CBDR: Central Bank Dealers Range
Also known as: CBDR, dealers range, central bank dealer range, CBDR standard deviations
What is it?
The Central Bank Dealers Range, or CBDR, is the high-to-low price range a currency pair forms between roughly 14:00 and 20:00 New York time — the quiet window after the London close and before Asia gets going. ICT traders measure that range and then project multiples of it above and below, using those projections to anticipate how far the coming session's expansion might travel. The logic is that a genuinely quiet, low-participation window gives you a clean read on the market's current baseline volatility, and that the next session's move tends to expand out of it by a fairly consistent number of range-widths.
The projections mark where an expansion is likely to run out of room, not levels price must respect. A CBDR wider than about 40 pips makes them meaningless.
The standard practice is to take the CBDR high and low, then plot two, three and four standard deviations of that width in both directions; those projections become the areas where an expansion is expected to stall rather than exact price targets. Quality control matters here: the technique is generally treated as reliable only when the range is narrow — under about 40 pips on a major FX pair — because a wide CBDR means the window was not actually quiet, so the baseline it measures is contaminated and the projections spread far too wide to be useful. Concretely, a EUR/USD CBDR from 1.0860 to 1.0888 is 28 pips; three deviations project roughly 1.0972 above and 1.0776 below, and a trader would watch for the London session's expansion to run out somewhere near those.
Everything about this is a probabilistic guide built on an observed tendency, not a rule the market owes you.
Why it matters: It turns a quiet six-hour window into a measured expectation of how far the next session can realistically expand, so targets stop being guesswork.
CBDR projection = CBDR high (or low) ± (n x CBDR range width), typically n = 2, 3, 4
It frames realistic session targets and stall zones, but gives no entry trigger or direction by itself.
Real-world example
EUR/USD forms a 28-pip CBDR between 1.0860 and 1.0888; three deviations project roughly 1.0972 and 1.0776 as the zones where the London expansion may run out.
How SignalBots handles it
SignalBots signals arrive time-stamped in UTC with their target levels, so you can check an entry against the session projections you have already mapped for the day. See /risk-warning.
Pro tip
Discard the reading entirely when the range is wide rather than stretching the projections — a contaminated CBDR produces confident-looking levels that are simply noise.
Common pitfalls
Trading the projected deviation levels as if they were support and resistance, when they are estimates of where expansion may exhaust, not levels price must respect.
Frequently asked questions
What exact hours define the CBDR?
Roughly 14:00 to 20:00 New York time, which is 19:00 to 01:00 UTC during US Eastern Standard Time. Practitioners vary the window slightly, so pick one definition and stay consistent rather than switching to fit the outcome.
Why does a narrow range matter so much?
The method assumes the window was genuinely quiet, so its width represents baseline volatility. A wide CBDR means real activity occurred, the baseline is inflated, and the projections spread so far they stop being informative.
How is CBDR different from the Asian range?
The Asian range typically covers the Tokyo session itself, while the CBDR sits earlier, in the gap after New York and before Asia. They overlap in purpose — measuring a quiet baseline — but cover different clock windows.
Which pairs does it work on?
It is applied mainly to major FX pairs with genuine liquidity across sessions, such as EUR/USD and GBP/USD. On thin crosses or exotics the quiet window is erratic enough that the baseline reading means little.
Is CBDR a complete trading strategy?
No. It supplies context and possible target zones only, with no direction, entry or stop. Combined with a directional framework it can shape targets, but it removes no risk and your capital remains at risk. See /risk-warning.
Trading involves substantial risk of loss. Historical and backtested results do not guarantee future performance. Read the full risk warning.
