Order Flow on Dow Jones Futures (MYM)
Order flow, volume profile, VWAP and the Initial Balance on Dow Jones futures (Micro E-mini Dow, MYM), from the Order flow encyclopedia space in Hetman Capital Club. The last three articles take real sessions apart piece by piece.
What order flow is
Order flow is a picture of who is really trading: how many contracts were bought aggressively at the offer, how many were sold at the bid, and at which price levels. A candlestick chart shows where price was; order flow shows how it got there.
Why order flow on MYM
The Micro E-mini Dow (MYM) is a Dow Jones futures contract listed on the regulated CME exchange in Chicago. Every trade goes through one central order book, so the footprint, delta and the order book (DOM) show the real market, not one CFD broker's quotes (exchange or CFD broker). The micro contract (USD 0.50 per index point) lets you learn to read the market at a smaller scale than the E-mini.
Live order flow: training on the Hetman Index
Monday to Friday, during the US session, I practise order flow on a free live stream (limited version, in Polish) on the Hetman Index – a training instrument with simulated data. Times and links: Free live in the Club. The full toolset (footprint, DOM, live volume profile, the daily plan and the session recap) is in Hetman Capital Club (in Polish).
Where to start: Auction theory → Volume profile → Absorption in a real market.
Order flow articles
- Auction market theory: how the market searches for a price both sides will accept The market is neither “too expensive” nor “too cheap”. It's a continuous auction that constantly tests the price at which people want to trade. Auction…
- Exchange or Broker: CME Futures vs CFDs and Forex with a Market Maker Before you start looking for an edge, check what market you are actually trading. The same Dow Jones chart can come from a regulated exchange with…
- Volume profile: how to read the POC, value area, HVNs and LVNs A candlestick chart shows where price was and when. A volume profile shows something else: how much trading took place at each price level. It's…
- VWAP and deviation bands: what they tell you and what they don't VWAP is one of the benchmarks institutions use most often – and one of the most misunderstood indicators…
- The Initial Balance and day types: what the first hour says about the whole session The first hour of the regular session is when the market sets its initial range. In Market Profile theory it's called the Initial…
- MYM contracts and rollover: what you need to know about expiration Unlike stocks, futures contracts have an expiration date. For an MYM trader that means four times a year when you have to…
- MYM Trading Hours: Sessions, Breaks and Clock Changes MYM trades almost around the clock, but not every hour is the same. Liquidity, volatility and the character of the moves depend on…
- The macro calendar: the data that moves the Dow and how to prepare for it Some of the biggest intraday moves come with macroeconomic data releases and central bank decisions. Within seconds…
- A Trading Journal That Teaches: Structure, Tags and Review A trading journal is a trader's cheapest and most effective development tool – and the most often neglected. Most…
- Replay training: how to practise reading the market outside the session An athlete doesn't train only during matches, and a pilot spends hundreds of hours in a simulator. Traders often learn only during the session, with…
- How to read charts from a real market This series has no “how it should look” drawings. Every example is a real Dow Jones futures (MYM) session: recordings…
- Absorption on a real market: a round-number level Absorption is aggression that doesn't move price. A passive participant takes every market order at a given level. In theory it's simple. On…
- The jobs report: minute by minute Macro data releases are the fastest minutes in the market. This is what MYM looked like around the September NFP (non-farm payrolls) report on October 2…
Frequently asked questions
What is order flow?
The flow of orders: a record of how many contracts were bought and sold aggressively at each price level. It shows who is taking the initiative, which you cannot see on a candlestick chart alone.
How is order flow different from technical analysis?
Technical analysis describes the shape of price (patterns, indicators). Order flow looks at the trades and orders that create that price: buy and sell volume, delta, liquidity in the order book.
Does order flow work on CFDs and forex?
A market-maker CFD has no central order book – you only see the broker's quotes and its tick volume. Real order flow requires an exchange-traded market, such as CME futures, and paid trade-by-trade data.
Which tools show order flow?
Most often the footprint (buy and sell volume at each level), delta and cumulative delta, the order book (DOM) and the volume profile – available on professional platforms.
Is MYM order flow suitable for beginners?
MYM is a micro Dow Jones contract (USD 0.50 per point), so the scale is smaller than the E-mini, but it is still leverage and the risk of loss. Order flow is a skill of reading the market, not a ready-made system – start with observation and replays.
♛ The Hetman Terminal is part of Club: live for Dow Jones from the Bishop plan, 6 markets (Dow Jones, S&P 500, Nasdaq, gold, crude oil, Bitcoin) and automatic detection of order flow events from the Rook plan. A session on the ♛ Hetman Index (training, simulated data) in the full panel comes with the Knight plan and above. Compare the plans →