[VSA] Volume Spread Analysis Part II

[BlowFish 10]

There's some pretty astute stuff there or so it seems to me.

[zeon 10]

Because you are in a downtrend from yesterday afternoon, and the market was weak with supply, an upthrust, and no demand on the 3-min chart.

 

You will think I sound like a broken record, but you must look at higher time frame charts. Again, what you thought you saw on the 3-min chart does not give the full picture of the structure of the market.

 

The attached chart is a 30-min chart which includes overnight data. The red arrow is where you wanted to go long. It is pretty clear we were in a downtrend all night long after putting in a lower high yesterday afternoon. The only relevant support around the open was yesterday's low. The lines drawn on your chart were illusory because of the limitations of the time frame.

 

When I look at support and resistance, I look for the obvious. I don't use Fibonacci numbers, pivots, MP value areas, etc. Some people seem to use these well, but I personally just keep it simple and think about nearby daily highs and lows and the hourly highs and lows, if relevant. If the day before had an especially active area (volume), I will note this too, as it may be tested today or tomorrow (and this is probably like MP). That's about all I do for S&R.

 

I also think about S&R as magnets. Traders will go and test these areas all the time. If I am short and there is an obvious support area nearby (like this AM), I look for a test of that support. The more obvious it is, the more confident I am about the target. If everyone can see it, they will usually go for it. Of course, I will buy support and sell resistance when it is appropriate to do so with confirmation whenever possible.

 

Hope this is helpful

 

Eiger

 

 

Yes it's helpful, but two things:

 

(a) I couldn't call it a selling climax if we weren't in a downtrend, so yes I noticed that, but selling climax & re-tests have to occur in a downtrend by definition.

 

(b) My line is about the same as yours around 1342. Indeed from yesterday's low, but that's also the high on the 19th. And when price breaks resistance this usually acts as support, so this was another reason for me to consider 1342 important support. I don't see it illusionary because it looks to me as if you've drawn the same line right?

 

I agree, S/R tend to be magnets. Which I why I take longs off support and shorts of resistance, I don't like trading in mid-air.

 

But 1342 seems to act as support after the open, price bounces off there. And then later on, I thought I noticed a re-test...

 

I'm not quite sure how the fact that we've been in a downtrend invalidates the setup though.

[Eiger 10]

FWIW, maybe this will help clarify.

 

This is what I do for Support and Resistance. I do the same thing on the daily and weekly charts. I update them every night, and keep the hourly on the screen all the time. It is part of VSA. Tom Williams in his book, the Undeclared Secrets, says us day traders would be well served by paying attention to the daily and weekly charts. Can you see the structure of the market and how the prior resistance at the 1336.50 area has become support and has acted like a magnant for this market today? I don't know if we will actually touch it, since volitility has dropped so low, but we are within a point or so of it. When you start to frame out the market like this, you will begin to see how much we trade around the daily highs and lows, and how the hourly and even weekly S & R become so important.

 

Eiger

[zeon 10]

FWIW, maybe this will help clarify.

 

This is what I do for Support and Resistance. I do the same thing on the daily and weekly charts. I update them every night, and keep the hourly on the screen all the time. It is part of VSA. Tom Williams in his book, the Undeclared Secrets, says us day traders would be well served by paying attention to the daily and weekly charts. Can you see the structure of the market and how the prior resistance at the 1336.50 area has become support and has acted like a magnant for this market today? I don't know if we will actually touch it, since volitility has dropped so low, but we are within a point or so of it. When you start to frame out the market like this, you will begin to see how much we trade around the daily highs and lows, and how the hourly and even weekly S & R become so important.

 

Eiger

 

Thanks, I see you take resistance as the upper line, I tend to define a zone. On your chart, this means I have support around 1358-1360. So at least I got that right then...

[Eiger 10]

So at least I got that right then...

 

You needn't be hard on yourself. This is a real challenge. As I said earlier, you know more than you may think you do.

