How To Read Crypto Candlestick Charts
- A candlestick chart gives you a visual representation of an asset’s price activity over a specific time period.
- Crypto candlestick charts provide data such as the highest and lowest price, opening and closing price, and the general price movement of an asset over time.
- Candlestick charts enable crypto traders to build a picture of how a crypto asset has been trading, and use this information to inform their own trading strategy.
A crypto candlestick chart serves as a vital technical analysis tool for traders, enabling them to visualize the price movements of a cryptocurrency over time. For those new to crypto trading, the plethora of available tools might seem overwhelming, but rest assured, there are resources to aid your understanding of the market. These include comprehensive guides and indices like the fear and greed index.
Among these tools, the crypto candlestick chart stands out as a powerful instrument for tracking market trends. Despite its complexity due to the abundance of data it presents, this chart is invaluable for traders across various markets, including crypto. In this article, we delve into the intricacies of the crypto candlestick chart, offering insights to help you incorporate it into your crypto trading strategy effectively.
The History of Candlestick Charts
Candle charts, also known as candlestick charts, have a long history dating back to the 18th century, attributed to a Japanese rice trader named Munehisa Homma. Homma observed that by plotting rice prices over time, he could discern patterns indicating potential future price movements. He represented price movements using bars, with the length of each bar depicting the price range within a specific time period.
Over time, traders refined this technique by interpreting chart patterns, leading to the widespread adoption of candlestick charts by technical analysts and traders globally by the 1990s. With the advent of real-time data available online, candlestick charts offer more accurate and timely information than ever before.
Given their effectiveness, candlestick charts are now utilized across various markets, including the cryptocurrency market. Traders rely on these charts to analyze price movements and make informed trading decisions in the fast-paced world of crypto trading.
What Is a Crypto Candlestick Chart?
A crypto candlestick chart serves as a visual representation of the trading activity of a specific cryptocurrency asset. These charts provide a wealth of information, including the asset's opening and closing prices, highest and lowest prices reached during the specified time period, and the price movements over both short and long-term intervals.
Displayed as a graph, each candlestick chart features a vertical axis representing the price of the asset and a horizontal axis indicating the time period. Automated crypto trading tools can analyze extensive trading data in real-time, generating candlestick charts swiftly. This enables traders to efficiently identify trends and patterns in the market.
Delving deeper into the structure of candlestick charts, it's essential to understand the various data elements they encompass and how to leverage them for crypto trading effectively.
How to Read A Crypto Candlestick Chart
Candlestick Real Body
Each candlestick on a crypto candlestick chart represents a specified time period, such as five minutes, an hour, or a day, and is characterized by distinctive green or red bars known as "candles" or "real bodies." Understanding the time period depicted by each candle is crucial, especially for day traders aiming to capitalize on intraday price movements. For instance, traders focusing on short-term gains within the day may find charts tracking price changes over minutes or hours more beneficial than those spanning weeks.
The real body of each candle provides essential information, with its top and bottom denoting the asset's opening and closing prices within the designated time frame. For instance, if we observe a candle spanning from 9:00 am to 10:00 am, with an opening price of $100 and a closing price of $110, the real body represents a $10 difference. Conversely, a candle depicting a $50 difference between opening and closing prices would feature a longer real body. The length of each candle holds significant insights: taller candlesticks signify a substantial disparity between opening and closing prices, while shorter ones indicate a more modest price movement over the same period.
Candlestick Colour
To determine which end of each candle represents the opening and closing prices, and consequently discern whether the price action is bullish or bearish, you can rely on the color of the candle.
In essence, if the price of the asset rose during the specified time frame, the candle will appear green (or occasionally white). In this scenario, the bottom of the body signifies the opening price, while the top represents the closing price. This is commonly referred to as a bullish or green candle.
Conversely, a red (or occasionally black) candle indicates a decrease in price over the designated time period, signifying a bearish trend. In this case, the top of the body represents the opening price, while the bottom signifies the closing price. A bearish candlestick suggests selling pressure prevailing during the time increment.
The Wick
The thin lines above and below the body of the candlestick, known as the tail or shadow, indicate the highest and lowest prices reached during the specified time frame. While the opening and closing prices provide valuable insights, they may not reflect the complete trading range for the period. For instance, although a crypto asset might have opened at $100 and closed at $120, its price could have fluctuated to a maximum of $150 and a minimum of $80 during that same period. Therefore, the wick offers a more comprehensive understanding of the asset's trading activity.
Now that you're acquainted with the components of candlestick charts, let's delve into how to interpret their patterns.
Important Crypto Candlestick Patterns Explained
Indeed, while market activity may seem unpredictable and random, certain patterns recur consistently over time. These patterns offer valuable insights into market activity and trends, empowering traders to speculate on potential future developments.
Now, let's explore some of the most useful candlestick chart patterns that traders should be familiar with.
