CBc Advance Smart Money

About

CBc Advance Smart Money is KAGAMI's own indicator. It marks the shapes that "smart money" traders look for.

"Smart money" is a way of reading charts. It looks for traces left by big buyers and sellers, like banks and funds.

To add it:

1. Click Indicators at the top of the chart.
2. Type CBc Advance Smart Money. It is in the KAGAMI group.
3. Click it.

On the chart, its short name is CBc ASM. See Indicators for how the list works.

This indicator is not in every account's Indicators list yet.

What you see on the chart

Everything is drawn on the price chart itself. It adds no pane. A pane is an extra box under the chart.

Two words first. A candle, or bar, is one slice of time on the chart. The close is the last price in that slice.

The indicator draws six kinds of marks.

Swing labels: HH, HL, LH, LL. A swing high is a peak. Its candle is higher than the candles around it. A swing low is a dip. Each swing gets a small label:

• HH (higher high) — a peak above the peak before it. Green.
• HL (higher low) — a dip above the dip before it. Green.
• LH (lower high) — a peak not above the peak before it. Red.
• LL (lower low) — a dip not above the dip before it. Red.

Labels for peaks sit above the price. Labels for dips sit below it.

BOS lines. Structure is the pattern of swing highs and swing lows. A break of structure (BOS) happens when a candle closes past the last swing. A close above the last swing high is a break up. A close below the last swing low is a break down. The indicator draws a solid line at the broken swing's price. The word BOS sits just above or below it. Green lines are breaks up. Red lines are breaks down.

CHoCH lines. The trend is the main direction of prices. A change of character (CHoCH) is the first break against the trend. An example is a break up while the trend was down. It looks like a BOS line, but dashed, with the word CHoCH. After a CHoCH, the trend has turned.

Order blocks. An order block is the last opposite candle before a strong move. Before a rise, it is the last falling candle. Before a fall, it is the last rising candle. The indicator draws it as a box, from the candle's highest to lowest price. A dotted line marks the middle. Green boxes come before a rise. Red boxes come before a fall.

Fair value gaps (FVG). Look at three candles in a row. Sometimes the first and third candles don't overlap at all. The middle candle moved so fast that it left a gap. That gap is a fair value gap. It is drawn as a box with a dashed edge and the word FVG. Indigo (blue-purple) boxes come from rises. Amber (orange-yellow) boxes come from falls.

Breakaway gaps (BAG). A breakaway gap is a fair value gap left by the move that broke structure. Price has not come back into it yet. Its box has a thicker, solid edge and the word BAG. Cyan (light blue) boxes come from rises. Violet boxes come from falls.

A few more things you will notice:

• A box gets paler once price comes back into it.
• Older boxes get paler when a newer box of the same colour appears.
• The newest order block of each colour reaches 20 candles past the last closed candle.
• A box disappears once a candle closes past its far side.
• Only the newest marks stay. For example, at most 5 green order blocks.

You can't move or change these drawings. They are not saved when you reload the page.

To hide them, point at CBc ASM on the chart. Then click the eye icon. To remove the indicator, click the ✕.

How traders often read it

• Many traders read a run of HH and HL labels as an uptrend.
• Many traders read a run of LH and LL labels as a downtrend.
• Some traders read BOS lines as signs that a trend is carrying on.
• Many traders read a CHoCH as an early sign that a trend may be turning.
• Some traders see order blocks as areas where big buyers or sellers once acted.
• Many traders expect price to come back into a fair value gap later. They call this "filling" the gap.
• Some traders give a BAG more weight than an FVG. They note that a break of structure came with it.
• Some traders look for marks that line up. An example is a gap inside an order block.
• Many traders call a touched box "mitigated". It means price has already come back to it.
• Many traders pay less attention to a mitigated box than to a fresh one.

An indicator only describes past prices. It cannot tell you what happens next.