 

A little psychology ...

 

Unlike most people, when a pro athlete discovers a limitation in her game, she's estatic. Why? Because now she has something concrete to work on to improve her game. Otherwise, she never knows, and never gets better. And she knows the discovery of limitations is more important than virtually anything else she can imagine. Once she identifies a current limitation, she can put together a plan to overcome that limitation. Believe me, if she is a serious athlete, she is out there every single day on whatever field she is playing on with her sincere intention to overcome her limitation, and working very, very hard at it. It takes great effort, but she knows that overcoming her limitation will give her a new asset in her game. This is why discovering her limitations is more vital than anything else. She knows it's the only way to improve her competitiveness and win more events.

 

Trading is a performance activity just like sport, it just doesn't include the physical. The more we learn about our limitations and develop a plan backed by sincere intentions, the more we can improve and overcome whatever challenge we face. Never call a limitation a weakness; it isn't. Never view a limitation as a critical comment about yourself; whatever limitation you have in trading has nothing to do with you as a person. Instead, view it with excitement, because now you can do something for yourself and get better .

 

Ok, back to trading ...

 

Use the higher time frames to give you a picture of the market in terms of trend, support & resistance. Then confirm your picture with the 30, 10 or 15 and 5 min charts. When something sets up, use the 5 or 3 min to trigger the trade.

 

Taking a trade because it looks attractive on the 3-min chart when everything else is going in the opposite direction is not generally a good idea. Our first job as traders is to protect our account so we can come back tomorrow and trade. So, look to take trades with the wind at your back; try not to fight the overall trend and tone of the market.

 

Hope this is helpful

 

Eiger

[jjthetrader 10]

Thanks, I see you take resistance as the upper line, I tend to define a zone. On your chart, this means I have support around 1358-1360. So at least I got that right then...

 

Zeon, would you mind posting the chart in here? I think I may have been looking at the wrong one of yours.

I think you may be putting a little too much attention on S&R. But if that's how you like to trade then posting over where DB is answering questions is your best bet.

 

For me S&R is sort of a side note. I'm aware of it but it's second always to price and volume activity. For example I don't want to jump in long if resistance is only 1 point away whether it looks like it's going to hold or break through. I take trades in the middle of nowhere sometimes because VSA is telling me to. The trade I posted today wasn't on any S&R, just reading price and volume.

[zeon 10]

Zeon, would you mind posting the chart in here? I think I may have been looking at the wrong one of yours.

I think you may be putting a little too much attention on S&R. But if that's how you like to trade then posting over where DB is answering questions is your best bet.

 

No problem, everybody can see my charts I'm just don't know which one you are refering to so I'll post all those I've posted elsewhere today here as well.

 

For me S&R is sort of a side note. I'm aware of it but it's second always to price and volume activity. For example I don't want to jump in long if resistance is only 1 point away whether it looks like it's going to hold or break through. I take trades in the middle of nowhere sometimes because VSA is telling me to. The trade I posted today wasn't on any S&R, just reading price and volume.

 

Ok, each to their own! Nothing wrong with that, but I prefer taking trades of S/R alone. Anything "in the middle of nowhere" has me spooked... I feel like I'm trading without anything to hang on to. Otoh, perhaps I'm clinging too much to S/R, I am indeed pretty lost without it

 

Attached charts:

ES_3 = support at 1342 from the previous day and also from overnight around 1344'ish

 

ES_4 = on the 19th, 1342 proved to be resistance. After we broke higher the next couple of days, we have returned to this area. So it should act as support. (R turning into S and the other way around)

 

ES_5 = why I see resistance at 1358-1360 (previous days)

 

ES_6 = my analysis of the selling climax and re-test

 

Feel free to comment.

[jjthetrader 10]

Hi Zeon, now that you've posted the chart, did you have a question.

One thing I noticed about the one with the SC is that you drew your Support from the bottom of the body of the candle. If you're looking for VSA setups then you may want to consider the whole bar. This may be out of alignment with candle people, I have no idea, but something to consider.