Bearish and Bullish Engulfing Patterns
The bearish engulfing pattern is a two-candle pattern indicating a shift from buyers to sellers' control. The first candle is bullish (green), showing a price increase over the initial period, while the second candle is bearish (red), indicating a significant price decrease. Crucially, the second candle's length surpasses the first, completely "engulfing" its body. This occurrence, where an uptrend followed by a downtrend below the previous period's opening price, signals a temporary transfer of market control from buyers to sellers.
Conversely, the bullish engulfing pattern denotes a potential reversal from bearish to bullish trends. In this pattern, the first candle is bearish, succeeded by a larger bullish candle that engulfs the previous candle's body. This reversal pattern suggests a shift in market direction, potentially leading to further price increases.
Bearish Evening Star and Bullish Morning Star
The bearish evening star is a three-candlestick pattern indicating a potential reversal from a bullish to a bearish trend. It begins with a long green bullish candle, followed by a small red or green candle that gaps up, reflecting indecision in the market. The pattern concludes with a long red bearish candle that closes below the midpoint of the first candle's body. This pattern typically emerges at the peak of an uptrend, signaling a shift in control from buyers to sellers and potentially leading to a further decline in prices.
Conversely, the bullish evening star suggests a potential reversal from a bearish to a bullish trend. This pattern forms following a sharp price decline, followed by a consolidation phase, and then a significant upward movement. In essence, it indicates that the price may start to rise.
Bearish and Bullish Harami
The bearish harami is a two-candlestick pattern indicating a potential reversal from a bullish to a bearish trend. It starts with a long green bullish candle, followed by a small red or green candle that is entirely engulfed by the body of the first candlestick. This pattern implies a shift in market sentiment, with bears gaining control and potentially leading to further price declines. Considered a robust reversal signal, some traders utilize these opportunities to enter short positions in a market trending downwards.
Conversely, the bullish harami signifies a possible reversal from a bearish to a bullish trend. It begins with a long red bearish candle, followed by a small green or red candle that is wholly engulfed by the body of the first candlestick. This pattern suggests the end of a downtrend and the initiation of an uptrend, indicating a resurgence of bullish sentiment. It implies that bulls are asserting dominance, and the market may witness higher prices ahead.
Dark Cloud and Piercing Line Patterns
The dark cloud pattern indicates a potential trend reversal from bullish to bearish. It begins with a long green bullish candle, followed by a red bearish candle that opens above the high and closes below the midpoint of the previous candlestick's body. The name "dark cloud" derives from how the red candlestick "clouds" the gains made by its green counterpart. Occurring after an uptrend, this pattern suggests a possible reversal in trend, potentially leading to continued declines in asset prices.
Conversely, the piercing line pattern signals a potential trend reversal from bearish to bullish. It commences with a long red bearish candle, succeeded by a bullish green candle that opens below the previous candle's low and closes above the midpoint of the first candlestick's body. This pattern suggests a potential shift in market sentiment towards bullishness, potentially leading to higher prices. Despite its unique name, the piercing line pattern is the direct opposite of the dark cloud pattern.
Crypto Candlestick Charts – Where to Find Them
Indeed, there are numerous online platforms and exchanges where you can find crypto candlestick charts. Here are some popular options:
- TradingView: Renowned for its comprehensive charting capabilities, TradingView offers candlestick charts for various cryptocurrencies. Users can access real-time charts and utilize a plethora of technical analysis tools to analyze price movements effectively.
- Crypto Exchanges: Leading crypto trading platforms such as Coinbase and Binance provide candlestick charts for different cryptocurrencies. These exchanges offer charts for various timeframes, along with trading volume data and analysis of different candlestick patterns.
- Data Aggregators: Websites like CoinMarketCap and CryptoCompare serve as data aggregators, providing comprehensive cryptocurrency market data, including candlestick charts and fear and greed indices for numerous cryptocurrencies. These platforms enable users to access charts for different timeframes and explore additional trading data.
It's important to note that each platform may offer different charting tools and features, so selecting one that aligns with your specific needs and preferences is essential for effective analysis and trading.
Beyond the Candle Chart in Crypto: Security Essentials
Understanding crypto candlestick charts may require some time and effort, but it's invaluable for traders seeking to make informed decisions regarding buying, selling, or holding assets in the crypto market. Whether engaging in leverage trading or not, mastering candlestick charts enables traders to comprehend market trends better and refine their trading strategies.
However, one crucial aspect unique to crypto trading is the importance of securing your crypto wallet. Regardless of how adept your market analysis skills are, an insecure wallet can jeopardize your assets. Hardware wallets provide a secure solution by isolating your crypto private keys from internet connections. This ensures that your assets' private keys remain truly private, offering peace of mind while trading. Therefore, before delving into complex trading strategies, staying updated on crypto regulations, or considering AI crypto trading bots, it's essential to invest in a hardware wallet, making it an indispensable part of your trading toolkit.