chart patterns

Trends in a stock’s price and volume data identified on a graphical chart by trendlines. Using chart patterns to try to forecast the price movement of a stock is called technical analysis. If a pattern on a chart appears, a chart watcher can create a framework for what the market might do if and when prices break free from that pattern. The three basic goals of the tools used to create chart patterns are to see where the stock is currently trading and figuring out how it got there; determine the power of a trend; and make comparisons of the stock to the market, its peers in its own industry and even to its own history.