VWAP

What it calculates

The volume-weighted average price (VWAP) adds up every trade of the session multiplied by its size and divides by total volume. It is the "fair" price at which trading actually took place since the open. It starts fresh every session and moves along with it.

Why institutional traders hold it sacred

Institutions measure their executions against it: whoever bought below the session VWAP executed better than the market, and whoever bought above it paid a premium. That is why algorithmic orders cluster around it, turning it from a measure into a real zone of reaction inside the session.

Reading it live

Price above it means the session's buyers are ahead, and below it that sellers own the day. Repeated bounces off it in quiet sessions are a familiar pattern: algorithms rebalance there. A sharp move away from it with no return says the day is directional, not balanced.

Hypothetical example

A stock opened at $50 and traded heavily in the morning between $50 and $51, so its VWAP is near $50.6. A pullback to $50.2 finds buyers there again and again. It is not magic. Institutional execution orders measure themselves against it.

Common mistake

Using it outside its time frame. It is a one-session measure, and weeks-long readings need its extended versions or other measures. Its strength also lies in deep-liquidity symbols. In thin ones, any large order drives it.

Why it resets every session

Because it is a single-day execution benchmark: large-order traders are measured against it within the session, so carrying it across days strips its meaning and turns it into a slow average nobody uses. That is why it is read as context by multi-day traders and as a direct tool by those trading within the session.

Where to see it on the platform

The quant tools show it among the session metrics, and the scanner terminal draws it on the live chart of the selected symbol.

The technical chart draws it on the daily time frame and below, and the scanner terminal shows where price sits relative to it.