Tools / 03 Flow
Delta, volume, bid and ask, the VWAP, your levels, all at the same time while price moves. Reading a footprint live is one of the hardest things in trading. The study reads it for you and names what happens inside each bar.
5:38
Several patterns often stack on the same bar. In the video, price comes back to retest the VWAP and that single bar carries six: SEQUENCE_VOL (bid volume growing at five levels in a row), SINGLE_PR (rejected at the extreme), OVER_TENSION, TRANS, DIV_VOL and DIV_DELTA.
Try to see all of this while you trade. The study shows it right away.
Patterns appear live on the current bar. When the bar closes they are locked: what you see after the close never changes, so a replay shows exactly what was there live.
Your plan is to sell a pullback on the composite. Price breaks out, comes back to test it. You arrive on your level and look at the footprint: a divergence, a TRANS, a RAMP4 with negative delta, a TRANS_PLUS. On the bars that matter, at the levels that matter, the study stacks up the evidence.
When price leaves the composite: SINGLE_PR, NOBUYER, OVER_TENSION, TRANS_PLUS. Traders bought, price barely moved up, and they probably had to sell right there.
Bullish labels sit below the bar, bearish labels above. The full rule and its thresholds are in the study description in Sierra Chart.
| Label | What it means |
|---|---|
| Delta | |
| FLIP | The previous bar's delta was on one side, this bar's delta is clearly on the other. |
| DIV_DELTA | New low (high), but the delta does not follow and the bar closes near its opposite end. |
| TRANS | The delta improves over 3 bars and turns to the label side on this bar. |
| TRANS_PLUS | The delta turned on the previous bar and keeps accelerating. |
| OVER_TENSION | 3 bars of rising (falling) delta, the last one much stronger than the one before. |
| RAMP3 / RAMP4 | 3 or 4 bars in a row with the delta getting stronger in the same direction. |
| SURGE | After an opposite-delta bar, the delta suddenly grows for 3 bars. |
| SLOWDOWN | 3 bars of shrinking delta on the same side: the aggressive side is fading. |
| Volume at the extremes | |
| SINGLE_PR | Almost nothing traded at the extreme, much more on the next level: price was rejected right away. |
| SEQUENCE_VOL | From the low (high), aggressive volume grows at every price level, five levels in a row or more. |
| RATIO_B | Volume on the 2nd level vs the extreme. A ratio of 30 means the interest simply stopped at the last price. |
| BURST | Sudden aggressive volume on the level next to the extreme compared with the rest of the bar. |
| TAIL | A short block of opposite delta at the extreme: traders trapped at the low (high). |
| STACK_ABS | Heavy selling (buying) on the 3 levels next to the low (high), but the extreme holds: passive orders absorb. |
| CLUSTER_FAIL | A cluster of aggressive selling (buying) at the low (high) that fails to extend the move. |
| NOBUYER / NOSELLER | The aggressive side is exhausted at the extreme: nobody wants to buy up here (sell down here). |
| DIV_VOL | New low (high) on strong volume, with little extension and a close near the opposite end. |
A divergence doesn't mean you have to sell, and a Ratio B of 114 doesn't mean you have to buy.
The study tells you what is happening inside the bar. The decision is yours.
A label in the middle of nowhere is noise. On your level, it is evidence.