 

Eiger and I had support drawn at the same levels purely because these were floor trader pivots.

 

When trading in the 'middle of nowhere' your support is the background strength. Background strength with a nice test on a subsequent rally is a good place to go long even though it's not on support. In that case your support is lack of selling after a climax.

[zeon 10]

Hi Zeon, now that you've posted the chart, did you have a question.

One thing I noticed about the one with the SC is that you drew your Support from the bottom of the body of the candle. If you're looking for VSA setups then you may want to consider the whole bar. This may be out of alignment with candle people, I have no idea, but something to consider.

 

I'm sorry if this wasn't clear, but the 1342 level comes from the 19th and the previous day low. The fact that the 'selling climax bar' (sorry candle) closes above the line isn't a coincidence for me. It shows that traders are interested in keeping price above this level, hence the buying pressure that comes in. I'm not sure how this relates to VSA but I thought upthrust for example are a typical example of candles that spike outside the range, but close within.

 

Eiger and I had support drawn at the same levels purely because these were floor trader pivots.

 

Hmm... that must have been very coincidential then? Do you mean the classic pivots levels?

 

When trading in the 'middle of nowhere' your support is the background strength. Background strength with a nice test on a subsequent rally is a good place to go long even though it's not on support. In that case your support is lack of selling after a climax.

[Sledge 13]

FWIW, maybe this will help clarify.

 

This is what I do for Support and Resistance. I do the same thing on the daily and weekly charts. I update them every night, and keep the hourly on the screen all the time. It is part of VSA. Tom Williams in his book, the Undeclared Secrets, says us day traders would be well served by paying attention to the daily and weekly charts. Can you see the structure of the market and how the prior resistance at the 1336.50 area has become support and has acted like a magnant for this market today? I don't know if we will actually touch it, since volitility has dropped so low, but we are within a point or so of it. When you start to frame out the market like this, you will begin to see how much we trade around the daily highs and lows, and how the hourly and even weekly S & R become so important.

 

Eiger

 

I'd like to ask your opinion on Pivot Points if I may? Do you take the previous day bar and utilize its high/low/close to calculate pivots for the next day- IN ADDITION to having a weekly set of pivots?

 

So to simplify. On Saturday night you sit down and look at the Weekly Chart-you take the high/low/close from this prior week (Ending Close Friday) for the upcoming weeks pivot points (these would be your "wider net" pivots)

 

Then you sit down at EOD every day of your market and take High/low/close of DAILY chart and have those pivots set for next day?

 

Also there are about 4 common pivot "sets" out there- you use "Floor Pivots" then?

 

Thanks in advance!

Sledge

[Eiger 10]

And we do tag 1365.50, just like a magnet. I love this stuff

[Eiger 10]

I'd like to ask your opinion on Pivot Points if I may? Do you take the previous day bar and utilize its high/low/close to calculate pivots for the next day- IN ADDITION to having a weekly set of pivots?

 

So to simplify. On Saturday night you sit down and look at the Weekly Chart-you take the high/low/close from this prior week (Ending Close Friday) for the upcoming weeks pivot points (these would be your "wider net" pivots)

 

Then you sit down at EOD every day of your market and take High/low/close of DAILY chart and have those pivots set for next day?

 

Also there are about 4 common pivot "sets" out there- you use "Floor Pivots" then?

 

Thanks in advance!

Sledge

 

Hi Sledge,

 

I don't use pivots of any kind - sorry, I am a pretty plain vanilla, basic kinda guy . I just use the highs and lows on the daily and hourly, and note weekly S&R as well.

[Sledge 13]

Eiger-

So you don't use "pivot points" you just look at the weekly high/low and previous day high/low to gauge trades?

 

Ok, so if yesterday low was 1.999 and you see your trade right now heading towards 1.999 with increased volume you are anticipating a break through. If you see average volume, you are more on point to wait and see if this is your exit (a la bounce?)

