Structured Trading Glossary

The terms of structured market reading, futures trading and prop firms, defined simply and without folklore. Missing a word? Others are probably missing it too: write to us.

Reading the market

Structured market reading

A method of analysis that reads a chart as ordered structure (swing highs and lows, levels, liquidity, ranges and trends) rather than as a stream of isolated signals. A zone only carries weight when several independent reads agree on it. The method, explained in full.

Market structure

The skeleton of a chart, formed by the sequence of its swing highs and swing lows. Their order indicates the market regime (rising, falling, hesitating); a break in that sequence indicates a change of regime.

Swing high and swing low

Local turning points of price. A swing high is a peak framed by lower highs, a swing low is a trough framed by higher lows. They are the elementary building blocks of structure.

Break of structure

A clear break of the swing high or swing low that was organizing the current structure. On its own it predicts nothing: it signals that the previous regime no longer holds.

Trend

A market regime where swing highs and swing lows succeed one another in the same direction, up or down. A trend is read in the direction of its impulses.

Impulse

A marked directional move, in the direction of the trend. Impulses produce the displacement; corrections let the market breathe between them.

Order block

The last cluster of candles running against the move, right before a clear impulse takes off. It marks where the move started; it proves nothing about who was behind it and guarantees no reaction from price. The concept, in detail.

Correction

A temporary pullback against the trend, usually slower and shallower than the impulse before it. A correction that gets too deep questions the structure itself.

Range

A directionless market regime, where price oscillates between an upper and a lower boundary. A range is read between its boundaries; applying trend logic to it is one of the most common reading mistakes.

Consolidation

A market pause after a move, taking the form of a narrow range or a compression. On its own, it does not say in which direction it will resolve.

Liquidity

The concentration of orders at certain prices, typically above obvious highs, below obvious lows and at the edges of ranges. Where liquidity sits explains many of the sharp moves around levels.

Liquidity grab

A fast incursion of price beyond an obvious level, triggering the orders resting there before turning back. From afar it looks like a breakout; up close, price failed to hold beyond the level.

False breakout

A break of a level that does not hold, with price quickly moving back inside its previous territory. Telling a breakout from a false breakout is done after the fact, by whether price holds, never at the moment of the break.

Level

A price where the market has already reacted visibly (a prior high, a prior low, a zone worked several times). A level shows where a reaction is more likely than elsewhere, never what that reaction will be.

Support

A level below current price where buying reactions have already been observed. A support is not a guaranteed floor: it is a zone to watch.

Resistance

A level above current price where selling reactions have already been observed. Same status as support: a zone to watch, not a barrier.

Round number

A "psychological" price at a round figure (for example 20,000 on the Nasdaq) where reactions are frequent, because many participants rest orders there. At Ephore, the tool that plots them is called Rondator.

Confluence

The agreement of several independent reads (structure, level, liquidity, trend) on the same price zone. Confluence ranks the zones that deserve attention; it predicts nothing and guarantees no result.

Timeframe

The observation scale of a chart (monthly, daily, hourly, minute). Structured reading articulates timeframes in a fixed order: higher timeframes provide context and zones, lower timeframes provide the trigger.

Bias

The directional hypothesis for the session or the period, derived from context (higher-timeframe structure, market climate). A bias is a revisable working hypothesis, not a conviction.

Price action

Reading price itself (candles, structure, levels) as the raw material of analysis, before any indicator. Structured market reading is price action organized into a method.

Execution and risk

Trading plan

A written framework that defines in advance what you trade, under which conditions, with which risk and which limits. A method that is not written down deforms under the emotion of live markets.

Trading journal

A record of what the structure showed, what you read and what you did, trade by trade. The gap between the three is what makes you progress.

Stop (stop-loss)

An order that automatically closes a position at a loss level defined in advance. The stop materializes the accepted risk; trading without a stop means your risk was never defined.

