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Glossary / Market structure

Volatility

Definition

How much price moves over a given period.

Why it matters

Position size should scale inversely with volatility. Journaling ATR at entry shows whether your losses cluster on high-volatility days.

Example

If ATR on your instrument doubles from 8 points to 16, the same 2-point stop is now four times more likely to be hit - size must halve to keep dollar risk constant.

How to track it in a journal

TradeStack calculates the core performance numbers — win rate, average win and loss, profit factor, expectancy, drawdown and consistency — automatically from imported trades, so volatility stops being something you estimate and becomes something you read.

Related terms

Slippage
The difference between your expected fill price and the price you actually get.
Spread
The gap between the best bid and the best ask.
Liquidity
How much size a market can absorb without moving price.
ATR (Average True Range)
The average size of a bar's full range over a lookback period.

Keep reading

Trading journal guides
Expectancy, profit factor, drawdown, backtesting and the PDT rule.
Free trading calculators
Position size, risk-reward, expectancy and options profit.
Expectancy calculator
Expected profit per trade from your own numbers.
Broker CSV export guides
Step-by-step exports for Tradovate, NinjaTrader, IBKR and more.
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