The two minutes before data matter more than the two after

[Amanhasnoname]

Plenty of scalpers wait for the release, then jump in. By then the interesting part of the spread story is already over. The sequence on a typical high-impact release looks like this: liquidity providers start pulling quotes or widening a minute or two before the print, the spread drifts from 0.6 to maybe 1.5 or 2, then at the release it can jump far higher for a few seconds, and then it collapses back toward normal within a minute or so. Details change by broker and event.

The trap is the minute before. Price looks calm, ranges shrink, and mean-reversion setups seem perfect. That calm is partly an artefact of thin books and wide quotes. Entering there means paying more spread than usual for a move that has a real chance of being cut in half by the release.

Pulling up a tick chart or a spread log for the last ten releases on your pair is more useful than any general rule. Look at three timestamps: T minus 120 seconds, T minus 10 seconds, and T plus 60 seconds. Compare spread at each.

For most scalping styles the cleanest policy is to be flat or inactive from two minutes before until at least a minute after.

Which release type, NFP, CPI or central bank, gives you the ugliest spread behaviour, and for how long?