A trend gaps forward. A pullback candle tries to erase that gap — and fails to close it completely. The gap surviving the pullback is read as proof the trend still has conviction behind it.
The Sakata ledgers named this shape after a tasuki, the cord used to tie back a kimono's sleeves — the third candle ties back into the gap without ever quite closing it.
Unlike doji or engulfing shapes, a price gap doesn't need a candle body to be visible — bar charts show this pattern's core logic clearly.
Steve Nison's 1991 catalog carries across both the tasuki gap and its rarer cousin, side-by-side white lines — noting the downside version is seen so rarely it's almost a curiosity.
Traders today use it as one more vote for continuation when a pullback tests a gap and can't quite fill it.
A long candle, then a second same-direction candle gapping away from the first. A third candle, opposite color, opens inside the second candle's body and closes inside the gap — but not through it.
A gap-up in an uptrend that survives a red pullback candle is the upside tasuki gap. A gap-down in a downtrend that survives a green pullback candle is the downside tasuki gap — the identical logic, downward.
Side-by-side white lines skip the pullback candle entirely: a second white candle of similar size gaps away and opens near the first white candle's open — two candles standing side by side across the gap, both agreeing.
Across the 2020–2021 advance, several up-gaps were tested by a red pullback candle that closed inside the gap rather than through it, before the climb resumed.
During the 2022 bear market, several down-gaps were tested by a green bounce candle that closed inside the gap rather than through it, before the decline continued.
The downside version in particular is uncommon enough across real charts that this lesson teaches it schematically rather than forcing a specific chart to fit it — consistent with how this course treats every genuinely rare shape.
In an uptrend, a green candle gaps up from the prior one. A red candle then opens inside that second candle's body and closes inside the gap, without filling it. What is this?
The same setup begins, but the red pullback candle closes all the way through the gap, back into the first candle's body. Is this still a valid tasuki gap?
A green candle gaps up from the prior green candle, and instead of a pullback, a second green candle of similar size prints right beside it, opening near the same level. What is this?
A gap, and the candle that tests it, watched tick by tick on the left — and the mark it leaves in the ledger on the right. Held upward, held downward — and the test that failed.
A gap, and a candle testing it. Judge exactly where the third candle's close lands — then call it: continuation (gap held), pass, or reversal (gap filled).
The classic error is eyeballing "close enough" instead of checking the exact price. The discipline is mechanical: mark the precise edge of the gap, and judge the pullback candle's close against that exact line, not a rough impression.
From a single doji to a gap that survives its own test, thirty foundations now cover the candlestick's complete working vocabulary — single candles, pairs, trios, reversals, continuations, and the honest limits of each. The chart's shapes are now yours to read. Next: the larger shapes those candles draw together.
«What is bent will straighten again.»