hard · Order Flow Analysis absorption-exhaustion-imbalance

Which combination most rigorously distinguishes exhaustion from a healthy continuation imbalance here?

1. Continuation requires the diagonal imbalances to remain on the bid (buy) side with stable or rising volume; this print flipped to a sell-side diagonal imbalance while volume contracted, meaning the initiative that drove the move could no longer find willing sellers and is failing on thinning participation.
2. Exhaustion is confirmed purely by the presence of the single 70-contract sell imbalance regardless of what the surrounding volume happens to be doing, because any opposite-side imbalance printing at a fresh extreme is assumed to always reverse the prior trend, no further confirmation needed at all.
3. Because the cluster printed a brand new session high, the three stacked bid imbalances alone are treated as guaranteeing continuation from here no matter what follows, and the lone sell imbalance is dismissed as noise from a single large responsive seller who will shortly be re-absorbed by returning buyers.
4. Rising total volume on that final bar combined with the sell imbalance would actually be the genuine exhaustion tell in a setup exactly like this one, so the declining volume actually observed here instead argues strongly for continuation of the prevailing upward move through the level and further beyond it still.

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