What this chart is showing you
The Dealer Flow Tape tracks how much the market makers (called 'dealers') have been buying or selling the underlying stock since today's market open.
Green line going up: dealers have been net BUYING. That usually pushes the stock up.
Red line going down: dealers have been net SELLING. That usually pushes the stock down.
Think of dealers as the bookies of the options market. When traders buy a lot of calls, the dealers selling those calls hedge themselves by buying the stock. When traders buy puts, dealers hedge by selling the stock. The tape shows the running total of that hedging activity for today.
How to read the line
Look at where the line is, not just where it is going.
If the line is high and green, dealers have been buying all day. Their position is now loaded up. Pushing the stock higher will not make them buy more, so the day usually quiets down.
If the line is low and red, dealers have been selling all day. Pushing the stock lower makes them sell MORE (because their options exposure keeps growing). This is when things get nasty. Watch for downside follow-through.
Look at the slope at the right edge.
A steep right-edge slope means the latest poll added a lot of new dealer flow. Something just happened.
A flat right-edge slope means the chain has gone quiet. The market is taking a breath.
The LIVE / STALE badge
LIVE means the chart is updating in real time via a connection to the backend.
STALE means the connection dropped and what you are seeing is old. Refresh the page or wait for it to reconnect.
How it pairs with the regular GEX chart
The regular GEX chart tells you 'if the stock moves $1 from here, how much will dealers have to hedge?' That is the POTENTIAL pressure.
The Dealer Flow Tape tells you 'how much have dealers already had to hedge today?' That is the ACTUAL pressure that has been happening.
Read them together:
Positive GEX day plus rising green tape: dealers are buying into a regime that suppresses further buying. Quiet afternoon likely.
Negative GEX day plus falling red tape: dealers are selling into a regime that amplifies more selling. This is the danger setup. Take it seriously.
Why it resets every morning
The cumulative resets to zero at the market open. You are always seeing TODAY's activity, not yesterday's leftover.
What the chart cannot tell you
The tape updates each polling cycle (usually 5 to 15 minutes). It misses what happens between polls. If a big trade hits at 10:32 and the next poll is at 10:35, you see the impact at 10:35, not the moment it occurred.