Forex guide · 7 min read · Updated 8 October 2026

Liquidity sweeps explained

What a liquidity sweep (stop hunt) is, and the tells that separate a sweep you can trade from a breakout you shouldn’t fade, with two real GBPUSD days.

A liquidity sweep (or stop hunt) is when price pushes just past an obvious high or low, triggers the stop orders resting there, then turns back. Those stops give larger players the orders they need to fill their own positions the other way.

The problem: a breakout starts in exactly the same way. Fading a breakout is how most range traders lose. These are the tells we use, learned from real charts.

Signs of a sweep you can trade

• A decisive flush, not a nibble. Price runs 5 pips or more past the level in one push, actually taking the stops.
• A quick return. Price closes back inside the range within a few candles, or by the session open.
• A higher low (or lower high). When the next session tests the area again, it can’t beat the sweep’s extreme.
• A strong candle the other way, then a reclaim of the middle of the range.

Signs of a breakout to leave alone

• Nibbling. Price pokes the level by a pip or two, again and again. The stops are still there, and every touch weakens the level.
• New extremes. The next push goes beyond the first sweep’s extreme.
• Acceptance. Candles keep closing beyond the level.
• The retest holds. Price comes back to the broken level from the other side and is rejected. Old support becomes resistance.

Two real GBPUSD days

6 October 2026: a sweep (trade day)

Asia box 1.32134 to 1.32319 (18.5 pips). At Frankfurt, price flushed 11 pips through the low to 1.32024 and even sat below it for 40 minutes. By 07:45 it was back inside. At London, the 08:05 dip only reached 1.32120, a higher low than the flush. A strong bullish candle at 08:10 confirmed it and price reached the Asia high by 08:40. See the full day.

7 October 2026: a breakout (no trade day)

Asia box 1.32463 to 1.32718 (25.5 pips). Frankfurt only nibbled the low by 1 to 3 pips, again and again. The bounce stalled below the middle of the box. London pushed past Frankfurt’s low, broke 10 pips through at 08:50, and the return to the old low at 09:00 was rejected from below. Price fell about 50 pips by the afternoon. See the full day.

What doesn’t decide it

On both days price drifted into the level before the sweep, so the approach on its own told us little. And closes beyond the level during Frankfurt didn’t kill the trade on 6 October, because London then held the higher low. Judge the whole sequence, not one candle.

The Today page reads these tells live every morning and gives an 08:00 lean, and our daily GBPUSD analysis records every day.