The settings

This indicator has no settings to change. KAGAMI shows it without any inputs. It always uses the same fixed values. These matter most:

• Swings: a swing needs 5 candles on each side. So you see it 5 candles late.
• Typical candle size: most sizes are compared with the average size of recent candles. Traders call this the ATR (average true range). KAGAMI uses 14 candles for it.
• Order blocks: the move away must be at least 1.5 times the typical candle size. It must also break structure.
• Volume: volume is how much was traded. If the chart has volume, the breaking candle needs at least average volume. The average covers the last 20 candles.
• Tall boxes: an order block taller than 3 times the typical candle size is skipped.
• Small gaps: a gap smaller than 0.2 times the typical candle size is skipped.
• Gap boxes: each gap box is 6 candles long.
• How many: only the newest marks stay. There are at most 5 green and 5 red order blocks. Gaps keep at most 5 from rises and 5 from falls. There are at most 10 BOS lines and 5 CHoCH lines each way. There are at most 10 peak labels and 10 dip labels.

When it can mislead

• Swings show up late. A swing is only known 5 candles after it happens. Its label is then drawn back on the swing's own candle. On older parts of the chart, it looks as if it was known at once.
• The newest label can move. Say two peaks come in a row, with no dip between them. If the second peak is higher, the label moves to it.
• The forming candle is ignored. The last candle on the chart is still forming. The indicator never judges it. A break shows only after that candle has closed.
• Choppy markets. When price moves sideways, it breaks swings often, both ways. You then see many BOS and CHoCH lines close together.
• Failed zones vanish. A box is removed once a candle closes through it. So the zones that failed are gone from the chart. The boxes left can look more reliable than they really were.
• Few candles. A new market or a short history gives few marks. Boxes need at least 14 candles. A swing needs at least 11.
• Only recent history. KAGAMI reads at most about the last 2,000 candles. Scroll further back, and you see no marks. Marks near that far edge can differ from other charts.
• Jumps between trading days. A stock can open far from the last day's close. The indicator treats that jump like any fast move. It can draw a gap there.
• Names are not promises. "Order block" and "fair value gap" are only names for shapes. Price may ignore them completely.

Charts are for learning, not advice. Read our Risk Disclaimer.

An example

Here is a made-up example on NASDAQ:AAPL with the 15 minutes timeframe. The prices are round numbers, not real ones.

1. Add CBc Advance Smart Money to the chart.
2. Say prices have been falling. The labels read LH and LL. The trend is down.
3. Say the last swing high is at 104. Later, a candle closes at 105.
4. That close is above 104, against the downtrend. A dashed CHoCH line appears at 104.
5. The line runs from the swing high's candle to the candle that closed at 105.
6. Say the last falling candle before the rise went from 101 down to 99.
7. Say the rise was big enough. A green box then appears from 99 to 101. A dotted line marks 100.
8. Say the rise also left a gap between 102 and 103. The candle that closed at 105 is one of its three candles. So a cyan BAG box appears there.
9. Later, a candle dips to 102.5. It trades into the gap. The box turns pale indigo and now reads FVG.
10. If a later candle closes below 99, the green box disappears.
11. If a later candle closes above the next swing high, that line reads BOS. The trend is already up.

Technical details

This part is for readers who want the exact rules. KAGAMI's servers run them, one closed candle at a time, from the oldest candle to the newest.

The calculation

What it reads. The chart's own symbol and timeframe, from KAGAMI's own data: the latest 2,000 candles at most, fewer when the data source has fewer. The candle still forming is left out. With fewer than 3 closed candles, nothing is drawn.

The shared building blocks:

1. True range of a candle: the largest of three distances. These are high to low, the previous close to the high, and the previous close to the low. On the first candle it is high minus low.
2. ATR(14), the average true range: on the 14th candle, the plain average of the first 14 true ranges. After that, ATR = (13 × ATR of the candle before + true range) ÷ 14. The first 13 candles have no ATR.
3. Volume average: the plain average volume of the last 20 candles, this candle included. Volume sum: their total. Both are missing on the first 19 candles.
4. Swing high at candle p: its high is above the high of each of the 5 candles before it, and at least equal to the high of each of the 5 candles after it. It is confirmed on candle p + 5, when the fifth candle after it closes.
5. Swing low at candle p: the mirror. Its low is below the low of each of the 5 candles before it, and at most equal to the low of each of the 5 candles after it.

The order on every closed candle: 1 structure and breaks, 2 order blocks, 3 BOS lines, 4 gaps, 5 swing labels, 6 CHoCH lines. Each part is below.

Inputs

KAGAMI shows this indicator without inputs. It always uses the fixed values below: the original Pine script's defaults. The last column shows what the original lets you choose. None of these can be changed in KAGAMI, and no part can be turned off.

