Trading Institutional Order Flow

BTCUSDT, daily income, 3R target

Hello AKT,Why is the supply and demand approach effective for forex trading compared to other strategies?

What is the significance of supply and demand in forex trading? How can I differentiate between support and resistance trading and supply and demand methodology?

hello just read this thread or watch akt's basic video in youtube you will learn

hello just read this thread or watch akt's basic video in youtube you will learn

There are so many ways to trade this methodology. OTA's, Alfonso's, AKT's, Austin Moneyball's and there are more variations on Youtube. Austin has a free course on Youtube. Go check it.

what is your trading style zkchyo ... i trade ota( surjeet kakkar because he was instructor in India that teach ota methon you can search it on youtube name = surjeet kakkar he also has free course whole method but don't have confirmation mehod ) and some time Moneyball's method tying find what shoot me the best because some time price hit htf zone and never return and some time price hit htf zone and break through and run from ltf zone that was just below/above htf zone lol so I take confirmation trade in those ltf zones ... how about you

I trade moneyball's method with some variations and I enrolled his course 5 years ago. The key is to always trade with the trend. Let's say we are in an uptrend and price sits at an hourly supply zone. Normally, S.A.D. traders would try to seek for a confirmation entry for a short trade. But with lots of backtesting results from his other students, it's not a good idea. Like you, I switch to lower timeframes to find a zone and take a trade from there. The only time I'll take a reversal trade is when ITF shows a trend change(Break of structure). Otherwise, it's just too risky.

Looks like W sz has been contacted and price reacted off it.
Are you looking at an entry on a 4H timeframe?

Caught the 4 hour sz on monday for a nice risk reward. I am now looking to see if it wants to react off of this daily demand but will most likely wait till it is in discount price.

AUDUSD trade. DBD, 200 sma used as support. Did not take a trade immediately when it got into the zone. Waited for another break of structure on the 5 minute and entered on FVG created once it rejected the zone.

Looks like a rejection candle at supply to me. Why complicate things?

It is not complicated in my eyes. I stick to my rules and I see my confirmations line up. I got in before the rejection candle was fully formed, and seemed to work out for me.

Hello Everyone

I hope the following information proves helpful.

Zone Quality Assessment:
Not all zones are created equal, each needs to be assessed for characteristics that help define the quality.

Characteristics Intrinsic to the zone itself:

A). The strength of the move. Prices can leave a zone in one of three ways:

1) Gap away - more frequently seen in stocks for the sheer reason that those markets close very day and therefore have out of hours "gap risk" where information such as earnings, policy decisions etc are released that may affect the supply-demand dynamics.
2) Large candles, with strong closes - often referred to in the supply and demand community as "ERC" expanded Range Candles.
A couple of important notes about these candles/bars - they are said to be of an expanded range relative to other candles/bars around them, within the same vicinity.
It is also important to note that by “range” we are referring here to the range of the open to close, not the high to low range of the candle. Typically, an expanded range candle is a candle/bar whose range from open to close relative to its high to low range is greater than 50%. However, a trader may wish to apply more stringent criteria to focus on the large moves and define the open to close range relative to high-low range as greater than 75% for example and score such candles/bars higher than others.
By "strong closes", we refer to where price closes strongly within the range of each candle/bar. 60% or higher is preferred for up candles and 40% or less, for down candles.
3) Small indecisive candles/bars OR an alternation of large and small candles - again here, the definition of what is a big candle can be determined by the trader. There is universal consensus that candles/bars with open-close ranges relative to high-low ranges of less than or equal to 50% are "small candles". These types of candles/bars are often fondly referred to in the supply-demand community as 50% candles.
B). The amount of time price stays at a level.
The foundational principle of this characteristic is deeply embedded in the assumption within the methodology that the less time spent at a level, is indicative of the number of orders to buy/sell left within a level. Therefore, time spent at a level is used as a proxy for demand or supply within a level. A general rule of thumb is that the zones where price stayed for only 6 periods or less before departing are better than the zones where price stayed for longer periods.
6 is not a magic number though. If one considers that there are typically 5 trading sessions per week, so on a daily chart one could argue for using 5 as this is also a Fibonacci number for example or 10 periods which would be two trading weeks and a half trading month thereby giving more information. In addition, since the whole idea is to be able to "see" order flow clearly, one could argue that having a minimum number of candles, for example, three or 4 is better for achieving this aim than say for example one or two candles.
Then there is the issue of timeframes. One candle on a monthly chart is roughly the equivalent to 4 candles on a weekly chart which when viewed on a daily chart would be equivalent to 20 candles etc.
To infuse some objectivity and starting from the base premise of less time is better, regardless of timeframe, supply and demand traders apply an assessment system whereby these issues are taken into consideration. They score zones where price stayed 3-6 periods higher than periods where price stayed for one period because 3-6 periods is a better representation of order flow than one period So to conclude, one to two periods is acceptable, 3-5 is preferred, anything greater than 6 periods is not as good when considered on its own without other assessments of zone quality.
C). How far did prices move on departure from a level before returning to the level. This is a measurement used to estimate the initial profit potential that can be reasonably expected from trading a level. The further the better. The distance is objectively measured relative to the size of the zone (measured from entry line aka proximal line to the stop line aka distal line). Distances that measure 3 times the size of the zone for example are considered better than those that measure 2 times the size of the zone. The often-used minimum criteria of a distance moved of at least 2 times is quite popular and is a good starting point.
A final note on this quality assessment item - it is important to remember that it is a crude measure of profit potential, because depending on how quickly prices return to the level, a lot can happen to change the supply-demand equation of that market or timeframe and result in the creation of an opposing level so close to the level the trader is assessing, that the profit potential of a potential trade is reduced, sometimes to the extent that the trade is not worth taking anymore.
It’s therefore advisable that whenever possible, profit potential should be assessed in real time. Some supply and demand traders have also added an addition extrinsic assessment to manage this challenge - when they can, the assess what is referred to as the arrival of price to the zone. As that is not actually an assessment of the zone itself, I will not go into detail about that here, suffice to say that it requires the trader to be present in front of his/her charts to do the assessment, which may not always be possible depending on the trader's life or trading style.
D) Did the departure from the zone result in the removal of opposing orders (above and to the left in the case of a demand zone, or below and to the left in the case of a supply zone) or new price discovery in terms of new highs or new lows being reached because of the departure of price from a zone.
This is a very important assessment for supply and demand traders to make because of the message such price movements convey to other market participants. Working from the premise of zones being representative of orders to buy/sell in the market therefore representing buyers and sellers, the removal of one group by another indicates two things, strength, and better profit potential. Supply and demand traders therefore often give this point the highest rating in the assessment, either as a stand-alone assessment or in combination with how far prices moved from the level (point c above)
Having this criterion fulfilled is part of a larger assessment of zone quality and is better used that way, rather than as a standalone measurement on its own.
E). How deep price has penetrated a zone following or during its creation -often referred to as the freshness by practitioners. This assessment is done to gauge the number of buy/sell orders within a zone. Whilst this is entirely unknowable, having a framework such as this helps the trader attempt to quantify order flow size. It is also a crude measure as is the measure of how far price moved away from a level as described above. The fresher the better.
A virgin "untouched" zone is usually better than a zone that has been "tested" many times. Note - there is a particular type of test of a zone that can be helpful for the trader in assessing the number of orders potentially left at a zone. It is the first test of a zone that only reaches the proximal line with little or no penetration of the zone.
Here is a model that can be used for assessing Degrees of penetration. It is not the only model, but I think it is a good starting point:
1. Totally fresh
2. Price has returned to the level on one occasion with <= 25% penetration
3.. Price has returned one or more times with a >25% return on at least one of the returns but no penetration was greater than 50% of the width of the zone.
4. Price has returned one or more times to the level with at least one penetration being >50%.
It is worth noting that this is just a representative system and traders will make their own adjustment, for example only using points 1 and 2, ignoring the others. The trader may also decide what type of penetration he/she trades. He/she may decide that they will only trade totally fresh zones for example.