 

Hoping to clarify what you use, as it seems to be simple- yet effective.

Thanks,

Sledge

[jjthetrader 10]

Eiger-

So you don't use "pivot points" you just look at the weekly high/low and previous day high/low to gauge trades?

 

Ok, so if yesterday low was 1.999 and you see your trade right now heading towards 1.999 with increased volume you are anticipating a break through. If you see average volume, you are more on point to wait and see if this is your exit (a la bounce?)

 

Hoping to clarify what you use, as it seems to be simple- yet effective.

Thanks,

Sledge

 

Hey Sledge, FX is a different beast. You'll get a feel for how much volume it will take to penetrate any resistance in your market. It's just like breakout volume. You get an idea if a breaout is legitimate by it's volume.

Don't forget about spread of the bars to. Increading volume heading toward resistance is going to signal a possible reversal if the spread is narrow. "End of a Rising Market".

 

I use normal floor trader pivots calculated on the previous days US session only. With FX there's that controversey over when to start calculating them. But you could do weekly and monthly fine.

 

Zeon, it was a close support point between the previous days low and the floor trader S1 for today. That's why Eirger and I appeared to have similar numbers.

[dandxg 10]

FWIW, maybe this will help clarify.

 

This is what I do for Support and Resistance. I do the same thing on the daily and weekly charts. I update them every night, and keep the hourly on the screen all the time. It is part of VSA. Tom Williams in his book, the Undeclared Secrets, says us day traders would be well served by paying attention to the daily and weekly charts. Can you see the structure of the market and how the prior resistance at the 1336.50 area has become support and has acted like a magnant for this market today? I don't know if we will actually touch it, since volitility has dropped so low, but we are within a point or so of it. When you start to frame out the market like this, you will begin to see how much we trade around the daily highs and lows, and how the hourly and even weekly S & R become so important.

 

Eiger

 

Eiger, thanks so much for posting that info on S/R. I have been working on coming up with a method of just trading VSA/PV when it comes into a "relevant" area of S/R. If you don't mind sharing do you place more weight on high and lows for a given time frame or the number of times an area has hit a certain area. For example, past price action could take out a trading zone by a few ticks and then fall back into the previous zone. Would you place more weight on that new high or the zone with many hits? Hopefully, my question makes sense. I would post a chart, but I am on relative's computer for a few days.

[Sledge 13]

 

I use normal floor trader pivots calculated on the previous days US session only. With FX there's that controversey over when to start calculating them. But you could do weekly and monthly fine.

 

JJ-

Do you tend to use the US session because that is when you personally take your trades?

Since I like to get at least part of the London session in my trades- would it be wise to calculate them as I posted? I dabbled with Pivot Points for a while and did have some success. Somewhere along the line they fell by the wayside with information gathering and trying of new ideas. Maybe it is time to re-implement them!

Sledge

[CandleWhisperer 10]

I honestly do not care what it's called - hammer, doji, spinning top (actually would probably be a spinning top more than a doji ) Point is, great trade there.

 

And it was easy - high volume bullish candle signal. I see all this stuff in this thread making trading so much more difficult than it needs to be IMO. There's one post asking if this was a trade and then another that says it was textbook... Well, if it was 'textbook' shouldn't it be obvious? I mean, there are some patterns that require discretion regardless of the trading method, but to call something 'textbook' would indicate to me it should be incredibly obvious.

 

Not sure what was so unreliable about a spinner that produced +8 for me... I don't know, for me, that's reliable enough. It moved approx. 13.5 pts from the close, so if that's not reliable enough, then yes, candles are not good for someone that must get more. It works for me as +8 is a nice trade.

 

My point was simple - to take something that took at least 3-4 pages of this thread to dissect that literally took about 1 minute analysis in the candlestick world. Result was the same - a long that worked well - but it did not require question after question to get there.

