Volume is how much actually traded — the market's effort. Price is the result. Reading them together is the oldest edge in the book: big effort + big result confirms a move; big effort + NO result means someone absorbed it all (and usually wins); no effort + big result is a thin move begging to be retraced.
High-value volume reads
- Breakout confirmation: a range break on expanding volume has participation behind it. A break on dead volume is a fakeout candidate.
- Climax: the HIGHEST volume of the whole move arriving after a long trend — the crowd's final surge — often marks the end zone, not the middle.
- Absorption: repeated heavy selling into a level that will not drop = someone large is buying it all. When the selling exhausts, the reveal is fast.
Volume never tells direction by itself — it tells CONVICTION. Pair it with location: conviction AT a level is the story worth trading.