Spot vs Futures Flow Analytics

About This Feature

Spot vs Futures Flow Analytics compares aggressive buying and selling activity across Spot and Futures markets. It helps users understand which market shows stronger trading pressure during price movements and whether both markets are confirming or diverging from each other. This analysis describes trading activity and does not establish direct causation or predict future price movements.

Data Coverage

Spot: Binance, Bybit, KuCoin, Kraken, Bitget, Gate and other exchanges, from each exchange's own trade feed.

Futures: Binance, Bybit, Gate, Bitget and other exchanges. USDT-margined and USDC-margined perpetual contracts are included; coin-margined contracts are not included yet.

An exchange is counted for a date range only when it has nearly complete data for the whole range, so Spot and Futures totals always compare a stable set of exchanges. The exchanges used are listed under the chart.

Event tags appear only on closed candles where both markets have complete data. All times are UTC; values are in USD.

Futures history starts on the first date each exchange has complete data.

Event Types – Chart Tags

• ↑ S RiseSpot-led Rise

  Price rose during the candle and Spot showed clearly stronger unusual buying than Futures.

• ↑ F RiseFutures-led Rise

  Price rose during the candle and Futures showed clearly stronger unusual buying than Spot.

• ↓ S DropSpot-led Drop

  Price fell during the candle and Spot showed clearly stronger unusual selling than Futures.

• ↓ F DropFutures-led Drop

  Price fell during the candle and Futures showed clearly stronger unusual selling than Spot.

• ↔ DivDivergence

  Spot and Futures leaned in opposite directions, each with notable pressure and unusually active trading.

• ⇧ JointJoint Confirmation

  Spot and Futures both moved with the price, with unusual pressure of similar strength.

Tags describe trading activity during a candle. They do not explain why the price moved and do not predict what comes next.

Symbol Guide

Net Buy (Net Flow)

The difference between aggressive buying and aggressive selling in a market, in USD. Positive values mean buyers were more aggressive; negative values mean sellers were.

Buy Ratio

The share of aggressive trading volume that came from buyers. Around half means buyers and sellers were balanced.

Spot Volume

Total aggressive buying plus selling on spot markets over the period, in USD.

Futures Volume

Total aggressive buying plus selling on perpetual futures over the period, in USD, counted from the same trades as the futures net flow.

Futures / Spot

How many times larger futures trading activity was than spot trading activity over the same period.

Flow Pressure

How one-sided aggressive trading was in a market, from fully selling to fully buying, regardless of how much was traded.

Flow Impulse

How large a candle's net flow was compared with the typical trading activity of the same market and timeframe over the previous seven days. High values mark unusual activity.

Flow Divergence

The gap between Spot and Futures pressure, in percentage points. It compares relative pressure, not USD amounts.

Cumulative Net Flow

The running total of net flow since the start of the selected date range, shown separately for Spot and Futures.

See also Spot Flow Analytics and Relative Volume Analytics.