Skip to content
GetProfitable
Search
Dictionary

Dark cloud cover

A two-candle bearish pattern where a green candle is followed by one that opens higher and closes below the midpoint of the green body.

The mirror of the piercing-line. After an advance, a candle opens above the prior high, attracts sellers, and closes well into the previous body, below its midpoint.

The story is a failed gap: early buyers paid up at the open and were trapped as price slid all day. The deeper the close into the prior candle, the more traders are offside.

Like piercing lines, it needs a genuine opening gap to qualify, which limits it to instruments with session breaks. In continuous markets the closest equivalent is a wide-range-bar reversing off the overnight-high-low. Confirmation from the next candle closing lower substantially improves the read.

Related: piercing-line, bearish-engulfing, evening-star, gap

See it drawn

Original diagrams for the ideas on this page. Illustrative, not real market data.

The parts of a candlestickAn up candle and a down candle with the same high and low, labelled with open, high, low, close, the real body and the wicks.UP CANDLEclose above openHigh 41.00Close 40.30Open 38.20Low 37.40upper wickreal bodyopen to closelower wickDOWN CANDLEclose below openHigh 41.00Open 40.30Close 38.20Low 37.40Same high and low; only the open and close swap places.
The parts of a candlestick. One candle sums up a slice of time: the thick real body runs from the opening price to the closing price, and the thin wicks reach out to the highest and lowest prices traded. Colour tells you which way the body ran.

Educational only, not advice. Spotted an error? Post in Site Feedback.