Reading Order Flow & the Tape (Basics)
The tape is the live record of every trade and the resting orders around it. A retail-friendly intro to what order flow can — and can't — tell you.
Most traders watch a candlestick chart, which tells you where price has been. Order flow is the layer underneath: the live stream of trades actually printing right now (the time-and-sales, often called "the tape") and the orders resting just above and below the current price (the order book, or depth of market). It's the difference between reading a summary after the fact and watching the transactions happen.
This is a deep, specialist discipline used heavily by scalpers and futures day-traders. You do not need to master it to trade well. But understanding the basics helps you read why price stalls or accelerates, and — more usefully — it explains why your fills cost what they cost.
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