R (risk multiple)

A unit that measures an outcome in multiples of the initial risk of a trade. Losing 1 R, winning 2 R: thinking in R lets you judge execution independently of amounts.

Position size

The number of contracts (or shares) committed to a trade, calculated from the accepted risk and the stop distance, never the other way around.

Drawdown

The decline of an account from its peak. It is measured in amount or in percentage, and managing it sits at the center of prop firm rules. The table of Apex's 4 account sizes.

Prop firms

Prop firm (proprietary trading firm)

A company that allocates capital to traders selected through an evaluation, in exchange for a profit split. The trader pays for the evaluation and trades under the account's rules. Understanding the rules before paying for an evaluation.

Evaluation

The selection phase of a prop firm, on a simulated account, with a profit target and loss rules to respect. Passing it gives access to the funded account. The rules of all 8 firms, checked every morning.

Funded account

The account obtained after the evaluation, whose profits are shared between the trader and the firm under the terms of the contract.

Trailing drawdown

A loss limit that FOLLOWS the account's peak instead of staying fixed. Its exact mechanics (end-of-day or real-time calculation, freezing at a threshold) vary by firm and change regularly: they are to be checked in the firm's official rules. The Apex trailing drawdown calculator.

Daily loss limit

The maximum loss allowed in one day, beyond which the account is suspended or closed depending on the firm. It is a survival rule before being a constraint. Flex or Daily at Tradeify, two very different paths.

Consistency rule

A rule that caps the share of total profit a single day may represent, to require results spread over time. Thresholds vary by firm. The prop firm rule change log.

Buffer

The cushion of profit accumulated above the drawdown threshold, which gives a funded account its room to breathe. Building it is the priority of the first weeks of a funded account. The three freezing regimes of the Apex threshold.

Payout

The withdrawal of profits from a funded account. Conditions (qualifying days, minimums, caps, delays) are specific to each firm and are to be checked at the source. Drawdown, Safety Net and payouts at Apex.

Contract scaling

The progressive increase of the number of contracts allowed on a funded account, following steps defined by the firm.

Reset

A paid restart of an evaluation after a failure, offered by most firms.

Futures

Futures contract

A standardized contract, listed on a centralized and regulated exchange, to buy or sell an asset at a given expiry. Index futures are the main playing field of prop firms.

Micro and mini

Two sizes of the same index contract (the micro is one tenth of the mini). Size changes the exposure, not the reading of the chart.

Tick

The smallest possible price increment of a contract. Each contract has its tick size and tick value, defined by the exchange.

Point value

The amount gained or lost per contract when price moves by one point. It is read in the official contract specification, never from memory.

Margin

The deposit required to hold a position on a contract. At a prop firm, the firm manages margin; on a personal account, it is checked with the broker.

Session

A trading time window. On US futures, the reference is the New York regular session; activity and reading are not the same outside of it.

The Ephore indicators (the 6 main ones)

The Ephore indicators are proprietary TradingView tools (Pine Script). Each one makes ONE element of structured reading visible: they save reading time, they never replace the read, and none of them predicts the market.

Detector

Makes visible the price zones that matter for the read, where the market has left exploitable traces. It provides the zones; the decision remains a matter of confluence.

Pivator

Plots the pivot levels that structure the session and larger periods. A Pivator level serves as a confluence reference, never as an isolated signal.

Moyenator

Makes the trend readable at a glance through organized moving averages. It gives the direction of the current, not the moment to act.

Climator

Gives the bias of the period, the market climate in which the session opens. It is a context tool, to be read before any trigger tool.

Signator

Materializes signals when a majority of the method's conditions agree. A Signator signal is an invitation to check the confluence, not an order to buy or sell.

Rondator

Automatically plots the relevant round numbers of the instrument, notably on the Nasdaq. It makes visible the references many participants watch, hence where reactions are frequent.

Going further

This glossary gives you the vocabulary. Where to go next, depending on what you are looking for:

This glossary is educational and does not constitute investment advice. Futures trading involves substantial risk of capital loss.