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Algorithms: The Four Things

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Definition An algorithm has to be told exactly four things: what symbol, buy or sell, how (sit on the bid or take the offer), and when. Full timeframe continuity is the fourth instruction showing on the chart: price above (or below) the month, week, day, and 60 opens at once is the market literally displaying “buy, take the offer, this month, this week, today, right now.”

Most of the tape is not people. 70 to 75%+ of US equity volume is executed by programs (SEC Staff Report on Algorithmic Trading, 2020; JPMorgan estimate, CNBC), and a program cannot improvise. Algorithms are dumb: someone has to give each one its instructions. That is the edge: instructions are finite, and the chart shows you what they were.

The four things

Rob’s formulation: you have to tell a computer program four things. (1) What symbol? Tesla. (2) Buy or sell? Buy. (3) How? Sit on the bid, or take the offer. Take the offer. (4) When? Now. Four questions, four answers, and the order flow that follows is fully determined. The “how” is the aggression switch: a program sitting on the bid supplies liquidity and waits; a program told to take the offer causes price movement, the same distinction that makes a bar green or red in the first place.

An algorithm has to be told exactly four things: what symbol, buy or sell, how, and when — and full timeframe continuity is the fourth instruction showing on the chart across the month, week, day and 60-minute opens An algorithm has to be told exactly four things 1What symbol?“Tesla.” 2Buy or sell?“Buy.” 3How?“Take the offer” — not sit on the bid. 4When?“Now.” This month, this week, today, right now. “When” is the four opens M above the month open → this month W above the week open → this week D above the day open → today 60 above the 60 open → right now all four at once = FTFC up TheStrat.AI
The four instructions. The fourth one, when, is what the opens measure. Above the month, week, day, and 60 opens at once, the answer to “when?” was: this month, this week, today, right now.

The chart shows you the instructions

Price does not move so much as aggregate: for every buyer there is a seller, and the last sale is the running record of who is getting their price. So when every timeframe is green at the same time, buyers are the aggressive side on every timeframe at once, taking the offer monthly, weekly, daily, and hourly. It is the only thing that could produce the condition. FTFC up reads, literally: “Tesla, buy, take the offer, now.” And if it were all humans instead of machines, the read would be identical: buyers are more aggressive. The algorithms just make it literal.

Moves accelerate when a machine is told to take the offer and the move starts stopping people out: the stop orders remove liquidity from the book, which makes it go faster. Forced exits plus instructed aggression in the same direction is the fuel behind every fast move (see the pivot machine gun and the kicker).

The fourth instruction is timeframe continuity

“When” has four answers: this month, this week, today, and right now. Each one is measured from an open, and each open defines a participation group. That is why FTFC identifies algorithmic behavior: all four answers visible at once. It is also why the flip matters: every new 60-minute open at the bottom of the hour re-asks “right now?”, and the answer either re-confirms or it does not.

The tape below (real data, MRVL, July 1 to 2 2026) shows the instructions switching sides live. The morning prints FTFC up: buy, take the offer, now. Sellers press the fresh month open, two outside hours expand the range, and when the last sale takes the week open every group is red: the instructions are now sell, hit the bid, this month, this week, today, right now, and 2d follows 2d until the order is done (the full anatomy is on meta-orders and execution algorithms).

The whole life of a sell meta-order on MRVL, July 1 to 2 2026: the setup bar, the outside hour, the second outside hour expanding the broadening formation as FTFC flips down, then 2d after 2d of follow-through from 271 to 242, the prints shrinking as the order runs out, and finally the 60-minute reversal back up — the order is complete. Aggregated from the 5-minute stream. $240 $250 $260 $270 $280 $290 60-minute Wed Jul 1 Thu Jul 2 setup 3 3 2d 2d 2d 2d 2d 3 2u the reversal — order complete BF expanding Month Jul Week this wk Day Wed Thu July open = Wed open 282.48 week open 272.41 MRVL, July 1–2 2026 — the life of one sell order, five minutes at a time M W D 60 FTFC UP — all four green FTFC DOWN — all four red TIME & SALES one meta-order, start to finish BUY 2,400offer lifted ↑ BUY 5,100offer lifted ↑ SELL 900 BUY 600 SELL 2,200 SELL 3,100 SELL 4,000bid hit ↓ SELL 7,231bid hit ↓ SELL 11,400bid hit ↓ SELL 16,000bid hit ↓ SELL 13,644bid hit ↓ SELL 21,500bid hit ↓ SELL 3,800smaller… SELL 1,200smaller… SELL 400smaller… BUY 4,500offer lifted ↑ BUY 9,200offer lifted ↑ sizes illustrative — the candles are real July 1: the month opens ON this bar — and at the open everything is green: FTFC up, the buy programs in control sellers press the fresh month open — someone very large has started selling the setup bar, then an outside hour… then another: the BF expands — the algorithms are switching sides FTFC DOWN — and the order keeps going: 2d, 2d, 2d, 2d… follow-through from $271 to $242 the prints get smaller — the meta-order is running out of stock to sell then the 60 goes REVERSAL back up: the order is complete. The unwind is over — and the tape told you the whole way real MRVL data aggregated up from the 5-minute stream · background tint = all four timeframe groups agreeing · blue dashes = the opens and the last saleTheStrat.AI
MRVL, July 1 to 2 2026, aggregated up from the 5-minute stream. FTFC flips from up to down (the four instructions switching sides) and the follow-through runs until the sell order is complete. The background turns red the moment every group is losing from its open.

Related: Full Timeframe Continuity · Meta-Orders · Execution Algorithms · Urgency & Impact · The Flip
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TheStrat was developed by Rob Smith. These docs are written by Alex Sopa (AlexsOptions) and quote his teaching. Work in progress: spotted an error? Tell Alex.

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