Two more values are fixed in the original too: the ATR length (14 candles) and the volume average length (20 candles).

Structure and breaks

1. When a swing high is confirmed, it becomes the last swing high and is marked unbroken. It replaces the one before it, broken or not. Swing lows work the same way.
2. A bullish break is the first closed candle whose close is above the last swing high, while that swing is unbroken. The swing is then marked broken, so each swing breaks once at most. A wick above the level doesn't count. A close exactly at the level doesn't either.
3. A bearish break is the mirror: the first close below the last unbroken swing low.
4. The trend starts as none. A bullish break sets it to up. A bearish break sets it to down.
5. A bullish break while the trend is down is a change of character (CHoCH). Any other bullish break, with the trend up or no trend yet, is a break of structure (BOS). Bearish breaks are the mirror. So the very first break is always a BOS.
6. Order blocks and breakaway gaps use every break, BOS and CHoCH alike.

The BOS and CHoCH lines

• Drawn when the breaking candle closes. Never changed after that.
• A straight, flat line, 1 pixel wide, at the broken swing's price. It runs from the swing's own candle to the breaking candle.
• BOS lines are solid. CHoCH lines are dashed.
• The caption BOS or CHoCH sits in the middle of the line: above it for a bullish break, below it for a bearish one. It is text only, with no box, in the line's colour.
• Colours: bullish emerald green #10B981, bearish soft red #EF4444, both fully solid.
• Kept: 10 BOS lines per side and 5 CHoCH lines per side. A new line deletes the oldest of its own side and kind. Nothing else removes them.

The order blocks

The candidate (bullish side). Every bearish candle (close below open) becomes the new candidate. Its zone runs from its high (the top) to its low (the bottom). The move's lowest low starts at its low. Each later candle that is not bearish extends the move and updates the lowest low. A doji (close equal to open) only extends the move. It is never a candidate or a breaking candle.

Birth (bullish side). A bullish candle (close above open) makes a block from the candidate when all of these hold at its close:

• ATR is available and above zero.
• This candidate has not made a block yet. Each candle makes one block at most.
• Displacement: the close minus the move's lowest low (the candidate included) is at least 1.5 × ATR.
• The candle is a bullish break: it closes above the last unbroken swing high (a BOS or a CHoCH).
• Volume: if the volume sum of the last 20 candles is above zero, the candle's volume is at least the 20-candle volume average. Otherwise volume isn't checked.
• The zone's height (top minus bottom) is above zero and at most 3 × ATR.

The new block starts active. Its box runs from the candidate candle to 20 candles past the breaking candle.

The bearish side is the mirror. The candidate is the last bullish candle, and the move's highest high is tracked. Displacement is that highest high minus the close. The breaking candle is bearish and closes below the last unbroken swing low.

Lifecycle. On every closed candle, existing blocks are judged first, newest to oldest. New blocks are born after that, so a block is first judged on the candle after its birth.

• Removed: a close beyond the far edge deletes the block at once, active or finished. For a bullish block that is a close below its bottom. For a bearish block, a close above its top.
• Touched: the first later candle that trades into an active zone. For a bullish block, a low at or below the top. For a bearish block, a high at or above the bottom. The block stays, paler.
• Active: on every closed candle, the right edge moves to 20 candles past that candle.
• Finished: when a new block is born on the same side, the side's active block finishes. Its right edge freezes on the new block's birth candle. It is drawn 30% fainter and is no longer checked for touches. A bearish block never finishes a bullish one, and the other way round.
• Back on: if the newest block left on a side is finished (the block that finished it was removed), it becomes active again. It takes back its normal look and moves forward again.
• Kept: 5 blocks per side, touched and finished ones included. A new block deletes the oldest of its side.

The look. A box from the candidate candle to the right edge, between the zone's top and bottom. Bullish blocks are emerald green #10B981, bearish blocks soft red #EF4444. The border is solid and 1 pixel wide. A dotted 1-pixel line runs along the middle, at (top + bottom) ÷ 2. Transparency (0 = solid, 100 = invisible):

"30% fainter" means new transparency = round(100 − (100 − transparency) × 0.7), halves rounded up.

The gaps

Birth. On the close of every candle while ATR is above zero, the last three candles are checked. This candle is the third.

