One of Bullish’s unique value propositions is the Order Book Depth, which you will find next to the Price Chart on the Trade screen.
Overview of the Depth Chart
The Depth Chart reflects market depth in real-time. Our Depth Chart shows the depth of the Bullish Order Book, which combines the functionalities of an automated market maker (AMM), typically found in Decentralized Finance (DeFi), and a central limit order book.
At its core, the Bullish AMM uses a mathematical formula to price its assets. This integration provides stability across variable market conditions. Learn more about Automated Market Making at Bullish.
Components of the Depth Chart
Bids / Buyers
The left (green) side of the chart shows the cumulative quantity of all buy orders placed on Bullish at a given price point from the given price up to and including the best bid.
Offers / Sellers
The right (red) side of the chart shows the cumulative value of the sell orders placed on Bullish at a given price point from the given price down to and including the best offer.
Horizontal Axis
This axis represents the price points at which buy and sell orders are placed for a particular market.
Vertical Axis
The vertical axes on both sides of the chart represent the total volume that can be bought or sold, for the corresponding price.
Price range
You can use the “+” and “-” buttons at the top of the chart to shorten or widen the price range displayed. You can also use your mouse or trackpad scrolling functionality to zoom in and out.
Market Depth Indicator
Hover over the depth chart to see the Market Depth Indicator.
Understanding the Market Depth Indicator
The Market Depth Indicator shows how much quantity can be bought or sold at the selected price at that instant in time, and the cost of executing the order if buying, or proceeds if selling. Note that other market participants are constantly buying and selling on the same market, which can affect the values actually available by the time any order you send is received.
Reading the Market Depth Indicator (Bids)
Hovering over the green bid side of the chart in the example above indicates that if a customer wants to sell around 137.30 BTC immediately to the bids shown, the BTC/USDC market price would then move down to 29,025 USDC, and the customer would receive just over 4.006m USDC.
Reading the Market Depth Indicator (Offers)
Similarly, if a customer buys 100.67 BTC immediately from the offers shown, the BTC/USD market price would move up to 29,412 USDC, and the customer would need to pay approximately 2.959m USDC.
Crossed Order Book
You may occasionally see a crossed order book, meaning that the best bid has a higher or equal price to the best offer. This is common in traditional markets during auction phases, but is not as common in cryptocurrency markets. Bullish uses AMM Instructions to provide some of the liquidity, which are by definition market makers and cannot cross against each other. If you see this happen it simply means that there is a very good price available for anyone who wants to buy or sell. The opportunity does not usually last for very long.
Placing limit and stop-limit orders
You can use the Depth Chart to indicate a specific price point at which you would like to place a limit or stop-limit order.
Once you have selected an order type, simply hover over either side of the chart based on the order you wish to place (buy or sell) and choose a specific price from the chart. This will automatically fill your limit price in your order.