Price & Structure Indicators

Price and structure indicators describe where price sits relative to a recurring reference rather than how fast it is moving: the day's or week's high and low, pivot points, opening ranges, 52-week extremes, Darvas boxes, price channels, regression channels and fractals, plus the simple transforms (typical price, median price, weighted close, log price, normalized price, ratios and spreads) that other indicators are built from. They are read for support, resistance and location within a range.

What do Price & Structure indicators have in common?

Every indicator in this category either transforms price or measures its position against a level that recurs by construction. The transforms are arithmetic: the typical price averages high, low and close, the weighted close counts the close twice, log price makes equal percentage moves look equal, a ratio chart divides one series by another. The structural measures take the previous session's or week's high and low, the first minutes of the session, the last 52 weeks or a linear regression through recent prices and ask where today's price is relative to them.

The category divides into three groups. Reference levels (previous day and week high and low, the opening range and its breakout level, 52-week high and low, highest high and lowest low, the five pivot point conventions, Darvas box, price channel, support and resistance strength) are prices that traders watch because other traders watch them. Position measures (distance from a moving average or from VWAP, price percentile rank, rolling high-low percentile, normalized price, price gap percentage, the Williams fractal, zig zag) locate the current price within a recent range or mark the swing points that define it. Regression measures (the linear regression curve and channel, standard error and standard error bands) fit a line through recent prices and measure how far price sits from it in units of its own scatter.

What they share is that none of them forecasts: a pivot point is the previous session's arithmetic, a 52-week high is a fact, and the regression channel is a description of the data it was fitted to. Their use rests on the observation that many participants place orders at the same recurring levels, which makes those levels places where price pauses or accelerates more often than chance alone would produce.

How do you choose a Price & Structure indicator?

• For intraday trading, use the opening range and the previous day's high and low, which are the levels most participants are watching on the same session
• For a longer view, use the 52-week high and low and the rolling percentile, which have a documented link to subsequent returns through the 52-week high momentum effect
• Pick one pivot point convention and keep it; the standard, Fibonacci, Camarilla, Woodie and DeMark versions place their levels at different distances and mixing them produces a level every few ticks
• Prefer a regression channel to a hand-drawn trendline when the aim is reproducibility, and read standard error bands for how far price has strayed from the fit
• Use log price and normalized price when comparing instruments at different price levels or over periods when the price has changed by multiples

