Porous Price Action (Patchwork)
Also: patchwork, porous range, inefficient price range, patchwork zone
Visual Context Required
This concept requires chart visuals for full understanding.
Porous price action (also called "patchwork" by ICT) is a region of price delivery where consecutive candle bodies do not overlap one another — there are no body crossovers laying paint over the range — leaving the area porous (full of holes) and requiring algorithmic redelivery to fill it in. Unlike a formal Fair Value Gap (which is defined precisely by 3 candles), porous price action describes a broader zone of inefficient delivery across multiple candles where the algorithm will return to redeliver price ("patch" the holes) before committing to further directional movement. Identification rule: If you scan a segment of price action and find that candle bodies are NOT overlapping — i.e., each candle body is separated from the adjacent body with visible daylight between them — that segment is porous. Price is expected to return and redeliver through the full range, allowing high-frequency trading algorithms to "fire" in the directional bias as price redelivers through the porous zone. Patchwork is the algorithmic act of returning to and redelivering through a porous range. The price engine comes back into the porous zone, delivers both sides of the market in that range, and the zone becomes "efficient." This is not a reversal — it is a retracement within the prevailing directional move.
Identification4
- Scan a segment of price action on the relevant timeframe (15s, 1m, or 5m are most common contexts).
- If no candle body overlaps an adjacent candle body — each body has a gap of untraded price above or below it — the range is porous.
- Porous ranges are most significant when they form during a directional impulse move.
- A single indecisive candle sandwiched between two large opposite-body candles where all three bodies are separated is the simplest form (equivalent to a volume imbalance / FVG but without the 3-candle technical criteria being met precisely).
Entry3
- Do not enter during the porous zone itself — wait for price to return (patchwork) to the zone.
- When price re-enters the porous zone from the direction of the bias, look for HFT algorithm entries (shorts firing repeatedly into a premium porous zone; longs into a discount porous zone).
- The porous zone acts like an inefficient FVG — it will draw price back for redelivery.
Stop1
- Beyond the far boundary of the porous zone (the limit of the range where no redelivery has occurred).
Target3
- The consequent encroachment (midpoint) of the porous zone on the first partial.
- The far boundary of the porous range as the full target.
- Adjacent liquidity pools (smooth lows / relative equal lows below for bearish; equal highs above for bullish) as extended target once zone is patched.
Invalidation2
- Once price re-enters the porous zone and bodies overlap, redelivering through the full range: zone is patched and concept is satisfied.
- If porous zone occurs in a directionless consolidation context, it may have reduced significance.
Inferred Conditions (Unvalidated)
- Porous price action most commonly forms on the 15-second or 1-minute chart during the morning session when price is moving fast and leaving gaps between candle bodies.
- ICT notes that high-frequency trading algorithms operate specifically to exploit porous zones — they fire short (or long) repeatedly as price redelivers through the range.
- The concept is related to but distinct from a formal FVG: a porous zone may span many candles and not meet the strict 3-candle FVG criterion, but the redelivery expectation is the same.
ICT Quotes
"in need of patchwork. I've already let the cat out of the bag and last last week stream, but this is called Patrick, where the price engine will come back up and redeliver into that area, allowing for an efficient, not inefficient, and inefficient delivery of price. So when the market trades in there, high frequency trading algorithms will work with this area and fire in shorts, shorts, shorts, shorts targeting this low."
"All this is porous price action. I'll explain that in a second... this candle sticks close on this black, down closed candle. This candle here has a little bit of a wick, but there's no bodies overlapping and touching between the two... this small little pocket of inefficiency. It's just really porous. There's no There's no rhyme or reason as to why you could look at that with any retail perspective and say this is something that would constitute a buy or sell. But I'm telling you that that is in need of patchwork."
"the buy side's taken, drops down this little area of porous price action. There isn't bodies laying over top. Okay, between this candlestick here and this candlestick, these are two very broad candlestick bodies in between them."
Timeframes
Version History1 version
ICT YT - 2024-09-11 - ICT 2024 Mentorship - Lecture 25.srt
"in need of patchwork. I've already let the cat out of the bag and last last week stream, but this is called Patrick, where the price engine will come back up and redeliver into that area, allowing for…"
First observed definition. Note: transcript renders the concept name as 'Patrick' — contextual reading strongly indicates this is 'patchwork' (ICT says 'in need of patchwork' two lines earlier at 00:47:15, and 'Patrick' is the transcription of the word 'patchwork' spoken quickly). The Lecture 26 transcript also renders it as 'Patrick' at 04:54:55.
Notes
Transcription note: In both Lecture 25 and Lecture 26, the auto-transcript renders ICT's term as "Patrick" (a person's name). The surrounding context makes clear this is "patchwork" — the very sentence prior says "in need of patchwork" and the concept description ("the price engine will come back up and redeliver into that area") is semantically consistent with filling in holes (patching). This concept was apparently introduced in a lecture prior to Lecture 25 ("I've already let the cat out of the bag last week"), placing its first mention in approximately Lecture 23-24 timeframe. Relationship to FVG: Porous price action is a broader, more descriptive concept than a strict FVG. A formal FVG requires exactly 3 candles with a specific relationship between their boundaries. Porous price action describes any range where candle bodies fail to overlap — it can encompass multiple candles and may contain embedded FVGs. Both share the expectation of algorithmic redelivery. Relationship to volume imbalance: A volume imbalance (per ICT's teaching) is the gap between two candle bodies (close of one to open of the next) on the same timeframe. Porous price action is the broader zone containing such imbalances.
Asymmetry Notes
Fully symmetrical. A bearish porous zone (formed during a sell-side impulse, with downward-biased candles leaving gaps between bodies) draws price back up to redeliver buy-side liquidity. A bullish porous zone (formed during a buy-side impulse) draws price back down to redeliver sell-side liquidity. The HFT algorithm fires in the direction of the original impulse (shorts in a bearish porous zone, longs in a bullish porous zone) as price redelivers through the zone on the retracement.