Final Thoughts: The above assessment of the intrinsic quality of a zone is an important part of supply and demand trading. It provides the much-needed framework for choosing between zones on a chart, of which there are many. It does not however determine whether a trade will work or not.
A poor scoring zone will work sometimes, while sometimes a high scoring one will entirely fail. This is the market uncertainty that no methodology will ever be able to take away because it is just what it is, part of the market's own psychology.
These assessments should be done at the very least, on zones the trader is considering trading on the entry timeframe he/she chooses. Doing these assessments on multiple timeframes is an added level of complexity which is often rewarding even if not usually necessary. My preference is to do it on every zone of interest on every timeframe. Other traders may choose to do it just on the entry timeframe, which is also fine.
Finally, there are a few other assessments that the trader must make - of trend and price location relative to higher timeframe levels, correlation etc. These are extrinsic considerations to the entry zone but nonetheless, very important to consider...

Best wishes.

Paper trading. I think this trade will work out. The only bad thing about this trade is that the structure on the Weekly chart is not ideal.Paper trading.

EURAUD Daily demand. Is it approaching another Daily supply? Might have to reconsider the initial TP. Paper trading.

Paper trading, SL moved to break even. The multiple times tested Weekly demand is still showing strength.

Paper trading. Ranging market but hit a new fresh Weekly supply.



Can this Daily demand zone potentially push price up?







Shoud move SL to break even now.

Hi b94od! If I put this EA on any chart, will the EA only work on that chart?

After trading Supply and Demand for a long time, here are some short-term trading tips I'd like to share:
Confirmation trades are primarily for tightening your stop-loss (SL), and that's it. For instance, if you have a large 100-pip demand zone, a confirmation entry can help you align with current order flow and reduce your risk. However, you don't actually "need" confirmation. Instead, focus on accurate trend identification. The well-known downside of confirmation trades is often missing the entry. What many don't realize is that confirmation trades can also lower your win rate. When price first visits a zone, it reacts. If price revisits that entry zone, it's often because the initial Supply/Demand wasn't strong enough. For example, trying to confirm a 1-minute zone inside a 15-minute zone that's already weak means your first visit to the 15-minute zone might give you a bounce, but a second visit (which is the first for the 1-minute) likely won't. While it sometimes works, it's less frequent. The dynamic changes significantly when you're looking for a 1-hour entry within a strong 1-week zone, as the larger timeframe can absorb more pressure. For short-term trading, the key is to trade with momentum. If momentum is strong, meaning market orders are aggressive, price often just touches a zone and quickly rallies or dumps without hesitation.
Another crucial point is price levels. Pay close attention to previous day's highs/lows and pre-market highs/lows. These provide a clear bias for short-term direction, and you generally don't want to trade against them. If price breaks yesterday's high and pushes into your 15-minute supply zone, don't try to fade it for a small bounce. My rule of thumb: any timeframe lower than 240 minutes isn't worth fading. For taking short trades, correctly identifying the trend direction change significantly improves your odds.