Undoubted reference for the technical analysis lovers. But serious work very well popularized by Steve Nison. Japanese candlesticks reveal better than any other chart or curve the trend of a market, whatever it is. Indeed a candlestick by itself can instantly view the history of a trading period which may vary at the discretion of the investor (in mn for traders, 1 day, 1 week, 1 month, 1 year etc ... ) depending on the speculative level sought. This simple little figure contains in itself a lot of valuable information that a curve does not: opening and closing (the body of the candlestick) above and below (the wicks of the candlestick), increase (white candlestick) , down (black candlestick), rating gaps. The very shape of the candlestick, with all the possibilities (body size and the wick). All this is important. More importantly, the combination of several successive candlesticks. With poetic names, images or metaphors as only our Asian friends know create: Morning Star, Evening Star, the 3 mountains and three rivers, three white soldiers, and many others ... We see "black crows" darken the horizon of "hollow frying pan" promise better days. Finally candlesticks are associated with other methods of technical analysis (moving averages, RSI, Stochastic, Momentum ...) that confirm the strength of the trend. Financial markets are now so complex that few extra weapons are not too many. I do not know what fiscal said: "It's when the tide goes out that you who were swimming naked." To meditate. Good luck. LUDI