**. So test both versions on the same market, and **log the breaks that kept going too**. Replay old lows bar by bar Replay a few months of `XAUUSD` on D1, marking each new 20-day low and whether price traded back through the old one. Make the failure a written condition Add a During Trading rule such as "No fade until a candle closes back inside the old level". An early entry then counts as a broken rule. **Go deeper** The evidence on stops comes from research by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York: stops cluster beyond obvious highs and lows, and triggering them can speed a move up. **It does not say the run will reverse.** Test the original entry stop against the ICT close-and-shift version. In the replay, check each old low's age, and note whether price traded back through it within the next session. Then try the ICT version on M15. 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