• Bullish gap: the third candle's low is above the first candle's high. The gap runs from the first candle's high (bottom) to the third candle's low (top).
• Bearish gap: the third candle's high is below the first candle's low. The gap runs from the third candle's high (bottom) to the first candle's low (top).
• The gap must be at least 0.2 × ATR tall. The middle candle's body isn't checked.
• One candle makes one gap at most. The bullish check comes first.
• It is a breakaway gap when the latest break on its side happened on one of its three candles: a bullish break for a bullish gap, a bearish break for a bearish gap. Otherwise it is a fair value gap.

Lifecycle. On every closed candle, existing gaps are judged first, newest to oldest. New gaps are born after that.

• Filled: a close beyond the far edge deletes the gap at once, active or finished. For a bullish gap that is a close below its bottom. For a bearish gap, a close above its top. A wick through doesn't fill it.
• Touched: the first later candle that trades into it. For a bullish gap, a low at or below the top. For a bearish gap, a high at or above the bottom. The gap stays, paler. A breakaway gap becomes a plain fair value gap here: caption FVG, the fair value gap colour and a dashed border. Unlike order blocks, finished gaps are still checked for touches.
• Finished: when a new gap is born on the same side, the side's newest gap finishes. It is drawn 30% fainter. Its box doesn't move.
• Kept: 5 gaps per side, touched and finished ones included. A new gap deletes the oldest of its side.

The look. The box starts on the first candle and is always 6 candles long: its three candles plus three more. It never moves. The caption FVG or BAG is centred on the fourth candle, at the middle of the gap, as text only in the box's colour.

• Fair value gap: indigo #6366F1 (bullish) or amber #F59E0B (bearish). A dashed border, 1 pixel wide.
• Breakaway gap: cyan #06B6D4 (bullish) or violet #8B5CF6 (bearish). A solid border, 2 pixels wide.

Transparency (0 = solid, 100 = invisible), with the same "30% fainter" rule as the order blocks:

The swing labels

• The labels use the same swings as the breaks. They form one path that alternates: high, low, high, low.
• A swing on the other side from the newest point becomes the newest point. It is labelled against the previous point on its own side. A high above the previous high point is HH, otherwise LH. A low above the previous low point is HL, otherwise LL. So an equal high is LH and an equal low is LL.
• The first point on each side has nothing to compare with. It gets no label.
• Two in a row: a swing on the same side as the newest point, with no swing on the other side between them. A higher high (or a lower low) takes over the newest point. Its label moves to the new swing and is worked out again against the point before. A lower high (or a higher low) is skipped. So only the newest point can move. Every earlier point is fixed.
• Both at once: one candle can be both a swing high and a swing low. Then the side that alternates with the newest point goes first.
• Each label is drawn on the swing's own candle, at its high or low, once the swing is confirmed 5 candles later.
• HH and HL are emerald green #10B981. LH and LL are soft red #EF4444. The label's box has transparency 10. The text is white #FFFFFF, small.
• A high's label is a balloon above the high, pointing down at it. A low's label is a filled box just below the low, with no pointer.
• Kept: 10 high labels and 10 low labels. A new label deletes the oldest of its side.

When values change

• Closed candles only. A candle counts as closed once its start time plus the timeframe's length has passed, by the clock of KAGAMI's servers. The forming candle is never judged, so nothing appears or moves in the middle of a candle.
• Refresh. The page asks for the drawings again when the chart sees a new candle begin. It also asks about every 60 seconds while the page is in view. On seconds charts, it redraws at most once every 2 seconds.
• Fixed once drawn: BOS and CHoCH lines, the place and length of every gap box, an order block's left edge, top and bottom, and every swing label except the newest point's.
• Can still change: the active order block's right edge (one candle per close). The paler look after a touch or a finish. A breakaway gap turning into a fair value gap. Blocks and gaps deleted when a candle closes through them. The oldest mark of a kind deleted when a new one is born. The newest swing label moving to a higher high or a lower low.
• The window moves. The rules run over the latest candles only. As new candles arrive, the oldest leave the window, and the trend starts again from none at its first candle. So marks near the far left can change or disappear. Marks further right usually come out the same.
• Just after a close. KAGAMI keeps fetched candles for up to 10 seconds. So a candle can be judged on prices read a few seconds before it closed. Its marks are worked out again once its final prices arrive, so a fresh mark can change once, at the next refresh.

