Single Print
Order Flow Analysis glossary · Absorption, Exhaustion & Imbalances
Definition
A very small volume number (often 1–9 contracts) at the very high or low of a bar, signalling exhaustion at the extreme. The market probed the level but almost nobody was willing to transact — the last buyer has bought (at a high) or the last seller has sold (at a low). The exhaustion is quantified by the ratio R_extreme = V_extreme / V_adjacent: when adjacent volume dwarfs extreme volume (e.g., 30:1), reversal is likely.
Single Print in plain English
A single print is a tiny volume number — often just a handful of contracts — sitting right at the extreme high or low of a bar, and it whispers that the move ran out of gas. Price poked up (or down) to that level, but almost nobody would trade there: the last willing buyer has already bought at the top, or the last willing seller has already sold at the bottom, so there's no fuel to push further. You measure how lopsided this is with R_extreme = V_extreme / V_adjacent — the volume at the tip divided by the volume just beside it. When the neighbor is huge compared to the tip (say 30 times bigger), it's like a rocket sputtering on its last drop of fuel, and a reversal back the other way becomes likely.
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Practice Single Print
A trader is analyzing a bar in the 10-Year Treasury (ZN)… What does this suggest?
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