Stop run (stop hunt)
A stop run is a price move through a level where stop orders are likely to be clustered, such as a swing high or low or the prior session's extreme, which triggers those stops and adds a burst of market orders to the move. 'Stop hunt' describes the same event with a claim that someone pushed price there on purpose, a claim that market data cannot verify.
Senzoukria · Glossary · Updated September 2026
Why stops cluster and why they are invisible
Stops tend to gather where many traders see the same invalidation point: just beyond a swing high or low, a round number, the prior day's high or low, the overnight range. Stop orders are not displayed in the order book, at the broker or at the exchange, so the DOM cannot show them. They become visible only when triggered, as market orders that print on the tape all at once.
The signature of a run
- Price trades through the level and the tape accelerates: a burst of same-side aggressive prints, often larger than the recent average.
- Several price levels are consumed in a fraction of a second, which is a liquidity sweep in mechanical terms.
- Delta jumps in the direction of the run, driven by the triggered orders.
- What follows decides the reading: acceptance beyond the level means continuation, a quick return inside means the run found no follow-through.
A worked example
The prior session's high is 5,012.00. Price trades up to it, then through: within one and a half seconds, about 1,100 contracts of aggressive buying print between 5,012.25 and 5,013.50, against a recent pace of about 80 contracts a second. In case one, buyers keep lifting offers above 5,013.50 and value starts to build there: the run became initiative. In case two, the offers above absorb the burst, delta at the high is strongly positive while the bar closes back below 5,012.00, and two minutes later price trades 5,010.00: the buyers who were stopped in, or who chased the breakout, are now trapped.
In Senzoukria
The heatmap's Liquidity lens records a 'Sweep candidate' when trades on the same aggressor side walk through adjacent price levels quickly, by default at least three levels within 250 milliseconds and above the minimum detected volume. Likely stop locations are marked by the Prior Session H/L/C, Overnight High/Low, Prior Week High/Low and Swing High/Low overlays; Swing High/Low only marks a pivot once the bars that confirm it exist. The Break of Structure marker requires a close beyond the last confirmed swing; its own definition notes that a high which pierces and comes back is not a break of structure but a liquidity take. Tape Speed and Big Trades show the burst itself.
Related
- Liquidity sweep
- Trapped traders
- Stop-loss order
- Buy-side and sell-side liquidity
- Break of Structure indicator
- Prior session levels
In the same section
- Short covering
- Wyckoff spring
- Stop-limit order
- Sticky strike vs sticky delta
- Static drawdown
- Stopping volume
- Stacked imbalances
- Straddle
This page in other languages
Frequently asked questions
- Is a stop run the same as a stop hunt?
- They describe the same price action. 'Stop run' is the observation that stops were triggered; 'stop hunt' adds the claim that a participant deliberately drove price there to trigger them. Intent is not in market data, so the observation is what can be traded and tested.
- Does a stop run always reverse?
- No. Triggered stops add fuel in the direction of the move, and if new buyers or sellers accept the prices beyond the level, the run turns into continuation. Reversals happen when the burst is absorbed and price returns inside the prior range; the evidence is in what follows the run, not in the run itself.