Timeframes

• It works on every timeframe KAGAMI offers: 1, 5, 10, 15 and 30 seconds (crypto only), minutes, hours, 1 day, 1 week and 1 month.
• Every rule counts candles, never clock time: 5 candles on each side of a swing, 20 candles ahead, 6-candle gap boxes. Every size is a multiple of the same timeframe's ATR(14), never points, pips or percent. So it reads the same way on every timeframe and market.
• Breaks in trading (stock nights and weekends, the FX weekend) are just the next candle. A price jump across one is judged like any three candles, so it can make a fair value gap.
• Daily stock charts: a day's candle counts as closed at midnight New York time, not at the 16:00 close. So that day's marks appear after midnight New York.
• Monthly charts: the closed-candle check counts every month as 30 days. A 31-day month's candle is judged on its last day. February's candle is judged up to two days after February ends.
• Seconds charts: 2,000 one-second candles cover about 33 minutes, so the window is short. Fewer candles may be available there.

Differences from the original Pine script

KAGAMI draws all six parts of the original Pine script: structure, order blocks, breaks of structure, fair value and breakaway gaps, swing labels and changes of character. The rules, colours, captions and transparencies are the original's, at its default settings. These are the differences:

• No inputs. Every input is fixed at its default (see Inputs above). You can't turn a part off, or change a colour, a size, a count or the line style.
• No "touched" label. The original can mark the candle that first touched an order block. That option is off by default, and KAGAMI never draws it.
• History. On TradingView, the script runs over all the history the chart has loaded. KAGAMI runs it over the latest 2,000 candles at most, fewer when the data source has fewer. The trend starts from none at the first of those candles, so the oldest marks can differ. The original's limit of 9,999 candles back for a line's start never comes into play.
• Data. KAGAMI uses its own candles for the symbol. A chart of the same market from another exchange or data provider can have slightly different candles, and so different marks.
• Low labels. The original draws HL and LL as balloons pointing up at the low. The chart has no such balloon. So KAGAMI draws a filled box just below the low, with no pointer and bold text. The HH and LH labels use the chart's own balloon drawing, which looks a little different from the original's label.
• Caption position. BOS and CHoCH captions sit at the exact middle of their line. The original puts them on the candle nearest the middle.
• When a candle closes. Daily stock candles and monthly candles count as closed by the clock rules under Timeframes above. The original's candles close with the market or the month.
• Refresh. TradingView redraws at each candle's close. KAGAMI redraws shortly after the chart sees the next candle begin, and again about every minute. On seconds charts, it redraws at most every 2 seconds.
• Locked drawings. You can't select, move or edit them, and they are not saved. If you delete them with the chart's own drawing tools, they come back at the next refresh.
• Timeframes. The original describes itself for charts from 10 seconds to 1 day. KAGAMI draws it on every timeframe it offers, from 1 second to 1 month.

Edge cases

• Too few candles: with fewer than 3 closed candles, nothing is drawn. The first 13 candles have no ATR, so no order block or gap is born there. Swings and breaks don't need ATR. The first swing can be confirmed on the 11th candle.
• ATR of zero: if every candle so far has had no range at all, ATR is zero. That can happen at the start of a quiet one-second chart, where candles without trades are flat. No new block or gap is born while ATR is zero. Existing ones still update. Once any candle has a range, ATR stays above zero.
• No volume: if the last 20 candles have no volume at all, the volume rule is off. It is also off on the first 19 candles. Missing volume counts as zero.
• Equal prices: of equal highs within 5 candles of each other, only the first can be a swing high. The same goes for equal lows. A close exactly at a swing's level is not a break. A close exactly at a block's or a gap's far edge doesn't delete it. A low exactly at a bullish zone's top counts as a touch, and a high exactly at a bearish zone's bottom too.
• Doji candles: a candle with close equal to open is never an order block candidate or a breaking candle.
• Zero-height zones: a candidate candle whose high equals its low makes no block. A gap is never zero-height, because its edges are strictly apart.
• One candle, many marks: one candle can give one order block, one break (BOS or CHoCH) and one gap, plus up to two swing labels.
• Missing candles: where the data has no candle, the rules simply move on to the next candle there is.
• A new symbol or timeframe: all drawings are cleared and worked out again for the new chart.