PRICE FIELDS

• Technical analysis is based almost entirely on the analysis of price and volume. The fields that define a security's price and volume are explained below.

Open-- This is the price of the first trade for the period(e.g., the first trade of the day). When analysing daily data , the open is especially important as it is the consensus price after all interested parties were able to "sleep on it".

High-- This is the highest price that the security traded during the period. It is the point at which there were more sellers than buyers.(i.e. there are always sellers willing to sell at higher prices, but the high represents the highest price that buyers were willing to pay).

Low-- This is the lowest price that the security traded during the period. It is the point at which there were more buyers than sellers(i.e., there are always buyers willing to buy at lower prices, but the low represents the lowest price sellers were willing to accept).

Close-- This is the last price that the security traded during the period. Due to its availability, the close is the most often used price for analysis. The relationship between the Open(the first price) and the Close(the last price) is considered significant by most technicians. 

Volume-- This is the number of trades/contracts that were traded during the period. The relationship between prices and volume(e.g., increasing prices accompanied by increasing volume) is important.

Open interest--  This is the number of outstanding contracts(i.e., those that have not been exercised, closed, or expired) of a future or option. Open interest is often used as an indicator.

Bid--  This is the price a market maker is willing to pay for a security(i.e., the price you will receive if you sell).

Ask-- This is the price a market maker is willing to accept(i.e., the price you will pay to buy a security).

These simple fields are used to create literally hundreds of technical tools that study price relationships, trends, patterns. etc.

Not all of these price fields are available for all security types.

                   FUTURES  MUTUALFUNDS  STOCKS  OPTIONS
OPEN               Yes                    No                 Often          Yes
HIGH                Yes            Closed end           Yes            Yes
LOW                 Yes             Closed end           Yes            Yes
CLOSE              Yes              Yes(*NAV)          Yes            Yes
VOLUME         Yes            Closed end            Yes             Yes
OPEN INT       Yes                   N/A                N/A            Often
BID             Intraday         Closed end        Intraday      Intraday
ASK            Intraday         Closed end        Intraday      Intraday