UMR Orderflow TOS Dots

Time and Sales gets noisy fast.

You can have the right data and still struggle to read urgency, slippage, and size because everything arrives as one fast stream of prints. That is where UMR Orderflow TOS Dots earns its keep.

Instead of forcing you to decode a scrolling list, it turns the tape into a visual layout that separates normal aggression from abnormal prints.

The Core Read

At the center of the study are four trade classes:

Above Ask
Ask
Bid
Below Bid

They are not cosmetic labels. They tell you what kind of trade just happened.

• Ask A buy-side trade that printed at the ask.
• Bid A sell-side trade that printed at the bid.
• Above Ask A trade that printed above the best ask.
• Below Bid A trade that printed below the best bid.

That last pair matters because it often signals urgency, slippage, stops, or forced execution.

Why That Classification Matters

If you flatten all tape prints into one marker style, you lose the difference between normal aggression and stressed aggression.

These are not the same thing:

Ask trade       -> buyer lifts the offer
Above-ask trade -> buyer pays through the offer

or:

Bid trade       -> seller hits the bid
Below-bid trade -> seller trades through the bid

UMR Orderflow TOS Dots makes that difference visible.

Two Main Layout Modes

The study supports two vertical plot modes:

Price Axis

Prints follow actual price.

That is useful when you want the tape tied directly to the chart and you care about where aggression happened in price space.

Centered Mid Line

Prints move onto fixed lanes:

Above Ask lane
Ask lane
---------------- center ----------------
Bid lane
Below Bid lane

This is useful when you want tape readability first. You stop chasing price wiggles and start reading the flow itself.

That is why centered mode works well in a dedicated region or a docked Region 1 overlay.

Aggregation Changes The Story

The study is not limited to one-record-per-print display. It supports:

Do Not Combine
Same Time and Price
Same Time and Type
Combine into Exchange Reported Summary Trade

That matters because different traders want different levels of compression.

• Do Not Combine Rawest tape feel.
• Same Time and Price Good for obvious bursts at one price.
• Same Time and Type Good for grouping same-side aggression.
• Exchange Reported Summary Trade Useful when Sierra exposes exchange summary and unbundled markers, so the study can combine the full flagged sequence.

That last mode is often the cleanest default when the feed supports it.

Size Matters, But It Has To Stay Readable

The study supports several ways to make larger prints stand out:

• variable sizing
• relative sizing profiles
• variable color intensity
• optional borders
• text labels

That means you can show importance without hiding everything smaller.

A useful visual hierarchy looks like this:

small dot   -> background participation
large dot   -> meaningful size
bordered    -> size or slippage deserves extra attention
text label  -> exact size matters here

The point is not to make the tape louder. The point is to make the important prints easier to separate from the background flow.

Borders And Slippage Are Not Decorative

Borders matter because they let you call attention to prints that need a second look.

That can mean:

• large dots
• slippage dots
• large or slippage dots
• all dots, if you want a stronger outline language

When the market gets fast, that extra separation helps a lot.

Alerts Are Per Class

The study also supports separate alerts for:

• ask trades
• bid trades
• above-ask trades
• below-bid trades

with separate minimum-volume thresholds.

That is useful because not every large print deserves the same treatment.

A big bid hit and a big above-ask slippage print are different events. The study lets you react to them differently.

A Good Way To Deploy It

Two strong layouts:

Option 1
Region 1 -> Bottom Docked centered tape

Option 2
Region 2 -> Centered Mid Line tape panel

Use Region 1 when you want the tape glued to the execution view. Use a separate region when you want cleaner tape reading without price-chart interference.

Where It Is Strongest

This study is strongest when you care about:

• aggressive buying versus aggressive selling
• urgency around the inside market
• size without losing the smaller supporting flow
• tape structure that stays readable during busy periods

It is less useful if you want:

• a DOM ladder
• a right-edge time-and-sales table
• pure text-only tape

This is a visual tape tool.