Price & Structure indicators at a glance

Indicator	What it measures	How it is read
52-Week High/Low	The 52-week high and low are the highest high and lowest low a security has reached over the trailing 52 weeks, roughly 252 trading sessions.	A close near the high means the price is at the top of its past-year range, near the low means the bottom.
Average Price	Average price is the mean of a bar's open, high, low and close.	It is a smoothed representation of where the bar traded, less sensitive to a single extreme than the high or low alone.
Typical Price	Typical price is the average of a bar's high, low and close.	It tends to sit closer to the middle of the bar's range than the close does.
Median Price	Median price is the midpoint of a single bar's high and low, ignoring the open and close.	It shows the middle of the bar's range and is often used as an input to other indicators in place of the close.
Weighted Close	Weighted close averages a bar's high, low and close with the close counted twice.	It sits closer to the close than typical price does, while still reflecting the bar's high and low.
Midpoint	Midpoint is the average of the highest and lowest values of a single price series (usually the close) over the last N bars.	Price above the midpoint is in the upper half of its recent range, below in the lower half.
Midprice	Midprice is the average of the highest high and the lowest low over the last N bars.	It is the middle line of a Donchian-style channel.
Highest High	Highest high is the maximum of the high prices over the last N bars.	It steps up when price makes a new high and otherwise stays flat until the old high drops out of the window.
Lowest Low	Lowest low is the minimum of the low prices over the last N bars.	It steps down when price makes a new low and otherwise stays flat until the old low leaves the window.
Price Channel	A price channel draws an upper line at the highest high and a lower line at the lowest low over the last N bars, with an optional midline.	The channel widens when the range expands and narrows when it contracts.
Pivot Points Standard	Standard (floor) pivot points compute a central pivot from the prior session's high, low and close, then derive three support and three resistance levels from it for the next session.	Price above the central pivot is read as trading in the upper part of the reference range, below as the lower part.
Pivot Points Fibonacci	Fibonacci pivot points start from the standard pivot (the average of the prior high, low and close) and place support and resistance levels at Fibonacci ratios of the prior session's range above and below it.	Levels extend from the central pivot by fixed fractions of the prior range, with R1/S1 closest and R3/S3 at a full range away.
Pivot Points Camarilla	Camarilla pivot points are intraday support and resistance levels computed from the prior session's range and close, using multipliers of 1.1 over 12, 6, 4 and 2 to set four levels on each side of the close.	Levels are anchored on the prior close and spaced by the prior range, with the inner levels (H3/L3) and outer levels (H4/L4) the most watched.
Pivot Points Woodie	Woodie's pivot points weight the prior close more heavily than the standard pivot does, then derive two support and two resistance levels.	Because the close counts double, the pivot sits closer to where the prior session finished than the standard pivot does.
Pivot Points DeMark	DeMark pivot points use the relationship between the prior session's open and close to choose a weighting, then compute one pivot with a single support and resistance level for the next session.	The weighting leans toward the session's low after a down day and toward the high after an up day.
Zig Zag	The zig-zag indicator connects significant swing highs and swing lows, ignoring price moves smaller than a threshold percentage.	The line strips out small fluctuations to make the larger swings visible, which helps measure trend structure and the size of past moves.
Williams Fractal	A Williams fractal is a five-bar pattern from Bill Williams.	Up fractals mark local swing highs and down fractals mark local swing lows.
Darvas Box	A Darvas box is a rectangular price range drawn around a consolidation, named after Nicolas Darvas.	A close above the box top is read as a breakout from the consolidation and a close below the bottom as a breakdown.
Linear Regression Curve	The linear regression curve plots, at each bar, the end-point value of the least-squares line fitted to the last N closes.	Price above the curve and a rising curve indicate an upward fitted trend.
Linear Regression Channel	A linear regression channel fits a least-squares straight line to the last N prices and draws parallel bands above and below it, usually a fixed number of standard deviations of the residuals away from the line.	The slope shows the direction and steepness of the fitted trend, and the band width shows how much price scatters around it.
Standard Error	In technical analysis the standard error indicator is the standard error of the estimate for a linear regression fitted to the last N prices, a measure of how far prices scatter around the fitted line.	A small value means prices hug the fitted line; a large value means they scatter widely around it.
Standard Error Bands	Standard error bands place bands a chosen multiple of the regression standard error above and below a linear regression line fitted to recent prices.	Wider bands mean greater scatter around the fitted trend.
Support/Resistance Strength	Support/resistance strength is a heuristic score for how significant a horizontal price level looks, usually based on how many times price has reacted at it, how recently, and how much volume traded there.	More touches over a longer span, with larger volume, are usually read as a more established level.
Distance From Moving Average	Distance from a moving average is the percentage gap between the current price and a chosen moving average, showing how stretched price is relative to its recent average.	Positive values mean price is above the average, negative below.
Distance From VWAP	Distance from VWAP is the percentage gap between price and the volume-weighted average price, the average price weighted by volume.	Positive values mean price is above the average price paid so far in the period, negative below.
Price Gap Percentage	Price gap percentage measures the jump between one session's close and the next session's open as a percentage of the prior close.	The size of the gap shows how much new information or order imbalance arrived outside regular trading, such as earnings or news.
Opening Range	The opening range is the high-to-low range that price traces during the first N minutes of a trading session (commonly 5, 15, 30 or 60 minutes).	A narrow opening range means price was compressed during the open; a wide one means the open was volatile.
Opening Range Breakout Level	The opening range breakout level is the high or low of the opening range (the first N minutes of a session) used as a trigger line, sometimes offset by a small buffer, to mark when price moves outside the opening range.	Price trading beyond the upper or lower level means it has left the range set in the opening period.
Previous Day High/Low	The previous day's high and low are the highest and lowest prices traded during the prior session.	Trading above the prior high or below the prior low means the current session has moved outside the previous day's range.
Previous Week High/Low	The previous week's high and low are the highest and lowest prices traded during the prior calendar or trading week.	Price outside the prior week's range means the current week has moved beyond last week's extremes.
Rolling High/Low Percentile	Rolling high/low percentile places the current close within the high-low range of the last N bars, scaled from 0 to 100.	Readings near 100 mean price is near the top of the rolling range, near 0 near the bottom.
Price Percentile Rank	Price percentile rank is the percentage of closes in a lookback window that are at or below the current price.	High ranks mean price is near the top of where it has traded in the window, low ranks near the bottom.
Normalized Price	Normalized price rebases a price series so that it starts at a common value, usually 100, which lets assets with different price levels be compared by relative performance over the same period.	A value of 120 means the price is 20% above its base level.
Log Price	Log price is the natural logarithm of the price.	A steady straight line on a log chart means a constant percentage growth rate.
Price Ratio	A price ratio divides the price of one asset by the price of another, for example a stock against an index or one commodity against another.	A rising ratio means asset A is gaining relative to asset B.
Spread	A spread is the difference between two related prices, such as the ask and bid of one security (the quoted spread), two futures contracts, or the prices of two different assets.	For a bid-ask spread, a wider spread means a higher cost of trading and thinner liquidity.
Ratio Chart	A ratio chart plots one asset's price divided by another's over time.	Direction of the ratio line shows relative performance only.

Each row is the opening sentence of that indicator's own definition and reading, so the table says exactly what the profile says.

What limits do Price & Structure indicators share?

A reference level has no predictive content of its own; it works to the extent that enough participants act on it, and the more conventions in use the less any one level means. Pivot points and opening ranges are session arithmetic that changes every day, 52-week extremes are reached by definition in every trend, and the zig zag and fractal indicators repaint, since the swing point they mark is only confirmed after price has moved away from it. A regression channel describes the window it was fitted to and shifts as the window rolls, so a breakout from it is as often a change in the fit as a change in the market.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are pivot points?

Pivot points are support and resistance levels computed from the previous session's high, low and close. The standard pivot is their average, with resistance and support levels placed at fixed multiples of the previous range above and below it; the Fibonacci, Camarilla, Woodie and DeMark conventions use the same inputs with different multipliers, so the levels differ by convention.

What is the opening range?

The opening range is the high and low of the first minutes of a session, most often the first 15, 30 or 60. An opening range breakout is a move beyond that range, read as the session's direction being set, with the range itself serving as the stop. Its value depends on the session's volume being front-loaded, which is true for stock index futures and less true for thinly traded names.

Why does the 52-week high matter?

The 52-week high is watched because it is published daily and widely, and because George and Hwang showed in 2004 that stocks near their 52-week high go on to outperform those far from it, a pattern they attributed to investors anchoring on the level and being slow to bid above it. It is a reference level with a documented effect, which few others in this category have.

What is the typical price?

The typical price is the average of a bar's high, low and close. It is used as the input to the commodity channel index, the money flow index and VWAP because it represents the bar better than the close alone, and the weighted close, which counts the close twice, is the same idea with more weight on where the bar ended.