Definition
Acceptance
Market behavior showing price is being sustained or traded comfortably around a new area.
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Trading indicator glossary
Short, practical definitions for the vocabulary traders run into while installing, testing, and comparing tools.
Definitions
Plain-English trading and platform terms
Definition
Alert Condition
The exact rule or event that triggers an indicator alert.
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Anchored VWAP
A VWAP calculation that starts from a chosen event, bar, or session point instead of resetting automatically every session.
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ATR
Average true range, a volatility measure often used for stops and position sizing.
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Backtest
A test of a trading idea using historical market data.
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Balance Area
A price zone where the market spends time trading back and forth rather than expanding directionally.
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Bid-Ask Spread
The difference between the highest bid and lowest ask at a given moment.
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Breakeven Stop
A stop adjustment that moves risk close to the entry price after a trade has moved favorably.
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Breakout
A move through a prior range, level, or structural boundary that suggests expansion.
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Candlestick Chart
A chart style that shows open, high, low, and close for each bar using a candle body and wicks.
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Commission
A fee charged by a broker or platform for executing trades.
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Confirmation Bar
A later bar that validates a pattern, swing, or setup condition.
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Confluence
The overlap of multiple useful factors at the same price area or decision point.
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Cumulative Delta
A running total of delta used to show the ongoing balance of aggressive buying and selling.
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Delta
The difference between buying volume executed at the ask and selling volume executed at the bid.
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Deviation Bands
Bands plotted around a reference line, often VWAP, to show how stretched price is relative to recent behavior.
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Donchian Channel
A channel built from the highest high and lowest low over a chosen lookback period.
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Drawdown
The decline from a peak in account equity, balance, or strategy performance.
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EasyLanguage
TradeStation's scripting language for custom indicators, strategies, and chart studies.
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EMA
Exponential moving average, a moving average that gives more weight to recent prices.
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Expectancy
The average amount a strategy is expected to make or lose per trade over time.
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Extended Hours
Trading activity that happens outside the main regular session.
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False Breakout
A breakout attempt that fails to hold beyond a level and returns back into the prior range.
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Fibonacci Retracement
A set of percentage levels used to frame pullbacks between swing points.
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Footprint Chart
A chart style that shows bid-ask volume or traded volume inside each bar.
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Gap
A price difference between one period's close and the next period's open or initial trade.
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Heat Map
A visual display that uses color intensity to show concentration or strength of activity.
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Higher Time Frame Levels
Daily, weekly, monthly, or session levels projected onto lower-time-frame charts.
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Imbalance
A meaningful difference between buying and selling activity at a price or across a bar.
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Inside Bar
A bar whose high is lower than the previous bar's high and whose low is higher than the previous bar's low.
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Limit Order
An order that sets the worst acceptable price for entry or exit.
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Liquidity
How easily a market can absorb orders without causing large price changes.
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Lookback Period
The number of bars or units of history an indicator uses for its calculations.
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Market Order
An order that prioritizes immediate execution over a guaranteed price.
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Market Replay
A simulation mode that replays historical market activity so traders can test behavior as it unfolded.
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Market Structure
The sequence of swings, highs, lows, and trend transitions that traders use to organize a chart.
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Mean Reversion
A trading idea based on price moving back toward a central reference after stretching away from it.
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Moving Average
A smoothed average of price values used to show trend direction or general market bias.
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MQL4
The MetaTrader 4 programming language used to build custom indicators and expert advisors.
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MQL5
The MetaTrader 5 programming language for indicators, scripts, and automated systems.
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MultiCharts PowerLanguage
The EasyLanguage-style scripting language used by MultiCharts for custom studies and signals.
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NinjaScript
NinjaTrader's scripting framework for custom indicators, strategies, and chart tools.
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NinjaTrader Import
The platform process used to install NinjaScript ZIP packages into NinjaTrader.
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Opening Range
The high and low formed during a defined early-session window.
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Optimization
The process of adjusting parameters to improve a strategy or indicator's historical performance.
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Order Flow
The study of how aggressive buyers and sellers are interacting in real time.
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Outside Bar
A bar whose high is higher than the previous bar's high and whose low is lower than the previous bar's low.
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Overfitting
When a strategy or indicator is tuned too closely to historical data and loses robustness.
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Pine Script
TradingView's scripting language for custom indicators and strategies.
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Pivot Points
Calculated support and resistance levels derived from prior-session price data.
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Position Sizing
The process of deciding how many shares, contracts, or units to trade based on risk and account size.
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Pullback
A temporary move against the prevailing direction of a market swing or trend.
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Range Bar
A price-based bar that forms when price moves a defined amount, regardless of elapsed time.
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Regular Trading Hours
The primary daytime trading session defined by an exchange or charting template.
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Rejection
Price behavior showing the market is unwilling to sustain trade at a certain area.
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Renko Bars
Price-based bars that form after a defined move rather than after a fixed amount of time.
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Repainting
When an indicator changes its signals or values after the bar or historical context has already passed.
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Resistance Zone
A price area where sellers may become more active than usual.
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Risk-Reward Ratio
The relationship between what a trader stands to lose and what they stand to gain on a trade.
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Rotation
Back-and-forth price movement within a range or around a reference area.
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Scaling Out
Reducing part of a position before the full trade is closed.
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Session Close
The final traded price or closing print for a session.
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Session High
The highest price traded during the current or referenced trading session.
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Session Low
The lowest price traded during the current or referenced trading session.
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Session Midpoint
The midpoint between a session high and session low or between opening-range boundaries.
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Session Open
The first traded price or opening print for a session.
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Session Template
The schedule a charting platform uses to define which market hours belong to a trading session.
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Session VWAP
A VWAP calculation that resets at the start of each trading session.
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Signal-to-Noise Ratio
A practical way of thinking about how much useful information an indicator provides relative to distraction.
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Slippage
The difference between expected execution price and actual execution price.
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SMA
Simple moving average, the unweighted average of price over a chosen number of bars.
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Source Code
The readable script or program logic behind an indicator or tool.
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Stop Order
An order that activates when price reaches a chosen trigger level.
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Stop-Limit Order
An order that activates at a stop price but then behaves like a limit order.
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Support and Resistance
Price areas where traders expect buying or selling pressure to matter more than usual.
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Support Zone
A price area where buyers may become more active than usual.
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Swing High
A local high surrounded by lower highs on both sides, often used in structure and retracement analysis.
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Swing Low
A local low surrounded by higher lows on both sides, often used in trend and retracement workflows.
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Tick Chart
A chart where bars complete after a defined number of trades or ticks.
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Tick Value
The dollar value of one minimum price increment for a contract.
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Time-Based Chart
A chart where bars complete after a fixed amount of time, such as one minute or one hour.
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Trailing Stop
A stop level that moves in the direction of a profitable trade to help protect open gains.
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Trend Day
A session where price sustains directional movement with limited meaningful counterrotation.
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Trend Following
A trading approach that tries to participate in sustained directional movement rather than fading it.
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Trend Ribbon
A multi-line moving-average display used to show short-term alignment, compression, or trend expansion.
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Volatility
The degree to which price is expanding and contracting over time.
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Volume Bar
A bar that completes after a set amount of volume trades rather than after a set amount of time.
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VWAP
Volume weighted average price, a benchmark that weights price by traded volume.
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Win Rate
The percentage of trades or signals that finish as winners.
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