 

I guess I'm that voice that won't go away in this thread b/c I see so much effort being exerted here for the EXACT same thing that us candle traders are doing, yet it's as plain as day. In other words, I have yet to see ANY advantage that VSA provides that your standard candlestick analysis does not... Oh boy... here comes the hate mail now...

 

First, I would put Mark's white hammer pattern (Found on elitetrader) up against any of yours or Steve Nison's. The text book/internet patterns are not reliable.

 

Second, unreliable does not mean on trade can't make 8 pts. It means for every 8pt trade there are 10 2pt losses. Not very reliable in my book.

 

You still have not shown any understanding of the Price Action. Why?

 

As far as "text book" VSA, we are not all on the same level. Surely a newer trader will miss an idealized set up. Even a seasoned trader misses things every now and then. If you want to go this route, you can't say with certainty that was a hammer or a doji or a spinning top. And I bet if you put a poll on the candle thread you would get many different responses. By you definition, very little is text book where candles are concerned...........

[dandxg 10]

JJ-

Do you tend to use the US session because that is when you personally take your trades?

Since I like to get at least part of the London session in my trades- would it be wise to calculate them as I posted? I dabbled with Pivot Points for a while and did have some success. Somewhere along the line they fell by the wayside with information gathering and trying of new ideas. Maybe it is time to re-implement them!

Sledge

 

Sledge, for the longest time, about a year I used floor pivots for the ES and ER and they worked, but too often price just smoked through them without a pause. Part of problem I believe with using floor pivots is which one do you use? There are 5-6 formulas I believe.

 

I don't post this to rain on your parade by any means, I hope you have better luck with them than I have had in the last few months. Just some food for thought.

 

I do believe in using PDH and PDL and looking to supplement them with some other logical S/R areas. I have been tinkering with MP and to me the it makes sense because it based on PV which is what VSA is, but when the market gaps hard and its far from the previous day MP levels what to do then? This is what I find myself thinking. This is the reason for question above to Eiger about S/R.

[Eiger 10]

Eiger-

So you don't use "pivot points" you just look at the weekly high/low and previous day high/low to gauge trades?

 

 

Unbelievable, isn't it? I was just taught to use the actual price levels painted on the chart. These work so well that I never felt the need to use pivots.

 

 

Ok, so if yesterday low was 1.999 and you see your trade right now heading towards 1.999 with increased volume you are anticipating a break through. If you see average volume, you are more on point to wait and see if this is your exit (a la bounce?)

 

Remember, I am trading the S&Ps. Cable trends a lot; the S&Ps is more of a counter trend market. Most of the time I will have my exit just below/above the resistance or support as a target for an exit. I know there will be activity there and I want to get filled. If it goes through it and continues, I just wait for a retest of that area or a retracement, and if appropriate, reenter in the direction of the origninal trade. My worries are more about price not making it to the S/R level, which sometimes happens. JJ talked about what price and volume should look like on the approach, and as usual, he is spot on.

[CandleWhisperer 10]

What strikes me in a lot of these posts, is that pin-pointing the entry always seems fairly easy, but determining the target is hardly ever discussed. Perhaps you could tell us also a bit about where or when you would exit your long trade? Or what signals you'd be looking for to exit that trade? Thanks in advance.

 

 

Very good question. Thanks for it. I am afraid you will find my answer wanting however.

 

If you had asked my this as little as two weeks ago, I would of said I don't believe in price targets. I like to trail my stop and let the market take me out of a trade.

 

That is what I would of said then , today it is a bit different. Since I am a client of a particular site, I do not want to say anything about targets. I will give a hint: it is in a least 2 threads in this forum.

 

Even with that, I still like to simply trail my stop. I move my stop up based on the appearance of WRBs. This method is detailed by Mark in the WRB thread I believe.

 

By the way, Tom Williams says markets will trend further than one expects them too. So all the more reason to not expect and simply allow the market to do what it wants to do.

