Wyckoff upthrust
BearishA tight box is broken above on heavy volume but the close falls back inside — supply met the breakout instead of demand carrying it, a downside warning
Most patterns resolve their way only 50–60% of the time — nearly half miss.
Textbook shape
How to read it
A tight box is broken above on heavy volume, but the close falls back inside. The mirror of a spring, with the volume condition inverted.
It reads as supply meeting the breakout instead of demand carrying it — and the heavy volume is the point. A quiet poke above and back is just a failed break; a loud one is a record that someone sold size right there.
It is a staple of Wyckoff's distribution phase. Whether the bottom of the box holds afterwards is the follow-up.
Real example
US stockDISDaily
Completed 2021-08-13
CryptoBTC-USDDaily
Completed 2023-07-13
A window SQMATE's detectors actually flagged in past bars. It records a day that worked out — the same shape doesn't always resolve the same way.
On SQMATE
No more eyeballing charts
You don't have to flip through charts hunting for shapes. Signal watch pings your browser the moment a condition is met, patterns on your watchlist arrive by email, and the screener lists every symbol that matched today.
SQMATE draws the lines
Support lines, trendlines, channels — the lines you need to read a pattern are drawn for you, so no time goes into drawing.
Patterns aren't the whole story
The same shape doesn't always resolve the same way. It's safer to read it together with candles, volume, and market context — news, catalysts, flows.