[BlowFish 10]

If price smokes through, just as if it smokes through any other line, it tells you something pretty important. Now if you get a climatic bar that pokes the pivot then closes back up followed by no supply a test etc etc you have a different story.

 

I favour the traditional pivot (h+l+c)/3 mainly as it's the one the world and his brother watches so there is an element of the self fulfilling. There is some inherent logic if you think about what that calculation actually represents. Hint: (H+L)/2 is yesterdays midpoint (somewhere else stuff often happens).

[Eiger 10]

Eiger, thanks so much for posting that info on S/R. I have been working on coming up with a method of just trading VSA/PV when it comes into a "relevant" area of S/R. If you don't mind sharing do you place more weight on high and lows for a given time frame or the number of times an area has hit a certain area. For example, past price action could take out a trading zone by a few ticks and then fall back into the previous zone. Would you place more weight on that new high or the zone with many hits? Hopefully, my question makes sense. I would post a chart, but I am on relative's computer for a few days.

 

Hi Dan,

I place the most emphasis on the daily highs and lows. The market will trade around these areas quite a bit. I don't really think too much about how many times price has hit a specific level in terms of weighting it more or less important (though obvious, major congestion areas are unlikely to be penetrated on the first try). Instead, I focus more on the tape action as price comes into one of these areas. I do not try to get the high or low tick if i am looking to sell resistance or buy support. I am more interested in taking a trade with confirmation than getting the very best price, so I am happy to wait for that confirmation. Usually, if I am focused on getting the very best price, i am ignoring something else that is important, and I always seem to pay a price for that.

 

What I do think about is when price breaks through a given level. Support and resistance are opposition. When price breaks through the opposition, the odds are very good that it will continue in the direction of the break through. I am then looking for weak rallies or reactions to take a trade in the direction of the break through. Those are high odds trades. And, if the market gods are favoring me that day, price will come back to test the opposition area .

 

Wyckoff originally talked about this using the analogy of dams. He said that engineers don't build dams right next to one another. So when the dam breaks, there isn't another dam right behind it to hold back the water. Same with price. Once it breaks through the opposition, you can anticipate continuation.

 

Eiger

[jjthetrader 10]

Sledge, for the longest time, about a year I used floor pivots for the ES and ER and they worked, but too often price just smoked through them without a pause.

 

This is true dandxg.......sometimes. The thing with the ES is there was a time when it would never respect them and then six months later it starts bouncing right off them. It's the nature of the evolving beast and as such you always want to put price and volume ahead of anything. You can't just play John Carter's 'pivot plays' willy nilly.

I like to have them up there to see if they're going to be respected as this gives you a bit of an indication of sentiment.

 

 

Sledge, I don't have any good answers for for when to start your pivots session. Some say 12-12, others 2:30 EST. I think Mark fisher has some info on this in regard to FX. BUT Eiger uses true pivots which are highs and lows so I would suggest having a look at Eigers method first.

[jjthetrader 10]

Hi Dan,

 

Wyckoff originally talked about this using the analogy of dams. He said that engineers don't build dams right next to one another. So when the dam breaks, there isn't another dam right behind it to hold back the water. Same with price. Once it breaks through the opposition, you can anticipate continuation.

 

Eiger

 

Nice analogy! You had another good analogy earlier about an athlete. I think all these are great when forming an image of the flow of the market and of the workings, inner workings, of a trader.

[Seb Manby 11]

Dow is showing weakness after the FED cut rates, this shows that the Specialist's took the opportunity to distribute stock they had bought from the public at the lows at around 11800 level, rarely at a loss to themselves of course.

 

Point A, up bar with the high lower than the previous high, and look at the volume! remember that markets do not like high volume on upbars, unless tested immediately.

 

Point B, there is a test and all looks rosy and looking strong at this point.

 

C, A down bar after a test, this is weakness, well this bar says it all, I can now look forward to lower prices, look for a 'No demand' into the 12600 level to confirm the downtrend. And don't forget to post your short trades for all to study.

 

Regards S